A call for stronger leadership has been a characteristic of many analyses of American organizations, especially business firms. This is also true of discussions of public health, at least since the publication of The Future of Public Health. This paper summarizes the major writing in the literature on leadership in public health, including papers related to performance standards and quality improvement. It also analyzes the missions of the national, regional, and state public health leadership programs supported by CDC and HRSA, with special attention to the audience for these programs. The paper discusses the concept of leadership embedded in a major quality program (the Sterling Challenge) that the Florida Department of Health is currently implementing. The paper concludes with a discussion of the arguments for focusing on leadership and leadership development for the top echelons of public health leaders and those for broadening the focus to include midlevel and front line staff.
Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of the presentation, the participant will be able to: 1. State the key themes in the literature on leadership in public health; 2. Summarize the relationship between quality improvement and leadership; 3. Compare the advantages of focusing on top level administrators in public health leadership programs with those of focusing on lower levels of staff
Keywords: Leadership, Training
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.