Planting the Seeds for Future Women Leaders in Medicine
November 28, 2023 | Leadership, Medscape, Women in healthcare, oncology
What are the qualities needed to be a leader in the medical field of oncology?
Of course, you must be a good clinician. But you also have to be wise and skillful in how you approach people without losing any of your own authority. You need to be able to see things from their perspective and be a good listener.
It’s no secret that compassion and communication are skills many women possess. And yet when you look at who’s chairing most oncology conference sessions it’s invariably a man, says Dame Lesley Fallowfield, professor of psycho-oncology and director of Sussex Health Outcomes Research and Education and Cancer Institute, known as SHORE-C, in the UK. (And guess whether men or women also ask more and longer questions at those conferences, according to a report published in The Lancet!)
So, what are the barriers facing women in oncology today? What is keeping them from rising through the ranks?
As a Psycho-Oncologist, Fallowfield says that powerful stereotypes still exist, both outside and inside the hospital setting: Women in scrubs are assumed to be nurses, not doctors, and women are often encouraged to go into branches of medicine that tend to be more traditionally female.
A European Society for Medical Oncology survey found that another “major barrier” is the work-life, or work-family balance, says Eva Thalmann, who spent 30 years at Janssen Pharmaceuticals in various senior leadership positions in oncology. But just because women may take time off to focus on a new baby or young children, “that doesn’t mean their brain stops working!” says Fallowfield.
Part of the responsibility of leaders today is to “tell young women to step up, lean in, and just try something,” says Thalmann. “If you fail, you fail. Lean in to do things even if you’re not sure you can completely master it” — because your male colleague wouldn’t hesitate!
For more of the conversation — including Fallowfield and Thalmann’s thoughts on the types of leadership training skills needed for the next generation; the resources that exist today and those that are missing; and how women themselves are sometimes partially to blame for the inequity that exists — check out Episode 4 of Medscape’s Women in Healthcare Leadership podcast series. Click here to listen on Apple Podcasts or head straight to Medscape.
Hosted by Victoria Harvey-Jones, Associate Director of Clinical Strategy at Medscape Oncology Global
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For more information, please contact Jelena Spyropoulos (Global) or Piyali Shin (US).
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