NWAS Leadership Conference Event Report

North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014 Date: 4th September 2014 Venue: Macron Stadium, Bolton

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

CONTENTS Bob Williams: Introduction................................................................................................................... Page 4 Visual Minutes from Bob Williams' presentation.................................................................................. Page 5 Lois Burton: Leading Branding – Exploring Leadership Identity.......................................................... Page 6 Visual Minutes from Lois Burton's presentation................................................................................... Page 7 Question 1: What do you most deeply desire to contribute and create as a leader?................... Page 8 Question 2: What are the values you want to express as a leader?.............................................. Page 9 Question 3: What are your ambitions as a NWAS leader?.......................................................... Page 10 NWAS World Café – 'Going from good to great'................................................................................ Page 11 Question 1: What does great leadership look like?..................................................................... Page 12 Question 2: How could we support our leaders to become great?............................................ Page 14 Question 3: What makes a great NWAS leader?......................................................................... Page 16 Question 4: How can you support the organisation's culture and values in your leadership role.............................................................................................. Page 18 Professor Keith Grint: Wicked Problems & Clumsy Solutions – The Role of Leadership.................. Page 20 Visual Minutes from Professor Keith Grint's presentation.................................................................. Page 21 Feedback............................................................................................................................................ Page 22 PAGE

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

INTRODUCTION I was delighted to be able to host the first NWAS Leadership event on 4th September. Leadership and culture change have become increasingly important and eminent in the national thinking behind organisational change and strategic delivery. The Care Quality Commission has included ‘well led’ as one of the core 5 areas of accountability when reviewing organisations and both Monitor and the Trust Development Agency have reiterated on many occasions their belief that it is at the heart of being a successful organisation.

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

More importantly for me though, it is about doing what is right.

Not just delivering organisational requirements, but ensuring that patients get the best possible care and our staff are engaged, well-led and managed. This leadership event allowed NWAS to clearly set out our expectations of how leadership should be developed and embedded going forward. The interaction on the day showed there is a real willingness to change the style and behaviours. It is imperative that we follow through on the themes expressed here and support each other in progressing a more engaged and coaching leadership framework for NWAS. Bob Williams Chief Executive, North West Ambulance Service NHS Trust

Visual Minutes: North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

© SCARLET DESIGN 2014. MAPS:WWW.FRANOHARA.COM

4th September 2014, Macron Stadium

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

Visual Minutes: North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

© SCARLET DESIGN 2014. MAPS:WWW.FRANOHARA.COM

4th September 2014, Macron Stadium

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

LEADING BRANDING – EXPLORING LEADERSHIP IDENTITY Lois Burton is an innovative and progressive leadership consultant and coach whose career over the last 20 years has included work with many of the most complex issues for individuals and organisations.

Lois’s session, ‘Exploring Leadership Identity’, set out to answer the question ‘what is leadership identity and why is it important?’ Delegates were encouraged to consider what they most deeply wanted to contribute as a leader within NWAS along with what their most deeply held values are as leaders and how they want to express these.

The questions were designed to draw out individual’s sense of purpose and increase self-awareness to understand both what

their values are and how they can be expressed within the organisation.The emphasis was very much on the organisation not individuals as the end point; however, the session highlighted how the alignment of personal purpose and values to that of the organisation is key to organisational success.

Input from delegates into the sessions questions have been incorporated within the report. The responses here reflect a flavour of the thoughts from the day.

In a defining point to her presentation Lois discussed how exploring leadership identity “is not about a quest for perfection – it is about doing your best and not being afraid to make the odd mistake. The best role models do make mistakes, the best leaders do make mistakes – the important thing is not letting the mistakes define you, keep trying, keep moving forward, keep striving for the best and you will be a truly “great” leader.”

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

Patient Care Be supportive.

A constructive, engaged, motivated, innovative workforce who are involved and support the same values.

Deliver to the best standard. Make this a great place to work.

Creation of patientcentred pathways.

Removal of risk over attitude.

Be a positive and approachable leader.

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Maintain optimism, professionalism and build positive internal and external working relationships.

To bring about change to improve patient outcome.

Make a difference.

Nurture staff. Be a positive role model.

Be proactive.

Allow freedom to lead.

Be seen to act in the way I expect my teams to act.

This diagram features a selection of answers from the day North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

Create a team ethos and be an organisation that others want to be like.

