045_Why Most Healthcare Leadership Programs Fail and How to Fix Them

Episode Overview:
In this episode, Jarvis T. Gray dives deep into what truly makes a healthcare leadership program effective, moving far beyond basic workshops or compliance certificates. Jarvis shares lessons from the field and the three pillars that set great programs apart: clarity, structure, and sustainability. You’ll hear practical advice and stories that can help you build—or revitalize—a leadership development initiative that delivers real change in people, teams, and patient outcomes.

Key Topics Covered:

1. Common Pitfalls in Leadership Programs:
   • Why so many programs have good intentions but little real impact
   • Examples of why programs lose momentum and fade away
2. The Three Essential Pillars of Effective Leadership Development:
   • Clarity:
     • Define the specific kind of leaders you need
     • Align your program with organizational strategy and culture
     • Set clear leadership competencies and measurable outcomes
     • Example: A rural health center’s six competency model
   • Structure:
     • Build programs for real-life application
     • Blend knowledge (theory), practice (application), and reflection
     • Importance of multi-level support and integrated learning
     • Protecting time for growth
   • Sustainability:
     • Strategies to maintain momentum after the program ends
     • Systems for accountability, coaching, and peer support
     • Measuring behavior change and organizational impact
     • Real-world improvement: decreased conflict, increased satisfaction, and lower turnover
3. Practical Reflection Questions & Challenges:
   • Is your team clear on the kind of leadership you’re building?
   • Is your development integrated into daily work or just an “extra”?
   • What’s missing in your current approach—and what will you do about it?

Action Steps and Takeaways:

• Reflect: What one element is missing from your current leadership development approach?
• Act: Choose an idea from the episode, start a conversation, propose a change, or design something new.
• Share: If the conversation sparked ideas, connect with Jarvis on LinkedIn to keep building together.

Connect with Jarvis T. Gray:

• LinkedIn (reach out and share your wins, challenges, or what’s working in your organization)

Quotes:

• “Leadership development must serve your organizational strategy.”
• “Blend learning with practice and reflection. Get buy-in from every level.”
• “If you can’t measure it, you can’t multiply it.”

Next Episode Teaser:
Look forward to more real-world strategies and stories to help you lead with courage, clarity, and purpose.

