Time to Think - Medical Leadership

If that is what I can achieve in five minutes, imagine what I can do in an hour."

Above quote - participant of my recent workshop 'Leadership and being a role model: decision making and taking responsibility' for the FMLM. If you have attended one of my workshops, you will be aware that I almost always use Nancy Kline's 'Thinking Partnerships' model in workshops. This technique gives people the opportunity to receive and give uninterrupted thinking time, a rarity. These workshop moments (usually 5minutes) are welcomed, although the technique can take some getting used to. It is probably because our access to time to think is rapidly shrinking, partly because of the increased demands and expectations placed on us, but partly because technology has exposed us to being constantly connected so we don't switch off, literally. I see this as a problem, not only for us in general, but in particular for our leadership practice. The pace of work and pressures placed on people force us to do more, work harder and cram in extra hours. We actually don't have time to think and whilst we can achieve a lot of activity, is it productive and sustainable? Only through stopping, reflecting and gaining perspective can we establish if we are being productive and supporting those around us. Reflection and gaining perspective are crucial to leadership practice - as one of my recent Doctors who completed a coaching programme with me highlighted. He is an incredibly busy man balancing his clinical commitments against his leadership priorities and a couple of his learning points were:

1. Improved approach to prioritising what is important and what isn't.
2. Understanding that Leadership is often more about influencing others rather than telling them what to do.

He couldn't have worked on these (and other areas) without time to think and his pre-coaching and post-coaching questionnaire highlighted his progress. Despite an incredibly turbulent year, he feels more resilient than a year ago because he has had time to think things through.

We need to get back into the habit of thinking well for ourselves.

A decent way to invest in your leadership practice would be to attend the Leaders in Healthcare conference 31.10.16 to 2.11.16 Liverpool. I and other FMLM Coaches will be there and are running an exciting session on day one called 'Coaching for leaders: A worthwhile investment?' This will be highly interactive and you will have the chance to access learning through 8 executive coaches on a range of subjects. I'll be there on my table titled Time Management.

If you would like time to think about your leadership development, call me on 0754 0593476 or email me at alexishutson@yahoo.com