HLSC605 - Leadership in Health Care

Year

Credit points

Campus offering

Prerequisites

Teaching organisation

Unit rationale, description and aim

Leaders in healthcare must develop sound knowledge and skill in leading service transformation through transformation of self and others. Today's leaders require personal leadership characteristics as well as the ability to facilitate others to achieve their potential through role modelling, supporting and empowering. This unit is necessary for future leaders who can lead others in planning, implementing and evaluating strategies and tools designed to resolve complex problems and optimise health for diverse population communities such as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, among others, through innovative health administration practices that shape and improve healthcare systems.

The aim of this unit is to introduce students to contemporary theory-based leadership practices in order to develop knowledge and skill necessary for leading health service transformation.

Learning outcomes

To successfully complete this unit you will be able to demonstrate you have achieved the learning outcomes (LO) detailed in the below table.

Each outcome is informed by a number of graduate capabilities (GC) to ensure your work in this, and every unit, is part of a larger goal of graduating from ACU with the attributes of insight, empathy, imagination and impact.

Explore the graduate capabilities.

On successful completion of this unit, students should be able to:

LO1 - explain how the effective application of leadership frameworks/theory/principles can transform self and engage others (GA1, GA2, GA4)

LO2 - evaluate contemporary challenges and management approaches for healthcare leaders in facilitating service transformation with a person/family-centred and culturally safe focus in healthcare delivery that incorporates equity and diversity (GA1, GA2, GA3, GA4)

LO3 - generate leadership strategies that empower self and others to drive ethical innovation and changes that contribute towards service transformation through cross-sectoral collaborative action. (GA1, GA2, GA3, GA4, GA5, GA6, GA9). 

Graduate attributes

GA1 - demonstrate respect for the dignity of each individual and for human diversity 

GA2 - recognise their responsibility to the common good, the environment and society 

GA3 - apply ethical perspectives in informed decision making

GA4 - think critically and reflectively 

GA5 - demonstrate values, knowledge, skills and attitudes appropriate to the discipline and/or profession 

GA6 - solve problems in a variety of settings taking local and international perspectives into account

GA9 - demonstrate effective communication in oral and written English language and visual media 

Content

• Leadership frameworks/theories/models to guide practice improvement, including: 
• leadership theories/models 
• application of leadership theories/models to the health care environment 

• Leadership strategies for practice improvement  
• components of effective and ethical leadership 
• influence of leadership in contemporary health care organisations including 
• socio-political  
• legal 
• economic 
• technological influences 

• The person as health care focus  
• diverse cultures, including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, spiritual backgrounds, values, beliefs, education, economic background 
• human flourishing 
• person/family-centred care – multiple dimensions 
• legal, ethical and communication aspects of relational care 
• issues of technology and information systems use in person-centred care  

• Leadership strategies for organisational innovation and change 
• models/theories of change 
• enablers/resistance/barriers to change 
• creating climate for innovation and change 
• building political and organisational support for change 
• organisational/practice policy development 
• staff development and education 

• Leadership strategies from a global perspective 
• systems thinking 
• communicating and negotiating within/across teams, services, sectors 
• engaging and enabling consumers and communities 
• building coalitions across silos, organisations and sectors 
• ethical implications of effective leadership. 

Learning and teaching strategy and rationale

This unit complies with adult learning principles in that the learning and teaching strategies will provide students with foundational leadership knowledge and skills that can be applied in the workplace. Teaching and learning strategies utilised in this unit will support students in meeting the aim and achieving the learning outcomes relevant to this unit as well as to the broader course learning outcomes.  

As postgraduate students who are already health practitioners, students will have varying experiences of leadership in the health care environment. In this unit students will have the opportunity to reflect on leadership practices and challenges, to explore issues around equity and diversity and to analyse ethical and collaborative decision making. This teaching and learning strategy will support the development of effective and ethical leadership practices which can have a significant impact on health outcomes.   

Multi-mode  

Modes of delivery in this unit include face-to-face lectures, online readings, class-based individual and group activities including discussions and debate, and self-directed learning. These modes of delivery assist students in linking theory to leadership practice and in developing shared meanings through experiential reflections, discussions and class-based debate.  

Online mode 

Modes of delivery in this unit include online lectures through the online learning platform (LEO), online readings and group activities including online discussions about leadership practices and challenges, among others, and self-directed learning. These modes of delivery assist students in linking theory to leadership practice and in developing shared meanings through online experiential reflections, discussions and online debate. 

Online learning in this unit will be supported by the provision of opportunities for students to attend online Webinars that allow synchronous exchange of information and facilitate responses to queries generated by students in relation to unit content. For those unable to participate in synchronous Webinars, recordings will be available 

Assessment strategy and rationale

In order to pass this unit, students are expected to submit three graded assessment tasks. In addition, students must achieve a cumulative grade of at least 50% across all assessments. The assessment strategy used allows for the progressive development of knowledge and skills necessary for the student to be able to consider leadership practices and challenges, evaluate ethical leadership approaches and apply effective leadership practices to improve health outcomes.  

Multi-mode  

To become an effective leader in a health care environment, the student will be supported to develop a sound theoretical basis upon which contemporary leadership approaches and challenges to effective leadership can be assessed and evaluated. Students will be further supported to collaborate with peers in developing ethical leadership strategies that can be applied within the workplace. Students will be further supported to apply their knowledge of ethical and effective leadership practices to improve health outcomes in a variety of health care settings.  

Online mode 

To become an effective leader in a health care environment, the student will be supported via the online learning platform (LEO) to develop a sound theoretical basis upon which contemporary leadership approaches and challenges to effective leadership can be assessed and evaluated.  Students will be further supported to collaborate with peers via an online medium to develop leadership strategies that can be applied in the workplace from within an ethical framework. Students will be further supported to be able to apply their knowledge of ethical and effective leadership practices to improve health outcomes in a variety of health care settings.  

Overview of assessments

Multi-mode;

Online mode

Representative texts and references

There is no required text for this unit. 

Recommended References 

Barr, J., & Dowding, L. (2016).  Leadership in health care (3rd ed.). London: Sage. 

Gopee, N., & Galloway, J. (2014). Leadership and management in health care (2nd ed.). London: Sage.  

Keyko, K. (2014). Work engagement in nursing practice: A relational ethics perspective. Nursing Ethics, 21(8), 879 – 889.  

Kouzes, J. M.. & Posner, B. Z. (2017). The leadership challenge: How to make extraordinary things happen in organizations (6th ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. 

Lussier, R. N., & Achua, C. F., (2016). Leadership theory, application & skill development (6th ed.). Boston, MA: South-Western/Cengage Learning.  

Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and practice. U.S.: Sage Publications. 

Wood, J., Zeffane, R., Fromholtz M., Weisner, R., Morrison, R., Factor, A., … & Osborn, R. (2016). Organisational behaviour: Core concepts and applications. (4th Australasian ed.). Milton, QLD: John Wiley & Sons, Australia, Ltd.