Covid-19 Healthcare Management & Leadership Support

The challenge:
On March 11th 2020, the World Health Organisation officially confirmed Covid-19 as a pandemic. The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) updated its guidelines advising all countries to act early to be effective. 

On March 27th, Ireland went into its first lockdown; intensive care units were already nearing capacity and at risk of becoming overwhelmed. These were unprecedented and incredibly challenging times for the country; in particular, for all working in healthcare. Gearóid reached out to healthcare leaders responsible for the delivery of these critical services. 

The approach:
Initial conversations with leaders and managers indicated that they required one-to-one coaching, mentorship and support through volatile times, as well as the critical tools needed to build unshakable resilience (both within themselves and within their teams).

To address this, Gearóid distributed tailored tips, tools and techniques for leadership daily for 100 days. Gearóid drew from his extensive experience in management development in the healthcare sector and shared insights with 50 hospital general managers, clinical directors, heads of organisational development, directors of nursing, and heads of learning and development.  

Leaders, in turn, circulated this bespoke guidance daily to their management teams and throughout the organisation. 

The outcome:
Managers were able to use these insights to support themselves and their teams during times of volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. There was a feeling of connectivity across the healthcare teams as they openly shared the difficulties they faced daily as well as ways to address them as they arose.