Future-ready healthcare leadership: the revised International Hospital Federation competency model

Major global trends are reshaping health services delivery, and preparing current and future healthcare leaders requires an understanding of these trends. A well-designed leadership competency model can provide guidance for individuals, as well as for system-level leadership development and integration programmes.

To describe the process of updating the International Hospital Federation's (IHF) Global Healthcare Management Competency Directory.

Revisions were informed by a recent foresight study of major trends in health services delivery, and an evidence-informed framework of leadership competencies. The original framework competencies were reviewed by 45 subject-matter experts from 30 countries and regions, who provided feedback through electronic surveys and online interviews. We incorporated this iterative feedback to revise the framework design, competencies within the framework and their associated behavioural descriptions.

A total of 45 subject-matter experts from 30 countries and regions participated in 1 or more phases of the survey process. The resulting leadership competency model includes 32 competencies organised into a framework of 6 domains: values, self-development, execution, relations, context management and transformation.

The updated IHF Leadership Model provides a robust, evidence-based and up-to-date resource for assessing and developing future-ready healthcare leaders.