A fairly frequent comment I get from student pharmacists goes something like this, "I don't really want to be a boss, why do I need to know leadership and management skills?"

Well, aside from the fact that every employer on the planet is looking for people who can lead their businesses successfully, there is not much reason to hone your management skills.

The old paradigm

Back when I started in pharmacy in 1977, most pharmacists were male and measured their career success by how high up the management ladder they went. Of course, those demographics have dramatically shifted. Now most pharmacists graduating from schools in the past 15 years are female, and they measure their success by a different methodology.

This is not to say that female pharmacists don't have the leadership and management skills to be the boss. That is clearly not what I'm saying. What I am saying is that they have a different definition of value than the old male-centric standard, and the modern definition of success cannot be directly compared to a 30-year-old paradigm.

The world has changed

I have heard many pharmacists suggest that the reason young pharmacists shy away from management training is because of the trend to a higher percentage of young ladies in the profession.

But this sexist view of what a good manager or leader looks like is simply not correct and not helpful in guiding young pharmacists to understand how to lead others. Not to mention that the incredible young ladies I have the privilege of working with each day are as talented as any pool of future leaders I have seen in my lifetime.

The heavy emphasis on clinical training since the early 1990s has unintentionally de-emphasized the importance of the business side of our profession. And while there may be a change of attitudes toward work-life balance that has its roots in a more feminine view of the world, this trend is manifesting in young men as well.

People just don't want to spend all their time working anymore. There is less loyalty to the organization because organizations have not demonstrated loyalty to their people. They keep getting bought, sold, downsized, outsourced or re-engineered, which is fancy terminology for getting rid of employees.

It is significant that the Center for the Advancement of Pharmacy Education has invigorated the call for more management and leadership training in the new CAPE 2013 outcomes statements, but I think organizations need to rethink how to engage employees better in the rewards and benefits of leadership positions. Until they do that, they are going to have a hard time convincing young pharmacists that becoming managerial is worth the aggravation.

The reality of the new paradigm

However, young pharmacists have room to grow as well.

The reality is that in virtually every practice setting — whether you have the official title of manager or not you will perform in a leadership role. This leadership may take the form of supervising clerks or technicians in a community setting, or it may take the form of working with technicians and nurses on the care team in a hospital setting. To say that you don't need to learn management skills simply because you don't want to be a manager would be shortsighted.

Some suggest that they don't want to be a manager and they simply want to work for a good company. But the reality is that one of the key ways you will know a good company from a bad company is by the quality of management. Therefore, if you don't understand what good management looks like, how will you measure the quality of your potential employer?

My take-home point for the day is that it is important that young pharmacists and the organizations they work for learn what it means to be a good manager and learn how to identify quality leadership.

How to identify good management and leadership

Here is your free cheat sheet for the day. This is based on more than 35 years of experience in having several hundred employee pharmacists work for me in several different organizations. Here is what the company with good leadership looks like.

A quality pharmacy driven company is one that:

  1. Understands the importance of what pharmacists do for their patients
  2. Understands the critical role that good pharmacists play in enhancing the long-term success of their company
  3. Consistently recognizes the contributions of their pharmacists

Basically, employees want to know that the work they do is important, that they are good at what they do, and that their company appreciates their hard work. And if you can do those things for the people who work for you, you will be a good manager and a respected leader.

I look forward to your success.