Shared leadership and group identification in healthcare: : The leadership beliefs of clinicians working in interprofessional teams

Despite the proposed benefits of applying shared and distributed leadership models in healthcare, few studies have explored the leadership beliefs of clinicians and ascertained whether differences exist between professions. The current paper aims to address these gaps and additionally, examine whether clinicians’ leadership beliefs are associated with the strength of their professional and team identifications. An online survey was responded to by 229 healthcare workers from community interprofessional teams in mental health settings across the East of England. No differences emerged between professional groups in their leadership beliefs; all professions reported a high level of agreement with shared leadership. A positive association emerged between professional identification and shared leadership i.e. participants who expressed the strongest level of profession identification also reported the greatest agreement with shared leadership. The same association was demonstrated for team identification and shared leadership. The findings highlight the important link between group identification and leadership beliefs, suggesting that strategies that promote strong professional and team identifications in interprofessional teams are likely to be conducive to clinicians supporting principles of shared leadership. Future research is needed to strengthen this link and examine the leadership practices of healthcare workers.