Authentic leadership at the Cleveland Clinic: psychological safety in the midst of crisis.

OBJECTIVES: The goal of this research was to examine the leadership experiences of senior leaders at the Cleveland Clinic during the recent COVID-19 pandemic crisis. A secondary goal was to examine lessons that could inform other healthcare organisations as they move into subsequent crisis situations. DESIGN: The authors examined publicly available podcast transcripts where interviewees shared their leadership experiences on the Cleveland Clinic Beyond Leadership Podcast. SETTING/PARTICIPANTS: Twenty-one publicly available qualitative transcripts were examined inductively and deductively to assess how authentic leadership principles were applied to the experiences noted. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Deductively, the four leadership behaviours of authentic leadership (ie, relational transparency, internalised moral perspectives, balanced processing of information and self-awareness) were noted in the transcripts. Inductively, the participants also identified the importance of developing an organisational culture rooted in psychological safety which allowed individuals from all levels of the organisation to voice their ideas, concerns and thoughts. As part of a psychologically safe culture, it was also important to understand the influence of hierarchy in healthcare, ways to encourage employee voice and the uniqueness of leadership during crisis. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS: We first offer insights about the importance of psychological safety, particularly during a crisis. Second, we offer a number of ways that other healthcare organisations might strive to build on their own approach to authentic leadership and develop an organisational culture built on psychological safety.

Observations from Transforming a Continuing Education programme in the COVID-19 Era and Preparing for the Future.

The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly disrupted and transformed continuing education in the health professions to be reliant on digital learning modalities. This retrospective observational study of a large, international health system's continuing education programme compares educational activities offered, participation, and learning outcomes pre- and intra-pandemic to assess the impact of digitisation advanced because of the pandemic. There was a significant increase in internet-based activities that filled the gap of cancelled or postponed live, in-person activities to keep healthcare professionals up to date in their specialities and prepared to handle the clinical and hospital demands of the pandemic. Compared to live, in-person education, virtual activities were offered in shorter increments, reached a much larger amount of participants, and were equally effective in achieving learning outcomes. Questions remain regarding business model implications to generate adequate revenues to cover costs of virtual education. Additionally, there is a general inadequacy of digital learning environments to coalesce groups and meet social needs. Regardless, the efficiencies and effectiveness of digital modalities will be a primary method of teaching healthcare professionals going forward.

Matching Allied Health Student Need with Supply: Description of a New Index

Hospitals often depend on rotating students to fulfill their educational missions, meet clinical needs, and develop a pipeline for workforce needs. Strategies to match clinical rotations offered with the hospital's hiring needs are often haphazard or even overlooked. This report proposes a new index-the HOT Index (for "Hired, Open, Trained")-to help match training with hiring of allied health students in academic medical centers. The index values generated range from 0 to 1, depending on the degree of alignment among the three variables considered. To evaluate performance of the index, data were compiled for health sciences clinical education rotations offered in three professions in the years 2017 to 2019 and for three more professions in 2019 alone. The index was assessed by application in scenarios with varying degree of mismatch among the variables of training provided, open positions, and students hired. Analysis of several professions over time confirmed the responsiveness of the HOT Index to fluctuating conditions. Based on preliminary analysis of its performance, the HOT Index appears to be responsive to matching of training and hiring in allied health programs, thereby enhancing sustainability and efficiency of allied health clinical training programs in academic medical centers. J Allied Health 2021;50(1):e23-e29.

A Perspective on the Educational "SWOT" of the Coronavirus Pandemic.

The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted clinical practice, health-care organizations, and life. In the context that "a crisis is a terrible thing to waste," as disruptive as the pandemic has been to traditional practices-both clinically and educationally-opportunities have also presented. Clinical benefits have included the propulsion of clinical innovation, including such items as the development of novel vaccines and accelerated understanding of multiplex ventilation. Approaches to educating students and other learners have also changed radically, with the suspension of live teaching in most instances and a precipitous transition to virtual instruction. This perspective considers a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) associated with the coronavirus pandemic in health care that focuses on the implications for education. Although the obvious disadvantages (weaknesses) regard the loss of face-to-face interaction with all of its consequences (eg, isolation, risks to camaraderie, loss of hands-on training opportunities, and loss of in-person celebratory events like graduations and end-of-training celebrations), there are clearly offsetting strengths. These include growing experience with virtual teaching and virtual learning strategies, the invitation to codify best virtual teaching practices, a tightening of alignment between undergraduate and graduate medical education (eg, around virtual interview strategies), and opportunities for both self-reflection and a commitment to act virtuously. On balance, the pandemic has created the opportunity, indeed the necessity, to innovate in practice and in education, making the landscape ripe for creative practice, new mastery, and the concomitant benefits to learners and to educators.