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Transcript

0:55

Hey there, healthcare leaders. Welcome back to the Excellence in Healthcare podcast. I'm your host, Jarvis T. Gray, and I'm excited to share something with you that's been on my heart for a long time. Today we're going to talk about what it really takes to build effective health care leadership programs. Not cookie cutter workshops, not compliance based leadership certificates, but the kind of development work that actually builds confident, capable, transformational leaders in healthcare. Now let me ask you, how many leadership programs have you seen launched only to fade away? Or how many of those had great intentions but really left people just saying, yeah, that was interesting, but nothing really changed. If you've been there, you're not alone. I've seen the same, but I've also seen what works. I've seen programs that create meaningful growth, programs that lift teams, shift culture, and produce results that you can actually see in patient care and organizational metrics. So today, we're pulling back the curtain. I'm going to share with you the three essential pillars that every effective leadership program must include. We'll talk about clarity, knowing what kind of leadership you're actually building. We'll talk about structure, how to make development practical and integrated. And we'll wrap it up by talking about sustainability and how to make it last and actually measure success. And along the way, I'll share stories and lessons learned from the field, things that can help you build or refine your program, whether you're starting from scratch or just trying to breathe life into a previous version of a leadership program that stalled out. So let's go ahead and jump in. So the first and most foundational ingredient of a strong leadership program is clarity. It sounds simple, right? But let me tell you that most programs skip this step entirely. They jump straight into planning sessions, picking facilitators, or building a curriculum before answering the most important question, which is, what kind of leadership are we actually trying to build? I worked with the health system once. They brought me in to evaluate their existing leadership academy. It had been running for about five years. It had some nice branding, and it cycled in more than 200 people through the entire program. But when I asked the executive team what kind of leader the program was designed to develop, I got 12 different answers. Some said strong managers, others said change agents. One person said, people who won't complain. And someone even said, we're still trying to figure it out. And that's a problem, because without clarity on the kind of leadership that you want to grow, you can't align your tools, you can't align your timeline or Your teaching. So let me break this into two parts. The first is around aligning with organizational strategy and culture. Your leadership program should never exist in isolation. It should be a strategic tool that helps your leaders execute your organization's mission, vision and priorities. For example, if your organization is prioritizing equity, your leadership curriculum should include inclusive decision making, bias awareness, and stakeholder engagement. If your focus is on operational excellence, your program should equip leaders with lean thinking, data fluency and process improvement tools. If your strategy is all about improving retention and engagement, then your program must address emotional intelligence, feedback loops, and trust building. In other words, your leadership development must serve your organizational strategy. The second essential is that you must define clear leadership competencies and outcomes. So once your strategic alignment is clear, you've got to define what success looks like. What skills, behaviors and mindsets will your program develop? Will leaders be better at giving feedback or will they run more effective meetings? Will they reduce variation in how they handle conflict? Will they become better mentors? Make it measurable, make it Behavioral so let me share a quick case. I partner with the Rural Health center that built this entire leadership program around six core competencies, resilience, team communication, coaching skills, strategic thinking, values based decision making, and inclusive leadership. Everything tied back to these six. And that clarity made the program easier to build, easier to assess. So here's a reflection question for you. Can your team describe the leadership your program is designed to build in one sentence? If not, start there. That's your foundation. Now once clarity is in place, the next essential component is structure. Because you can have all the right goals. But if your program is just a series of disconnected PowerPoints and keynote talks, it won't stick. Strong programs are built for action, for integration, and for real life application. Let me walk you through two key ingredients of structure that make a leadership program more than a feel good event. First, you have to blend knowledge, practice and reflection. This is what I like to call the triple threat for adult learning. Knowledge give you the what and the why. Think. Frameworks, models and strategies like situational leadership, Gallup strengths and the five levels of leadership practice gives you the how. This could be simulations, role playing, case challenges, or real time application with current projects. Reflection gives you the meaning space to internalize. So think journaling, group discussions, peer feedback. All three are essential. So let me give you a real world example. I ran a session on feedback and coaching with a group of new department managers. We spent the first part learning a feedback model that was structured, clean and clear. Then they practice it with each other. Then we had them reflect. When is feedback hard for you? Where do you avoid it? Who do you need to have a conversation with this week? That structure to teach, try and reflect turned a good session into a transformational experience. We then want to ensure multi level support and integration. If you want leadership development to be more than a training program, it has to be supported up and down the chain. That means executives have to model it. We know that if senior leaders aren't brought in, no one else will be. Middle managers have to reinforce it. They're the bridge. If they're not, create a space for learning. It won't land. Participants direct supervisors need to be involved. Otherwise people attend sessions, then they return to work and nothing changes. Here's something that's often missed. Protect time for growth. Don't expect people to lead better if you don't give them time, support and space to practice. Here's a practical question for you. Is your leadership program integrated into how people work? Or does it feel like something extra that they have to squeeze in? That one question can shift how you design everything. The final piece, and maybe the most overlooked, is sustainability. Too many leadership programs start strong and then disappear. But why? Because no one plans for what happens after the final session. But if you want your program to make a lasting impact, you've got to build it with follow through in mind. So let's talk about how. First, build systems for accountability and follow through. Leadership growth isn't just about what happens in the classroom. It's about what happened to people the next week, the next month and the next year. So here's what that looks like in practice. Post program coaching. Even 30 minute monthly check ins can help keep the momentum. Manager check ins involve supervisors in the follow up conversations. Peer accountability groups lets participants debrief and challenge each other over time. Leadership learning communities keeps the rhythm of learning ongoing, even if it's informal. Remember, growth, it is not a single event. It's a process. And for programs that create systems for that process, those are the ones that stick for the long term. Next, measure impact on behavior and outcomes. This is essential. You have to measure both the change and the result. Not just did they like it, but did they lead differently? Did the teams feel the difference? Did the engagement improve? Did the outcomes move? You can use 360 reviews, culture post surveys, patient experience metrics, retention rates, quality metrics, all tied to leadership behaviors. So let me share what a win looks like in this area. A client I worked with built behavioral tracking into their program. Every quarter, participants self assess progress on five key Leadership behaviors and their teams provided feedback too. Within a year, conflict resolution incidents decreased, Staff satisfaction increased. Manager turnover dropped by 16%. That's what happens when you track growth with intention. So here's the takeaway. If you can't measure it, you can't multiply it. Leadership development must be as rigorous and data informed as anything else you do in healthcare. Alright, so let's wrap this up. We've talked about what sets great leadership programs apart from the ones that fall flat. And here's what it comes down to. Clarity. Know what leadership looks like at your organization, define it and align it with your strategy. Then structure so build it for action. Blend learning with practice and reflection. Get buy in from every level. And then finally, sustainability. Plan for what happens after the last session. We have to keep the momentum and we have to measure what matters. If you're building a new program, then start here. And if you're fixing a stale one, also start here. And if you're participating in a program and feel that it's missing the mark, then share this episode. Start the conversation. Be a part of the solution. Because when we develop better leaders, we. We create better workplaces. And when we create better workplaces, we create better outcomes for patients, for teams and for the communities that we serve. So here's your challenge for the week. Reflect on this. What's one element missing in your current leadership development approach? Then act on it. Choose one idea from this episode and take a step. Start a conversation, propose a change or design something new. And of course, if this episode sparks something in you, then let's connect on LinkedIn and shoot me a message. I'd love to hear what you're working on, what's working well and what gaps you're still facing. Together, we're building a healthcare system that leads with courage, clarity and purpose. I'll see you next time.