Leading Cultural Change

Leadership is essential for ensuring the success and sustainability of an organization’s transformation. The physician leader is in a pivotal role in guiding the work related to cultural change. Physicians are inherently respected and trusted and can typically keep the patient at the forefront of the conversation; however, physicians also need the training, skills, personal development, and competencies to lead the work of culture change successfully. In this issue, we have compiled a series of articles that deal with this important physician leadership topic.

The first article describes a research study regarding the empowerment of teams. The authors define “empowerment” as the organizational process employees of the organization at every hierarchy are given to make decisions regarding their work assignments and responsibilities. The article examines the association between leader-member exchange (LMX) quality and a physician’s ability to empower team members at academic medical centers. The authors suggest that determining the role LMX quality plays in empowerment behavior may help develop physicians as leaders of interprofessional teams and may also help increase quality and safety in healthcare delivery. Further, physicians who have higher-quality relationships with team members allow those individuals to perform with greater autonomy and are more likely to contribute to their professional development. The study results demonstrate that relationships are essential in developing physicians as clinical leaders of interprofessional teams.

In addition, there is a field report addressing a regional approach for recruitment and retention to help manage physician workforce shortages. Intending to create a cost-efficient and sustainable regional hospital medicine model, the authors present an integrated Advanced Practice Providers and Hospitalist staffing model as an effective strategy to manage the long-term staffing crisis.

Finally, we have included an important discussion article on government policies addressing the economics and clinical effects of Electronic Health Information (EHI) systems, the impact of EHI legislation, and optimal EHI system configuration. Concerning these factors, the authors argue the importance of identifying solutions that may reduce healthcare expenditures and improve patient access to high-value healthcare.

As the official journal of the American Association for Physician Leadership, the Physician Leadership Journal provides a platform for you to share your research with members throughout the world. Now is the time to use this platform to inspire change in healthcare and improve how we deliver care to the patients, families, and communities we serve.

Please send me your thoughts at editor@physicianleaders.org. We would enjoy hearing stories about the relevance of mentorship and the methods you use to assure that you and your team are well cared for in our demanding careers.