Trauma-informed servant leadership in health and social care settings

Abstract

Purpose Practitioners, organisations and policy makers in health and social care settings are increasingly recognising the need for trauma-informed approaches in organisational settings, with morbidity and financial burdens a growing concern over the past few years. Servant leadership has a unique focus on emotional healing, service to others as the first priority, in addition to the growth, well-being and personal and professional development of key stakeholders. This paper aims to discuss Trauma Informed Servant Leadership (TISL). Design/methodology/approach A targeted review of the servant leadership and trauma-informed care literature was conducted. Relevant studies, including systematic review and meta-analysis, were sourced, with the resulting interpretation informing the conceptual model. Findings Although there are general guidelines regarding how to go about instituting trauma-informed approaches, with calls for organisational leadership to adapt the often cited six trauma-informed principles, to date there has not been a leadership approach elucidated which takes as its starting point and core feature to be trauma informed. At the same time, there is a paucity of research elucidating trauma outcomes for service users or employees in the literature when a trauma-informed approach is used. However, there is a large body of evidence indicating that servant leadership has many of the outcomes at the employee level that trauma-informed approaches are attempting to attain. Thus, the author builds on a previous conceptual paper in which a model of servant leadership and servant leadership supervision are proposed to mitigate against compassion fatigue and secondary trauma in the health and social care sector. The author extends that research to this paper by recasting servant leadership as a trauma-informed model of leadership that naturally operationalises trauma-informed principles. Research limitations/implications A lack of primary data limits the extent to which conclusions can be drawn on the effectiveness of this conceptual model. However, the model is based on robust research across the differential components used; therefore, it can act as a framework for future empirical research designs to be studies at the organisational level. Both the servant leadership and trauma-informed literatures have been extended with the addition of this model. Practical implications TISL can complement the trauma-informed approach and may also be viable as an alternative to trauma-informed approaches. This paper offers guidelines to practitioners and organisations in health and social care on how to operationalise important trauma-informed principles through leadership. Social implications This conceptual model may help reduce the burden of trauma and re-traumatisation encountered by practitioners and service users in health and social care settings, impacting on morbidity. Originality/value To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is a novel approach, the first of its kind.

Trauma-informed leadership: a new concept or has it been here all along?

“…It has been suggested that leaders should adopt trauma-informed principles (Mahon, 2021b). The same principles that were discussed earlier in this paper.…”

“…With further stating when emotional responses are triggered in the workplace, each person responds according to the extent of their emotional scars, traumas, and emotional strengths (Tweedy, 2019). Due to the financial burdens and sickness that first began in 2000 and has carried through the date TRAUMA-INFORMED LEADERSHIP: A NEW CONCEPT 20 GREER / DOI: 10.5929/2023.13.2.3 of this paper, organizations and policy makers are recognizing the importance of implementing traumainformed principles in the work setting (Mahon, 2021b). Koloroutis and Pole (2021) maintain trauma-informed leaders recognize that individuals will struggle because of current and past traumatic experiences with a trauma-informed leader responding with sympathy and understanding.…”

“…Adopting these principles will not occur overnight and involves creating a safe physical, and social environment with the possibility of needing a cultural change at the organizational level (Schulman & Menschner, 2018). Mahon (2021a;2021b) contends that a large body of knowledge exists that suggests many of the desired outcomes of trauma-informed leadership at the employee level are already occurring with servant leadership.…”

“…Trauma-informed leadership is a new notion that offers an opportunity for further exploration. Although, previous research (Mahon, 2021a;2021b) suggests that trauma-informed leadership is simply a new term for some already existing leadership frameworks with an emphasis on emotional intelligence. The purpose of this collective case study is to answer the question if trauma-informed leadership is a standalone framework or is it a new concept for existing leadership styles.…”

Implementing Trauma Informed Care in Human Services: An Ecological Scoping Review

“…At the same time, employee personal trauma, and the impact of vicarious trauma may be compounded by the environment in which the employee works [ 18 , 19 ]. For example, the climate and culture within the organisation, practices, as well as lack of supportive supervision and leadership may compound these trauma experiences [ 19 , 20 ]. Bloom [ 21 ] describes the impact of organizational stress as permeating across the entire system of an organization impacting all stakeholders, and levels of service delivery, care, and outcomes.…”