Reflections on leadership learning and development

Last month, I was thrilled to be awarded the King’s Emerging Leader Award as part of the King’s College London Distinguished Alumni Awards 2020, which has made me reflect on my clinical leadership journey so far.

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I began my career as a clinical pharmacist at Guys and St Thomas’ NHS Trust. It was while I was in this role, as a specialist electronic prescribing pharmacist, that my interest in big data, health informatics, solutions development and innovation was originally sparked. I became intrigued about new ways we could use technology to improve patient outcomes. With the support of my manager and the chief nursing information officer, I started looking into ways we could better utilise data to help prioritise high risk patients and as a result, I received a ‘highly commended’ and recognised as a “driving force" at the Digital Health Awards, 2018.

That same year, I began the Chief Pharmaceutical Officers National Clinical Fellow Scheme for NHS Specialist Pharmacy Service with the support of the fantastic FMLM team. The combined learning from the fellowship and the leadership sessions was incredibly valuable in my career journey.

During my clinical fellowship, I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to lead a national scoping exercise on behalf of NHS X – I learnt so much!  It involved engaging with a number of senior stakeholders and health tech enthusiasts to identify workflow challenges nationwide[1].  I published my findings in a national toolkit[2] highlighting the adoption of closed loop medicines administration[3] in the NHS. This project enabled me to develop an understanding of the wider digital healthcare landscape by working alongside global digital exemplars, as well as other less digitally mature sites.

I found that often with high workload pressures in the NHS, knowledge sharing across frontline clinicians nationwide can be challenging. To help improve this, I explored the effectiveness of digital communication within the national Medication Safety Officer network[4] alongside the NHS Specialist Pharmacy Service. I sought out a pre-doctoral opportunity to strengthen my skills in healthcare research.  I have now shared my work in digital healthcare over various publications including through the Cambridge University Press and a European journal[5].

One of the greatest highlights was time spent with Dame Sally Davies, when she was the Chief Medical Officer for England, during a dinner with the national clinical fellows, hosted at the Royal Society of Medicine. Dame Sally’s work on taking collaborative approaches in tackling global health risks like antimicrobial resistance (AMR) inspired me to look into ways to address global health challenges.  I subsequently joined the international Commonwealth Partnerships for Antimicrobial Stewardship scheme[6], funded by the UK Department for Health and Social Care’s Fleming Fund. These global partnerships are aimed at building capacity for antimicrobial stewardship in four African commonwealth countries. I have shared my thoughts on how digital technologies are being used to address the AMR challenge via a blog[7].

I have always taken calculated risks in my pharmacy career, by taking on a variety of different roles to expand my skill set. I have recently moved to a new role at the Deloitte Centre of Health Solutions and have been involved in projects across the UK and Europe encompassing the healthcare, life sciences and health tech industries. One of these involved exploring the potential for digital transformation to address the current and future challenges facing healthcare systems in Europe; Digital transformation: Shaping the future of European healthcare[8]. I also co-authored the report on what the future holds for the sector, The future unmasked: Predicting the future of healthcare and life sciences in 2025[9].  Furthermore, I am also proud to be involved in the launch of the Deloitte Health Tech Catalyst,[10] that aims to bring together the greatest minds in digital healthcare and medical technology.

Lessons to impart

Self-reflection and awareness are always useful tools and can help towards building and understanding yourself as a professional, particularly in identifying your own strengths and weaknesses. There are many tools that can help with this, such as the Clifton Strengths assessment. There is a saying that, “if opportunity doesn’t knock, build a door” – in other words, take a proactive approach in finding ways to get involved in projects surrounding healthcare technology. This may involve increasing your discretionary effort and putting in the extra hours.

Your on-the-job experience will go a long way towards developing your skills, but to consolidate and expand your learning, read around the subject. Lastly, and importantly, I recommend finding a mentor - having a mentor can bring several benefits to your professional practice. Not only does it give you access to a senior role model who can empower you to excel, they can also help you achieve your career goals and identify areas for development.

Embrace every opportunity; have confidence in your own abilities, undertake continuous learning, self-development activities and be curious - most importantly, enjoy the journey. Because it really is a great journey!

[1] Bhatti, Samrina. (5 June 2020). COVID-19: Catalyising digital transformation across pharmacy. DELOITTE. Retrieved from https://blogs.deloitte.co.uk/health/2020/06/catalysing-digital-transform...

[2] Future NHS Collaboration Platform. Retrieved from https://future.nhs.uk/system/login?nextURL=%2Fconnect%2Eti%2FMedsOPDigit...

[3] Bhatti, Samrina. (8 August 2019). Adoption of closed loop medicines administration into the NHS. The Pharmaceutical Journal. Retrieved from https://pharmaceutical-journal.com/article/opinion/adoption-of-closed-lo...

[4] Bhatti, Samrina. (11 December 2019). How effective is digital communication within the Medication Safety Officer network? Clinical Pharmacy Magazine. Retrieved from https://rxmagazine.org/how-effective-is-digital-communication-within-the...

[5] Bhatti, Samrina., Wake, Nicola., Jani, Yogini. (19 February 2021). Evaluating the effectiveness of digital communication within the National Medication Safety Network for England. European Journal of Hospital Pharmacy (BMJ). Retrieved from https://ejhp.bmj.com/content/early/2021/02/18/ejhpharm-2020-002517

[6] Commonwealth Pharmacists Association. Retrieved from https://commonwealthpharmacy.org/commonwealth-partnerships-for-antimicro...

[7] Bhatti, Samrina. (10 July 2020). Why COVID-19 risks undermining initiatives to reduce the global threat of antimicrobial resistance. DELOITTE. Retrieved from https://blogs.deloitte.co.uk/health/2020/07/why-covid-19-risks-undermini...

[8] Digital transformation: Shaping the future of European healthcare. Retrieved from https://www2.deloitte.com/uk/en/pages/life-sciences-and-healthcare/artic...

[9] The future unmasked: Predicting the future of healthcare and life sciences in 2025. Retrieved from https://www2.deloitte.com/uk/en/pages/life-sciences-and-healthcare/artic...

[10] The Health Tech Catalyst. Retrieved from https://www2.deloitte.com/uk/en/pages/life-sciences-and-healthcare/solut...