Mental Health Leadership
Introduction
Around five articles were published during 2007 in The Lancet which deals with the mental health of individuals globally focusing on countries where Middle-income and low-income people reside. The last published article among five articles highlighted the some of the tactics along with giving evidence about the number of services which are given to individuals facing mental disorders that fall under human rights perspective rights (Power, 2010). In 2008, October World Health Organisation started a program that solves the services gap with the name of Mental Health Gap Action Programme (Aarons, 2006). There are ten main strategies which are recommended by Mental Health World Federation “Non-government organizations to increases the number of facilities provides to the individuals facing mental disorders.”
Global Mental Health Movement (www.globalmentalhealth.org) started as soon as the articles appeared in The Lancet. These actions showed that one of the major issues that world is facing at the moment is mental health. Mental illness that can be diagnosed increased from 12 percent population to 15 percent population around 2020 (Green, Miller, and Aarons, 2013). Almost 450 to 500 million individuals have any mental disorder around the globe (Abdulmalik, Fadahunsi, Kola, Nwefoh, Minas, Eaton and Gureje, 2014). The illness which is related to mental health of a person is one of the major cause of life filled with disability in between 15-44 age groups and during 2005 disorder which is related to neuropsychiatric includes almost 28% of non-diagnoseable diseases which leads to disability throughout the lifetime. Almost one individual among every four faced mental conditions at some period of life. There are many reasons of mental strain including social issues, economic costs, due to war, forcefully migrate from one place to another and leads to debt and shame (Abdulmalik et al., 2014).
Many current activities including the articles series in The Lancet played their part in raising awareness about the mental health of individuals globally and try to introduce a way to deal with it. To complete aims regarding enhancement of mental health, the coming generation must be trained leaders of mental disorders in developed areas and third world countries as well where there is low income and middle-class people (Beinecke, 2009). A non-profit organization which the name of Annapolis Coalition, is focusing on improvement of the workforce in the United States, in the behavioral health study, stated that “the development of leadership, as a calculated aim, needs more capability to change the behavioral health positively (Beinecke, 2009).
Many issues are occurring the public leadership. Almost 7.5 percent of the total workforce of United States is below 30 years, while almost 40 percent of the workforce is above 50 years. Around 2006, almost 31 percent of the total federal workforce will be about to retire. Overall 15 percent and almost 50 percent workers who are working in different agencies will retire (Spors and Fialka, 2002). During 2004, almost seven out of ten managers in the Federal government that are on top will ask for pensions. The same situation is in the public sector. Around 40 percent senior level managers in health, public and private institution and other organizations will reach the retirement age in the time span of 5 years in the United States and other countries (Gureje, Lasebikan, Ephraim-Oluwanuga, Olley and Kola, 2005). Most of the people among these became leaders and got training for management tasks when there were funded programs. However, until we will not pay attention to this issue and provide resources, coming generation dealing with mental health and other leaders in public administration jobs will not have enough power to initiate new functions that are assumed.
The meaning of leadership altered during the 1990s. Skills and traits are now not linked with leadership and their relationships with other employees (behavioral approach), and scenarios they face (contingency approach) are still considered significant. For instance, a leader should take step carefully as certain elements are defined that may not fall in the current scenario. In different kinds of setting, many different types of leaders are there. Such leadership is considered effective which includes both situation and characteristics which are required in any certain situation (Green, Miller, and Aarons, 2013).Skillful leaders try to deal with situations differently by focusing on his knowledge regarding any issue and try to be creative as well as flexible if needed.
The modern theory of leadership is all about how to lead and manage in complex systems which include large networks of which there are many stakeholders. Simply, it is about the productive system in which the main focus is a requirement of flexible behavior, quality work, speed dealing, adaptability and experimenting new ideas. Systematic leadership deals with shared meanings, authorized and responsible employees and proper way of communication and sharing information on critical issues (Gureje et al., 2005). There is a large amount of discussions and theories on leadership types are available in the books. Most of the types deal with various leadership aspects. In current literature on mental health, thinking policy, transformation “is now vital for every mental health system whether public or private” (Beinecke, 2009). Before these concepts, it was considered as one of the important concepts of leadership. The difference in between transformational and transactional leadership is derived by Burns Aarons (2006), “Transactional leadership is all about the relationship among leader and their followers – leaders guide their followers in the process of trading things from one individual to another.” Such leader is a part of a system and works internally. On the other hand, transforming leader is “find promising intention in people, to fulfill the needs of higher level, and try to include every characteristic of a follower. Transforming leadership results in a relationship among the followers and leader which is based on mutual understanding and incentives that can transform followers as well as leader and conversion of the leader into morally good individuals” (Aarons, 2006).
