Leadership in Action – Metro North Leadership Principles
Metro North Health is committed to promote and deliver safe and healthy workplaces that put the wellness of our people first. Our vision is that our employees are working in teams that are happy, healthy, safe and engaging, where our people can thrive and perform at their best. Every day, our people achieve amazing things in difficult circumstances. Our best leaders promote the health and wellbeing of those around them and inspire us all to do the best we can for our patients, and staff.
Metro North should be a place where everyone thrives–both now and in the future. We all have a responsibility to demonstrate consistent values-based leadership behaviours. Achieving this requires a commitment to leading with alignment to our core values of integrity, compassion, respect, teamwork, and high performance which are consistently reflected in all our decisions, actions, and interactions.
What is Leadership in Action?
Our culture is shaped by our daily experiences. While positive workplace culture is everyone’s responsibility. Leaders underestimate the impact they have on organisational culture. The shadow they cast by the behaviours they demonstrate impacts not only engagement, but employee wellbeing and all aspects of organisational performance
Insights from our Have Your Say employee engagement survey and ongoing feedback from staff have provided an opportunity to strengthen leadership capability across the organisation. These capabilities include increasing visibility and responsiveness, improving clarity in communication, fostering respectful interactions, and addressing issues more efficiently.
Our Leadership in Action principles serve as an organisation-wide model for visible leadership. They empower leaders at all levels and formalise our approach to elevating performance and behaviour. Every leader is expected to recognise, reflect on, and embody the five core principles daily.
Co-created with staff from across facilities and streams, as well as executive sponsors, our Leadership in Action model embodies a comprehensive and inclusive approach to guiding and empowering leaders at every level. It formalises the core principles of values-based leadership that drive our vision for Metro North Health leaders and leadership.
Together, we build a great workplace where we all can thrive.
Leadership principles
We Model
The Way
Consistently embody
and reflect the MN Values
in all my decisions,
actions and interactions
We Provide Clarity
& Purpose
Clearly communicating a
compelling vision to
guide and inspire
the team towards
collective success
We Promote Safety
& Wellbeing
Creating a supportive
wellbeing culture where
everyone feels safe,
valued, and empowered
to thrive
Health Equity
Starts with Me
Providing equity of
access to high quality
health care services and
building relationships
based on inclusion with
Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander people
We Recognise &
Celebrate Success
Fostering a culture of
recognition by acknowledging
your achievements, and
appreciating your contributions
We Know & Grow
Our People
Building a collaborative
culture where everyone
feels valued and
encouraged to contribute
their best
Putting our Leadership in Action into practice
8 ways our leadership principles can be used:
- Publicise these principles in each directorate to encourage the right leadership behaviours in our organisation.
- Review any existing ‘leadership standards’ documents in use against our Leadership in Action principles.
- Develop a local Leadership in Action document, using this document as a guide.
- Re-engage with staff at all levels to understand what Leadership in Action means for them.
- Consider using the five core principles as headings in job descriptions and assessing/shortlisting candidates to judge how well their experience and commitment match these areas.
- When interviewing for senior leader roles, consider basing questions on these principles and behaviours.
- Build these principles and behaviours into appraisal conversations to understand how well leaders are doing in these areas and how they can do better.
- Organise your leadership development activities and interventions around these principles and behaviours, to help leaders learn more about what these model behaviours entail.