‘From the theatre to the office’: an analysis of the managerial and leadership skills and competencies of medical superintendents of public hospitals in Zimbabwe

Abstract

A lack of management capacity was identified as the key stumbling block to attaining the goals of health for all in Zimbabwe. As part of the overall management development process, this research set out to analyze and identify the management and leadership skills and competencies that are important for health services management and to evaluate managers’ self-assessed proficiency in each of these skills. Researchers also examined the impact of past training on perceived competency levels. A cross-sectional survey using a self-administered questionnaire was conducted among 20 hospital managers in the Zimbabwe public hospitals. Respondents were asked to rate the level of importance that each proposed competency had in their job and to indicate their proficiency in each skill. Managers rated competencies related to ‘people management’, ‘self-management’ and ‘task-related skills’ highest followed by ‘strategic planning’ and ‘health delivery’, respectively. The largest differences between mean importance rating and mean skill rating for the public managers was for people management skills, task-related skills and self-management skills. The largest deficits were for people management skills, self-management skills and health delivery skills. Informal management development programmes were found to be more valuable in improving management skills. These findings reflect the reality of the local health service environment and the need of health managers to be given training in management skills. The study and findings will be useful in the conceptualization, design and delivery of health management programmes aimed at enhancing current and future management and leadership capacity in the health sector in Zimbabwe.