Leadership & Management

© 1991 CCP, Courtesy of Photoshare Leadership and management have been described as two sides of the same coin: Each is equally essential for any organization to achieve its purpose. Often program managers play the roles of both manager and leader. Management deals with day-to-day complexities, such as planning and organizing resources to achieve objectives, implementing activities, problem-solving, and monitoring and evaluating progress. The vision and innovation of strong leaders and advocates help to lay a strong foundation for family planning programs. They use creative thinking and innovation to build an overall vision for their programs, and inspire others to make the changes needed to realize that vision.

To go directly to one of the sections, click on one of the links below:

Leadership and Management Fundamentals

Leadership and Management Tools

Training to Build Influential FP Leaders

Improving Access and Quality

Organizing Work

Supervision

You will find a more comprehensive collection of resources relevant to leadership and management by going to the Leadership and Management Toolkit. The Leadership and Management Toolkit provides evidence-based guidance and tools to update, expand, or develop leadership and management skills in health managers and service provision programs.

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Interviews with Family Planning Experts (9 resources)

Included in this section of the Toolkit are a series of audio and video interviews with family planning experts discussing issues related to leadership and management of family planning programs. The interviewees address the importance of strong and influential leadership; leadership development; and community involvement.

Leadership and Management Fundamentals

Strong leadership and good management helps programs improve and expand services, scale up best practices, and navigate change. Here you will find resources that address the fundamental elements and practices of leadership and management.

Leading and Managing Framework

no date | Management Sciences for Health (MSH) | 1 p

English

This 1-page brief highlights key elements for leaders and managers to employ to achieve efficient and successful programs and organizations.

2010 | Management Sciences for Health (MSH) | 446 p

English

This handbook brings together effective practices in leadership, management, and governance from decades of worldwide field experience in public health. It includes effective practices in key management systems that all work together to improve health. In addition, it draws on the practical approaches for leading and managing. The aim is to provide a comprehensive, practical guide and a set of tools and resources that address common issues in leading and managing health services.

2008 | Management Sciences for Health (MSH) | 15 p

English

This issue of the eManager will help you examine your managerial practices and give you the tools to expand your role from manager to manager as coach. Using the OALFA (Observe, Ask, Listen, give Feedback, and reach an Agreement) self-assessment, you can evaluate your coaching skills and make a plan to refine and apply them.

2005 | Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs | 2 p

English

This Tech Brief identifies and reviews success factors critical to changing and improving health care practices and services.

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Developing Managers Who Lead

2001 | Management Sciences for Health [MSH] | 20 p

English

When organizations invest in leadership development for managers at all levels, they increase their ability to change. Their managers learn to reinforce leadership values and apply leadership practices that promote sustainable organizational performance. By practicing both leading and managing, managers are able to achieve results and maintain high-quality services despite the obstacles they face. This issue of The Manager shows how managing and leading can be practiced at the same time by managers at all levels.

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Leadership and Management Tools

Many tools are available to help managers, supervisors and others organize and run a program to ensure a smooth and efficient operation. This section of the Leadership & Management Toolkit includes a list of selected tools to assist health professionals with the functioning, performance, and assessment of programs, resulting in improved programs and service delivery.

Management and Organizational Sustainability Tool (MOST)

2010 | Management Sciences for Health (MSH) | 86 p

English

The Management and Organizational Sustainability Tool (MOST) is a process for improving an organization’s management, with the end result of contributing to improved services. This section of the MOST guide explains what MOST is, how it differs from other management assessment processes, how organizations can benefit from using MOST, how the assessment instrument is organized, and how the MOST process works.

2009 | Management Sciences for Health [MSH] | 30 p

English

English

The Human Resource Management (HRM) Rapid Assessment Tool offers a method for assessing an organization’s Human Resource Management system and how well it functions. The HRM Rapid Assessment Tool helps users to develop strategies to improve the human resource management system and make it as effective as possible. It can also serve as a basis for focusing discussions, brainstorming, and strategic planning. It is designed to be used in public and private-sector health organizations.

2006 | Management Sciences for Health [MSH] | 143 p

English

This Menu was originally developed under the Management and Leadership (M&L) Program in 2003. It has been revised to include additional indicators validated during the implementation of the M&L Program and developed to monitor LMS program performance.

2005 | Management Sciences for Health [MSH] | 45 p

WCA Guide and Tool |

WCA Tabulation Sheet

This Guide is for managers, supervisors and others who want to better understand and measure workgroup climate. he first part of the Guide provides an overview of climate and the Workgroup Climate Assessment (WCA) tool and explains how to use the WCA as part of an organizational improvement process. The annexes of the Guide include all the necessary materials for facilitating a short workshop to administer the WCA with a workgroup and analyze the results.