Allow opportunities to progress.

Be safe, effective and patientfocussed.

Deliver the best care within the envelope.

Be innovative & challenging.

Inspire belief.

Instil in the team the sense of purpose to take greater ownership of their actions.

Patient Care

Fairness Honesty

Listen

Allow people to make mistakes

Support

Motivation

Ownership

Selflessness

Integrity

Ambition

Passion

Respect

Humility PAGE

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This diagram features a selection of answers from the day North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

Patient Care Maintain and achieve high clinical and performance standards.

Have a happy, healthy and confident workforce.

To be associated with an organisation that delivers on its promises.

To ensure sustainability of the Service through developing a culture of ownership, responsibility and innovation through combining diverse values to create a shared purpose and goal.

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Reinforce underlying values of the organisation and create a plan to implement at every opportunity.

Review and improve current practice. Be effective and committed as an individual and as a leader.

Be the person who always delivers and sets that example.

Keep positive. Lead from the front in assisting the change of culture throughout the Service.

Provide a quality patient service to the NW population.

This diagram features a selection of answers from the day North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

Improve patient care and job satisfaction for all staff.

That staff want to come to work and take pride in providing the best service they can.

Have an environment and culture where development, coaching, mentoring and emotional intelligence are present at all times.

Create opportunities for the team to develop a shared culture of support and development.

Bring through other leaders, developing potential to ensure the best delivery of patient care.

World Café: North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

© SCARLET DESIGN 2014. MAPS:WWW.FRANOHARA.COM

4th September 2014, Macron Stadium

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

Question 1: What does great leadership look like?

• Happy to challenge and be challenged

• Adaptable to situations

• Credible

• Effective

• Authentic

• Drive

• Empowering

• Trusting

• Accountable

• Innovative

• Prepared to go the extra mile

• Removes barriers to progress!

• Reliable

• Communicate!

• Engaging

• Respect

• Inspiring

• Energy

• Brave

• Courage & conviction

• Brave enough to say ‘no’

• Focused vision & direction

• Everyone taking responsibility

• Positive attitude

• Direction & vision

• Approachable

• Looking to the future

• Team, task, individual!

• Talk the talk & walk the walk!

• Team player

• Listen/learn/develop/review

• Self awareness

• Two-way process

• Personal integrity

• Empower to make decisions

• Self belief

• Responsible & accountable

• Competent in field

• Visibility

"prepared to go the extra mile"

• Lead by example

"communication"

"team, task, individual!"

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

Question 2: How could we support our leaders to improve and become great?

• Actively removing barriers to empower leaders

• Share positivity

• Set a clear agenda and consistent message

• Coaching culture

• Feedback. Recognise success and encourage challenge

• Learning environment

• Take calculated risks • Having confidence in your own abilities & in others • Ensuring patients are at the heart of everything we do

• Challenge / stop / tackle any obstructive and negative behaviours

• Challenge the norm • Walk the walk not just talk the talk • Provide opportunities to learn from others • Honest feedback • Support innovative behaviour • Engage two way process

• Accountability at all levels

• Visibility

• Challenging behaviours

• Engaging with staff

• Not always making reactive decisions

• Creating time and opportunity

• Greater discussion of solutions – not problems • Support people through change • Educate managers

• Taking responsibility • Stop silo working, involve people it effects • Build relationships with teams • Shared sense of purpose

• Time to reflect

• Commitment to tackle the ‘Elephants in the room’

• Actively working in cross directorate groups to set objectives

• Be proactive – don’t just wait to be told

• Communication

• Engage in the process and deliver the agenda (bubble) • Recognise and develop talent • Systems in place to ensure leaders of tomorrow can develop

• Create capacity • Wider NHS networking • Sharing best practice

"ensuring patients are at the heart of everything we do."

• Tackle negative Nora’s PAGE

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

Question 3: What makes a great NWAS leader?

• Have trust and confidence

• Visionary but not blinkered

• Adaptability

• Confidence in strategy and direction

• Look after and listen to your staff and they will deliver! (reciprocal)

• Integrity

• Support staff to reach their potential

• Confidence to lead

• Acknowledging how good an organisation we are.

