Pharmacy executive and mid-level manager perceptions of leadership in contemporary health-system pharmacy

The overall purpose of this survey was to assess the current state of pharmacy leadership in hospitals and health systems to identify opportunities and challenges in maintaining, growing, and filling formal leadership roles that would guide the pharmacy profession.

A self-administered, cross-sectional email survey was used to collect information from 1,263 randomly selected hospital and health-system pharmacy leaders to assess their perspectives with respect to job satisfaction, current workforce recruitment pipeline for formal leadership roles, desire to continue current leadership roles, motivators and discouragers to seek advancement, and development and support structures that may affect advancement, retention and work-life balance.

The response rate was 63% (788/1,243). Of the 788 respondents, 42% were system-level health-system pharmacy leaders, 27% were hospital pharmacy leaders, and 32% were mid-level pharmacy managers. Overall, the results suggest most pharmacy leaders are satisfied with their role, although job satisfaction has worsened when compared to the prior 12 months for a notable percentage of each leadership group. The majority of pharmacy leaders are not actively seeking to leave health systems despite challenges they face and are looking to grow within their existing or similar organizations. Several areas of improvement include opportunities to improve job satisfaction, create environments that foster career growth and retention, the need for strong internal development programs, and succession planning processes.

Most pharmacy leaders are satisfied with their leadership role and would pursue leadership in hospital or health-system pharmacy if starting their career over. Attention needs to be given to the percentage of dissatisfied pharmacy leaders and those whose job satisfaction has worsened when compared to the prior 12 months. Opportunities exist to increase succession planning, continuous professional development, mentorship, and work-life balance to build a qualified pool of leaders and sustain the satisfaction of current leaders.