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Performance Management Tool

1998 | Management Sciences for Health (MSH) | 19 p

English

The Performance Management Tool consists of three complimentary parts: A Work Planning and Performance Review System, a guide for Developing Performance Objectives and a guide for Developing Job Descriptions.

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The Health Manager's Toolkit

Management Sciences for Health [MSH]

The Health Manager's Toolkit

The toolkit is an electronic compendium of tools designed to assist health professionals in their efforts to provide accessible high-quality and sustainable health services. The tools have been developed by organizations working throughout the world to improve the delivery of health services.

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Training to Build Influential FP Leaders

Family planning professionals who want to strengthen their leadership capacities can consider attending a leadership training program. This section of the Toolkit includes a selection of trainings and workshops intended to develop influential family planning leaders and champions.

Bill and Melinda Gates Institute for Population and Reproductive Health Gates Scholars

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Website

Of the many exceptional master's and doctoral students accepted to the School of Public Health, the Gates Institute identified those students from developing countries who planned to pursue careers in population and reproductive health and who had the potential to become leaders in these fields in their home countries. More than 50 master's, doctoral and postdoctoral scholarships were awarded between 1999 and 2006.

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Website

Since 1998, the Gates Institute has worked to develop leaders and reproductive health champions through Baltimore- and field-based workshops. Many students have gone on to attend training-of-trainer workshops and now teach regional and national workshops and university courses in Nigeria, Uganda, Indonesia, Ghana and many other countries.

International Health Programs

International Health Programs/International Family Planning Leadership Program

The goal of The International Family Planning Leadership Program (IFPLP) is to build an influential cadre of FP leaders. The program aims to improve effectiveness of family planning leaders and provide them with skills and knowledge that will sustain them as they rise to higher levels of responsibility in their countries.

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Leadership Development Program

Management Sciences for Health [MSH]

Leadership, Management & Sustainability Program [LMS]

The Leadership Development Program (LDP) helps organizations to develop managers who lead with a vision of a better future. The program has three major learning objectives: learn the basic practices of leading and managing so that managers are capable of leading their workgroups to face challenges and achieve results; create a work climate that supports staff motivation; create and sustain teams that are committed to continuously improving client services.

USAID | Health Policy Initiative, Task Order 1, Futures Group International

Conference Overview

The USAID | Health Policy Initiative, Task Order 1, is implementing an important training event to build the capacity of women leaders to reinvigorate family planning/reproductive health (FP/RH) programs, funding and policies within their communities and countries.

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Improving Access and Quality

Promoting access and quality can start with good management and leadership. Here you will find resources that address how quality and performance improvement efforts by staff and managers can improve family planning programs and service delivery.

Increasing Access to Family Planning

2008 | Family Health International [FHI] | 2 p

English

Nearly a fifth of the worldwide burden of illness and premature death and a third of the illness and death among women of reproductive age is attributable to lack of comprehensive and up-to-date reproductive and sexual health care. Programs can increase access to essential reproductive health care by eliminating outdated, medically unjustified policies and practices that pose barriers to use of contraception and by strengthening policies and practices that are necessary for high-quality care.

2006 | Population Council, Frontiers in Reproductive Health | 12 p

English

This Program Brief focuses on provider time use and how programs can make better use of existing labor resources in clinic programs. The data come from 10 time use studies conducted in nine countries in Asia and the Near East, Latin America and the Caribbean, and sub-Saharan Africa.

2005 | Management Sciences for Health [MSH] | 305 p

English

The handbook includes six chapters, a toolkit, an annotated bibliography, and a CD-ROM with additional resources. Each chapter presents key issues facing managers today, practical advice on applying leadership and management practices to address health care challenges, questions for reflection, and real-life examples that illustrate the role of leadership and management in improving health.

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Prime Performance Improvement

2003 | United States Agency for International Development/ Prime II Project | 12 p

English

The document outlines the 6 factors that ensure good performance: clear job descriptions and expectations; immediate performance feedback; adequate physical environment and tools; motivation and incentives; adequate knowledge and skills; support from the organization. The document also provides a few country examples where PI was implemented.

2002 | Management Sciences for Health [MSH] | 24 p

English

This issue of The Manager shows how health managers, though faced with multiple challenges of decentralization, can redefine their roles and responsibilities to better support both the people they serve and the staff at management levels closest to the population. It shows how health managers can adopt leadership practices to carry out their new roles and ultimately make decentralization work.

