Combining a leadership course and multi-source feedback has no effect on leadership skills of leaders in postgraduate medical education. An intervention study with a control group

BACKGROUND: Leadership courses and multi-source feedback are widely used developmental tools for leaders in health care. On this background we aimed to study the additional effect of a leadership course following a multi-source feedback procedure compared to multi-source feedback alone especially regarding development of leadership skills over time. METHODS: Study participants were consultants responsible for postgraduate medical education at clinical departments. Study design: pre-post measures with an intervention and control group. The intervention was participation in a seven-day leadership course. Scores of multi-source feedback from the consultants responsible for education and respondents (heads of department, consultants and doctors in specialist training) were collected before and one year after the intervention and analysed using Mann-Whitney's U-test and Multivariate analysis of variances. RESULTS: There were no differences in multi-source feedback scores at one year follow up compared to baseline measurements, either in the intervention or in the control group (p = 0.149). CONCLUSION: The study indicates that a leadership course following a MSF procedure compared to MSF alone does not improve leadership skills of consultants responsible for education in clinical departments. Developing leadership skills takes time and the time frame of one year might have been too short to show improvement in leadership skills of consultants responsible for education. Further studies are needed to investigate if other combination of initiatives to develop leadership might have more impact in the clinical setting.