• Effective and productive

• Understanding their environment • Able to set clear boundaries and expectations • Motivational • Authentic • Positive recognition • Mutual Trust • Approachable • Be a role model • Certain essential intrinsic qualities – values and beliefs • Innovation

• The Leadership Conference

"support staff to reach their potential"

• Respect/trust • Resilience • Strategic • Purpose

"being motivational"

• Motivator • Inclusive • Team development • Puts patient care first • Charismatic • Supports NWAS values/NHS Constitution

"supports nwas values" PAGE

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

Question 4: How can you support the organisation's culture and values in your leadership role?

• Be the change we want to see

• Support innovation

• Raise awareness of expectations within the team

• Sharing good work

• External conversations as well as internal

• Staff feeling valued

• Buy in to it

• Engage!

• Engage with staff

• Development and empowerment against good to great goals

• Promote values

• Recognising they’re there

• Social Media – use to our advantage

• Confidence in the Trust’s organisational values

• Be positive and recognise achievement

• Across the organisation internally and externally

• Reflect

• Development • Self awareness

• Be approachable and listen to staff • Give clear direction

• Reflect on can do actions

• Coach – help shape culture and values

• Develop & empower service users

• Patient focused

• Compassion

• Take away the ambiguity

• Innovation but at local level – don’t let it be stopped by mid – level decisions

• Identify potential talent

• Remind staff of values and why change is required

"engagement with staff"

• Making it ‘real’ • Live the values & culture

"understand what they are and what they mean in practice"

• Create cultural champions

• Promote culture to live values

• Understand what they are

• Create visual ways to show staff they’re doing a great job

• Educating people

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

Visual Minutes: North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

© SCARLET DESIGN 2014. MAPS:WWW.FRANOHARA.COM

4th September 2014, Macron Stadium

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

WICKED PROBLEMS & CLUMSY SOLUTIONS – THE ROLE OF LEADERSHIP Keith Grint is Professor of Public Leadership at Warwick University.

His session ‘Wicked Problems and Clumsy Solutions’ centered around organisational change and how despite - or perhaps because of - the numbers of change models around most change initiatives fail.

His presentation suggested that this failure might be to do with society’s framing of problems and consequent approaches to resolving them.

Professor Grint suggested that differentiating between Tame, Wicked and Critical problems, and associating these with Management, Leadership and Command, might be a way forward. His presentation considered the role of default cultures and how these persuade us to engage ‘elegant’

- that is internally coherent - responses. These may be fine for Tame or Critical problems but Wicked problems need us to go beyond internally coherent approaches and adopt so called ‘Clumsy Solutions’ that use skills to pragmatically engage whatever comes to hand to address these most complex problems.

The session described public leadership as a form of collective leadership in which leaders from a range of public, private and voluntary organisations share a common aim in improving the life of communities. It examined the current focus on public service reform and highlighted the impact that performance targets have had on leadership. The importance of the role of the individual leader was acknowledged, but it was suggested that this role is not to provide the answers but to ask intelligent questions in tackling wicked issues that undermine well-being, prompting a different way of thinking about leadership.

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

FEEDBACK "An excellent event! Inspiration, motivation and future planning all in one day!"

"A varied and informative programme which delivered a thought provoking event."

"A great opportunity for leaders across the organisation to meet together, network and help the Trust move forward."

"Today's event gave me the opportunity to step out of the 'day-to-day' to learn, reflect and network with my colleagues. A great day, well done!"

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"Enjoyable and informative day.

Really good opportunity to share thoughts and ideas with other managers."

"Let’s make our good leaders great leaders!"

"Right place, right content, right team."

"Excellent opportunity to re-focus on the values of the organisation and identify 'hidden' barriers to change."

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North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014

"A brilliant opportunity to reflect on current position and how we can influence our future."

"Brought leadership to life through action and words."

"Fun, engaging and a positive experience. Fantastic networking opportunity."

"The sight of lightbulbs going on all over the room in self-recognition and opportunity was delightful!"

"The ideal focus to make a difference for NWAS."

"Great integration and shared views of all managers to deliver great standards to all stakeholders."

North West Ambulance Service Leadership Conference 2014 Date: 4th September 2014 Venue: Macron Stadium, Bolton

Visual minutes and facilitation by Fran O’Hara, Scarlet Design Int. Ltd. ‘live’ at the event www.franohara.com If you require these visual minutes maps in an alternative size or format please contact ohara@scarletdesign.com