Warrior Leadership: Leading with Resilience

With the publication of this issue of the Physician Leadership Journal, the world has now been battling the coronavirus pandemic for more than a year. At no other time, as physicians and as leaders, have we in healthcare been challenged like this.

I want to start by thanking you for your leadership and the efforts of you and all of your teams and colleagues. During the past year, we have witnessed human strife like that never seen before, and through it all I have been proud to watch so many of our physician-leader colleagues recognized for the ways they are helping their organizations and their communities deal with these unfathomable events through innovative and creative leadership approaches.

“Resilience” has become a key term for leadership in the ordinary state of healthcare; however, the term seems hollow in the context of the pandemic’s magnitude. Perhaps, terms like “endurance,” “persistence,” or even “survival” may be more fitting as you continue to lead your teams through the unknown.

The lens of a physician, regardless of discipline, is essential for delivering on the outcomes entrusted to us and our organizations. Hence, in this issue, we have included a discussion article examining the importance of the training of physician leaders. The article identifies four personal qualities and four key skills that differentiate effective leaders from ineffective ones. By restructuring physician leadership education strategically around these qualities and skills, the authors claim an organization is more likely to attract and produce impactful leaders, emphasizing the value of career-long mentoring and positioning newly trained physician leaders for success over the long term.

Another discussion article examines physician leadership within the anesthesia service line and recommendations for future leadership structures.

The issue offers two research articles, one describing the importance of a leadership and management elective course in undergraduate medical education and the other examining patient-specific factors and cost in relation to postoperative acute care unit length of stay for patients undergoing major urologic procedures.

As the official journal of the American Association for Physician Leaders, the Physician Leadership Journal provides a platform for you to share your research with members throughout the world.

I want to end this piece as I began, with a heartfelt “thank you” to our Editorial Board and to each of you. We received wonderful feedback from our readership during our recent readership survey. I have personally reviewed the feedback and each of the comments and appreciate your voice on how we can better meet your needs moving forward.

Two important themes emerged in this survey.

First, people are interested in submitting and do not know how. Our guidelines for submission are included in the journal and on the website at www.physicianleaders.org/news/author-submission-guidelines-for-the-physician-leadership-journal.

Second, readers offered some important recommendations on content and topics. We will encourage authors with expertise in these topic areas to submit to the PLJ for the benefit of our readership.

If you have an idea for publication, reach out to us and one of our Editorial Board members will mentor you through the steps.

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