Gold Coast campus

Title: Exemplary leadership, the clinician manager and a thing called ‘hybridity’ Background Critiques of leadership theories, and leadership development programs in health, have pointed to the dominance of individualistic and heroic approaches that focus on developing skills and capabilities of health professionals as epitomized by programs such as the Leadership Quality Framework developed for the National Health Service in the UK. Critics complain that these approaches have led to leadership being selectively blamed for failed health care reforms with clinician managers especially being singled out for negative treatment. To counter these individualistic and heroic discourses, alternative leadership approaches have been proffered including for example, post-heroic (e.g. distributed, shared and followership), post-individual, post-structural and relational leadership theory. Drawing on the work of several of these theorists, the paper explores how hybridity can be used to re-theorize leadership in healthcare as this relates to clinician managers. Empirical material is presented to support the case for looking at hybridized forms of leadership in healthcare. Hybridity is critiqued as it applies to healthcare and a way forward is proposed that might give a better understanding of leadership as exemplary in the realm of the clinician manager. Aim of study The study aims to challenge current leadership paradigms and contribute to debates surrounding the role of clinician leadership in health care reform. Methodolog