All great leaders must first learn to follow

To the Editor: Health services understand that they need strong medical engagement and leadership in order to achieve their organisational goals and performance targets. Doctors, by the nature of their duties, have a direct impact on patient flow, quality of care and clinical costs. The need for clinical leadership by doctors is now well established in the literature and, as such, leadership as a competency is taught in most medical schools and postgraduate medical specialty training programs. Leadership is also evaluated in most performance appraisal frameworks, including those for doctors. Despite all these endeavours, employing hospitals have found it difficult to engage medical staff on their payroll. It is possible that the medical leadership competency may only be part of the puzzle.