Being a clinical director is like being the manager of the England Football Team (minus the huge pay packet) - everyone thinks they could do a better job until they find themselves in the hot seat.
Having been a clinical director for two years now, these are some of the hard lessons I’ve learned.
The first thing to remember is that it’s your fault - even if you weren’t in the hospital. Get used to saying sorry.
Learn the four essential rules of email:
1. To avoid extra apologising (see above) always check your facts thoroughly before sending an angry email. Better still, don’t send angry emails.
2. Never say anything in an email that you wouldn’t mind everyone in the hospital reading - because there’s a fair chance that they will.
3. The chance of an email achieving its purpose is inversely proportional to the number of people copied in. Some things are best discussed face-to-face. The only emails not copied in to 50 other people are thanking you for something which has gone well (very rare). Emails pointing out some gross failure on your part are always copied into half the hospital.
4. To avoid email overload, some emails may safely be deleted immediately - these include any which contain the words “it’s unacceptable” (translation “ I personally don’t like it but can’t actually come up with any coherent reasons”), or “it’s a disaster waiting to happen” (ditto), or any mention of the word “status” (they’ve obviously lost the plot completely).
Then comes mobile phone etiquette. If answering calls on the rare occasions when you’re not at work, always say you’re “off-site”. Never admit to being “at home” - clinical directors aren’t supposed to have them - nor is being “on holiday” considered an acceptable excuse for being uncontactable. Try to give the impression that you’re at an important meeting at PCT headquarters.
Learn to accept that it’s virtually impossible to change other peoples’ behaviour, however irrational. You can only change your reaction to it. The following responses, though tempting, are not recommended: screaming, weeping, physical assault, or any combination of the above. The only sure-fire way of persuading colleagues to change their behaviour (i.e. holding a gun to the head) is unfortunately frowned on by HR.
Be grateful that you still do your day-job at least part of the time, and so have a get-out clause. Giving anaesthetics is great - I know what I’m doing (more or less), get instant results, and people are occasionally grateful. How different from the daily grind of the full-time manager, who has no relief from the tyranny of meetings, angry emails and conflicting targets.
Overall I’ve learned that most colleagues, from support workers to consultants and managers, are decent, hardworking folk who try their best most of the time. When people behave in an apparently irrational way, it is not (always) simply to annoy you, but generally due to some underlying problem which is nothing whatever to do with the matter in hand. Understanding this can save you a lot of aggravation.
Finally, there are two areas of personal development which are essential to the survival of all successful clinical directors: firstly, a good sense of humour; and, secondly, friends outside work. You’ll need both in spades.
Tags: Leadership, Management