IIHML conducted a survey with many different results presenting countries with IIHML are of the view that development of leadership is a crucial challenge which should be tried not only for mental disorders and using it later but also for health and public administration issues. There are many theories as well as debates on this issue, and many institutions and individuals are trying to define various models and needs (Beinecke, 2009).
It was concluded that competency of leadership for mental diseases is not divergent from the public administration or health and abilities do not change from state to state in which these abilities are applied. The core competencies of leadership are same around the globe. On the contrary, information required for policy building and programs initiating are distinct for mental conditions rather that health and it varies from country to country in which it will be used.
Studies are by the view of Annapolis Coalition which says that training of leaders is required to deal with many different stakeholders who include consumers, their family, and administrators. No matter the core skills are same in almost all training types; the specific skills may differ from a change in a target audience (Beinecke, 2009).
As mentioned earlier, transactional skills refer to those that are acquired through training. Anyhow, it is true that many individuals working at a lower level or clinical positions move upward to management and leadership level with the passage of time, and abilities are not gained by experience or training, it is part of personality. Whereas, skills like management performance, systems of information, and enhancing quality became significant recently and now must be studied by leaders and managers.
In a perfect world, an experienced leader must be powerful in almost all competencies. While according to reality, this thing is impossible. Every individual has certain strengths as well as certain weak areas. A solution for this problem is that leader must surround and support those team members around him that have those skills in which leader himself is weak. Another way of dealing with your weaknesses is learning continuously, getting training and self-restoration – introspection (Federal leadership needed to create national mental health system, 2008).
One of the dominant obstructions in training leaders is a lack of funding. The United States has funding by government for training of leaders decreases during the 1980s and today is available in the limited amount (National Center for Healthcare Leadership, 2005). However, resources of public agencies expanded due to training demands in certain areas, for instance in systems of information technology. The Budget of the countries is limited. The important thing that can be done is a development of professionals and supervisors. No matter, there are many pressures on a use of time for services, seminars, and conferences (Hoge and Morris, 2002). Most of the agencies are trying to focus on the present circumstances and preparing themselves for future.
Conclusion
There is a strong need for development, promotion and linking public administration various training programs for leadership with academic curricula along with inducing education. We must also try to work on the script of programs which are designed for transformation of our existing systems of a 21st century. Everyone must also try to improve, update and issue a list of main programs of leadership and initiate easy access to it. We should also try to find and make forums like conferences where critical issues are discussed for a success of organizations. We must focus on the ways through which these schemes can be taught to individuals and efficient way so that people can learn easily and enhance their leadership abilities. If we work on all of these elements, then it will be easy to eliminate issues concerning leadership which we are facing and guarantee that our schemes are well planned and will lead to success.
References
Aarons, G. A. (2006). Transformational and transactional leadership: Association with attitudes toward evidence-based practice. Psychiatric Services, 57(8), 1162-9.
Abdulmalik, J., Fadahunsi, W., Kola, L., Nwefoh, E., Minas, H., Eaton, J., & Gureje, O. (2014). The mental health leadership and advocacy program (mhLAP): A pioneering response to the neglect of mental health in anglophone West Africa. International Journal of Mental Health Systems, 8
Beinecke, R. H. (2009). Leadership Training Programs and Competencies for Mental Health, Health, Public Administration, and Business in Seven Countries. Retrieved from http://www.iimhl.com/files/docs/20090213.pdf
Federal leadership needed to create national mental health system. (2008, Sep 24). Canada NewsWire
Green, A. E., Miller, E. A., & Aarons, G. A. (2013). Transformational leadership moderates the relationship between emotional exhaustion and turnover intention among community mental health providers. Community Mental Health Journal, 49(4), 373-9.
Gureje O, Lasebikan V. O., Ephraim-Oluwanuga O., Olley B. O. & Kola, L. (2005). Community study of knowledge of and attitude to mental illness in Nigeria. Br J Psychiatry 2005, 186:436–441.
Hoge, M.A., and Morris, J.A. (2002). Special Double Issue: Behavioral Health Workforce and Training. Administration and Policy in Mental Health.
National Center for Healthcare Leadership (NCHL) (2005). Healthcare Leadership Resource Guide. NCHL: Chicago. www.nchl.org/ns/documents/CompetencyModel
Power, A. K. (2010). Transforming the nation’s health: Next steps in mental health promotion. American Journal of Public Health, 100(12), 2343-6.
Spors, K.K. and Fialka, J.J. (2002). Filling a public-service void: Federal workforce faces retirement bubble, personnel shortfall. Wall Street Journal, p. A4
