Thought Leadership
Hunter Healthcare is committed to equality, diversity and inclusion and to the NHS chair and non-executive director community. As part of that commitment, we are working with the Disabled NHS Directors Network (DNDN) on a research project to gain a better understanding of the experience of all
disabled chairs and non-executive directors (NEDs) in the NHS.
The latest statistics tell us that less than 4% of board members self-declare and 58% of boards do not have any disabled members. No-one disputes, therefore, that disabled people are under-represented on NHS boards and it has been this way for some time, despite the 2018 publication of the Holmes review into opening up public appointments to disabled people and the implementation of the Workforce Disability Workforce Equality Standard (WDES) in 2019.
We want to hear first-hand from disabled chairs and NEDs about their experience so we and others can learn from it and make things better for them, their colleagues and the next generations of disabled chairs and NEDs. We have set up an on-line questionnaire, in which disabled chairs and NEDs are invited to share their views and experience confidentially and with as much anonymity as they wish. The questionnaire will take as little as a few minutes to complete.
We would be grateful if you would share this with your chair and NED colleagues and encourage those who consider themselves to be disabled, whether or not you know about their disability, to participate.
Please complete the questionnaire by 31 July 2023. If you experience any difficulty accessing it please contact hhoward@hunter-healthcare.com.
To find out more about DNDN please contact kate.smyth@lthtr.nhs.uk.
The medical director role is one of the most varied in NHS management and reflects the breadth of organisational structures across the health sector. It is also of great significance for the NHS as it looks towards its next generation of leaders.
This report combines the results of a joint HSJ Hunter Healthcare survey of medical directors, including more than 50 conversations with medical directors working across acute, community and mental health organisations of varying size throughout the UK.
Our focus was to begin to understand the common elements that make a top medical director, to gain insight into the everyday pressures these individuals face and ask how we might support the next generation of medical leaders. We found the role is often shaped by the demands of the organisation. A medical director is much more than just a clinically informed voice on the board, whose role is to bring the front line of healthcare service into the boardroom. They provide key pointers for the strategic direction of the trust, particularly with regard to clinical practice, while communicating the strategic vision to frontline staff.
The best medical directors combine several qualities – personal resilience, integrity, honesty, openness and the ability to communicate effectively with a wide range of people from staff to patients and the public. They use these qualities to ensure that staff are engaged in the organisation’s vision and are able to create a culture of improvement.
However, given the importance of the role, there are impediments to the development of the next generation of medical directors. The majority of the medical directors we spoke to had set out on their careers with the aim of developing their clinical expertise. They become consultants within a given specialty, and often find themselves on the path towards becoming a medical director without having deliberately taken it. The route to being appointed on the board is not always actively pursued, with many of those interviewed commenting that opportunities simply arose or even that they fell into a particular role having being asked to help out.
Our survey found that 42 per cent of medical directors are in the job for between five and 10 years; 46 per cent last between two and five years. Although these figures could be seen as encouraging, more can be done to ensure the next generation of medical directors is primed to step into the role and prepared to stay there.
Read more here: What Makes A Top Medical Director Report – Hunter Healthcare