Leadership: The Importance of Something that Does Not Exist; The Special Case of Health Institutions

Abstract

If one googles the word leadership one gets thousands of hits: books, articles, essays, whatever.
However, in hospitals and other health institutions, the subject is taken in second place if not totally neglected.
Doctors? Hire the best. Nurses? As judiciously as pos- sible. Other technicians? The same. Managers? Find “nice” people, well educated, resourceful... without having a clear idea of what for. Of what concretely are their functions. The reasons are two mistakes. The first mistake is not knowing what is (and the importance of) management. The second mistake is to believe that one knows but one does not know; namely to believe that in “knowledge institutions” (orga- nizations intensive in know-how) what counts is the scientists and technicians’ know-how and not the organization to make them most productive. To facilitate their work.
Thus, the questions: could it be that leadership does not apply to knowledge institutions (in general) and health ones (in particular)? Why? And what is leadership? And why did Peter Drucker, founder of modern management, say that leadership both does not exist, and it is fundamental? How can that be?
Let us start by the beginning.