Abstract

Good medical leadership has been shown to improve patient care¹ and comprises an increasing part of a doctor’s professional duty.² Standards of medical leadership have been established,³ however, research on the role of consultants’ experiences in learning to lead is limited. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with six consultants, who had specific leadership roles in order to explore their leadership learning experiences. Each hour-long interview was recorded and the data analysed according to Charmaz’s⁴ constructivist grounded theory.

Four categories emerged from the interviews:

• Learning theoretical knowledge

• Learning through doing the job including with others

• Learning through reflection

• Timing

The largest contributor to leadership learning was found to be ‘learning through doing the job including with others’representing the non-formal aspect of learning. However, such non-formal learning was shown to only be realised in combination with ‘learning through reflection’and ‘learning theoretical knowledge’.

A conclusion of the research is that these three learning modalities do not necessarily operate in isolation; rather, these three methods of learning function simultaneously and often symbiotically. Furthermore, ‘timing’ was shown to be an environmental aspect of learning that cut across and affected each learning style. These findings demonstrate the subtle, complex and often multi-faceted nature of both education and leadership. The limitations of the scale and qualitative nature of the research are considered, alongside personal reflections and implications for future research.