Why Leadership will Make or Break the Community Services and Health Industry

Why Leadership will Make or Break the Community Services and Health Industry

An assumption that staff have the basic skills to change to customer-service focus is a key barrier for the Community Services and Health sector.  This emerged in discussions among senior HR managers at a series of forums that we ran in Sydney and Brisbane.

The ‘new’ world of person-centred care requires a different mindset that many people do not hold innately. Almost twenty years ago, Hugh Gunz from the University of Toronto wrote a great article called Right Strategy, Wrong Managers. His core argument is that if you shift strategy, such as from government funded delivery model to person centred care, then you need managers that think in a different way.

At our breakfast functions, we discussed the leadership behaviours that are the most effective to lead the health and community services organisations into the future. A great leader was described as:

1. Energetic and passionate,
2. who take ownership and drive change,
3. through a style of trust, honesty and support but,
4. are one with the organisation’s vision and,
5. can communicate ‘the why’ to people at all levels.

 There are few industries undergoing as much change as Health and Community Services (here’s a great environmental scan from the Community Services & Health Industry Skills Council).

Strong Authentic leadership will make or break organisations over the years ahead. Organisations that don’t adapt will shut down or be merged into those that do.

Retrenchment reactions reflect sentiment

Retrenchment reactions reflect sentiment

Violent outbursts are rare at retrenchment announcement meetings, in fact I can only recall one chair being thrown in our 19 years of operation. The vast majority of people experience a mix of anger, disappointment and anxiety about the future. These emotions are usually measured and often emerge in the early part of their outplacement program.

Strong emotional outbursts, however, have escalated in the past few months. This worrying trend reflects the negative sentiment in the employment market with people being increasingly concerned about the probability of finding another job. Professionals and middle managers are particularly concerned as many companies are trimming these roles.
 
Unfortunately, there is an inverse relationship between emotions and intelligence: as emotions go up, intelligence goes down. Thus the increase in strong emotional outbursts at retrenchment announcements.

Our team of career development consultants are finding that the intensity of support during outplacement programs has increased, however, people are still finding jobs within a reasonable time frame. The jobs are there, they are just harder to find.

More than ever, now is the time to ensure retrenchment processes are handled as effectively as possible to minimise the negative impact on those effected, and those staying.