2000 | United States Agency for International Development [USAID], Maximizing Access and Quality Initiative [MAQ] | 12 p

English
French

The quality of the client-provider interaction (CPI), along with other contextual factors of clients’ lives, is associated with the adoption, correct use, and continuation of modern family planning methods and with the achievement of other health care objectives. This paper is intended to provide guidance to family planning programs on how to improve the quality of CPI. It synthesizes the findings from research studies and program experiences, summarizing the lesson learned about the CPI process and content.

2000 | United States Agency for International Development [USAID], Maximizing Access and Quality Initiative [MAQ] | 16 p

English |

French

In this paper, we are speaking to the program leaders and donor agencies that are responsible for allocating resources for service delivery programs. We provide guidance on the actions that must take place to improve the quality of reproductive health and child survival programs. This guidance is based on the field experiences of members of the Management and Supervision subcommittee of USAID’s Maximizing Access and Quality (MAQ) Initiative. It results from multiple discussions, including a moderated electronic forum, held over the past three years.

IntraHealth International, PRIME

Performance Improvement: Stages, Steps and Tools

The PRIME II Project presents a set of tools that guide Performance Improvement (PI) users through the design and implementation of PI interventions. The Performance Improvement Stages, Steps & Tools CD provides step-by-step instructions that illustrate the stages of the process.

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Organizing Work

Organizing resources and processes to facilitate operations and activities of a program will improve efficiency and effectiveness of service delivery. Listed here are a few key resources to help family planning program managers better organize work flow and operations within their programs.

Task Shifiting for a Strategic Skill Mix

2006 | Intrahealth International/The Capacity Project | 4 p

English |

French |

Spanish

Reorganizing skills among cadres is called task shifting (moving skills from one cadre to another) or task sharing (increasing the number of cadres able to perform a skill). Based on a review of the literature and country examples, the brief describes why task shifting is important and highlights some key steps in planning for, developing, and supporting cadres involved in task shifting.

2004 | Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Center for Communication Programs, The INFO Project | 2 p

English |

French |

Spanish

Increasingly, family planning and other health care organizations in developing countries must do more with the same or reduced resources. To cope, organizations can make simple changes in the way work is organized-changes that can help them serve clients better, offer more satisfying work to the staff, operate more effectively, and become more efficient.

2004 | Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Center for Communication Programs, The INFO Project

English |

French |

Spanish

Family planning and other health care organizations in developing countries increasingly must do more with the same resources, and sometimes with fewer. Reorganizing work processes offers one common-sense way to help staff members at all levels cope with growing demands. Whether you are a clinic manager, front-line provider, program supervisor, or district-level manager, you can improve how work is organized and performed.

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Supervision

Good leadership and management practices, including effective and supportive supervision, contribute to a positive work climate. In return, staff performance is improved and better services are provided. This section of the Toolkit includes resources on approaches to and issues involved with supervising program staff.

Clinic Supervisor's Manual

2006 | Management Sciences for Health (MSH) | 202 p

English

This Clinic Supervisor’s Manual is helpful for focusing managers on the key elements of integrated primary health care as they simultaneously integrate new interventions for HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. This tool contains 12 sections. Section 1 explains how to use the manual. Section 2 helps the clinic supervisors organize their supervisory visit. The remainder of the sections focus on a number of key areas during a clinic supervision visit.

2006 | Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Center for Communication Programs, The INFO Project | 2 p

English |

Spanish

This brief provides information on how to create a work climate that motivates staff and improves performance. It discusses: Good leadership and management Three key dimensions of work climate Assessment of the climate How to take action

2002 | United States Agency for International Development [USAID], Maximizing Access and Quality Initiative [MAQ] | 28 p

English

This paper distills lessons from recent efforts to improve the supervision of family planning and health programs in developing countries and identifies approaches that may be more effective and sustainable. It describes supportive supervision, an approach to supervision that emphasizes joint problem-solving, mentoring, and two-way communication between supervisors and those being supervised.

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Facilitative Supervision Handbook

2001 | EngenderHealth | 167 p

English

Facilitative supervision is a major component of continuous quality improvement (QI) in health services. Facilitative supervision helps supervisors at all levels in an institution focus on the needs of the staff they oversee. Supervisors who use the facilitative approach consider staff to be their customers. This approach emphasizes mentoring, joint problem solving, and two-way communication between a supervisor and those being supervised.

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