Healthcare delivery within the military requires a multifaceted approach to achieve the desired outcomes of safe, effective, patient-centered, timely, efficient, and equitable health care. The prospect of maintaining a cycle of continuous process improvements within military clinical settings hinge on frontline leaders and middle-level managers who must be prepared to execute the mission and motivate, supervise, coach and mentor the staff. This project showcases a review of current literature translated into the development of an evidence-based Transformational Leadership Induction Program (TLIP) module that consisted of 4 subsections: the environment of care, clinical decision support systems, human resources management, and change management as well as resources for successful leadership within the organization. The training is designed to bridge the transition gap, facilitate role orientation and induction, and socialize frontline and middle-level managers during their role transition. The results of a need assessment survey, approved by the organization, were completed by 30 incumbents and resulted in 57% (17) providing feedback and role-specific contents that were integrated into the development of the TLIP module. The overall response to the survey was positive with 82% (14) of the respondents either agreeing or strongly agreeing with the items that they reviewed. The TLIP module provides a medium that translates current evidence into a succinct training platform capable of enhancing leadership transition and handoff. The TLIP module enables a culture of trust, enhances staff satisfaction, and fosters change management and succession planning within the military healthcare system.

Whilst the topic of leadership has been widely studied it remains little understood, particularly at the first-level line of leadership, especially as it relates to developing countries such as Kuwait. This study critically analyses and presents the needs, skills and capabilities of frontline leaders working in the Kuwait’s Oil and Gas Sector companies. It also examines how such needs and competencies can be developed so as to make these leaders more effective in leading functional units (teams) and to improve organisational performance overall. The study produces a frontline leadership needs and skills development framework that contributes to a better understanding of leadership in a Middle Eastern country (Kuwait), taking into account important contextual factors that influence leadership. Influenced by a social constructivist philosophy and based on qualitative evidence gathered from 42 Team Leaders, the essential leadership needs neglected by previous literature (and possibly lacking in Kuwait) were: business knowledge, technical skills, leadership and managerial skills, communication skills, decision-making skills and change management skills. These leadership needs reflected what the third line leaders understood and personally believed to be essential leadership dimensions for them to be effective and to competently undertake their work. These leadership needs constituted the foundation for their present and future leadership development in order to enhance their leadership capabilities. However, no single methodology was identified as a ‘one size fits all’ solution to meeting the development needs of the Team Leaders. Nevertheless, on the job-training was considered to be the most effective approach to develop these skills and capabilities. It is recommended that top management, and in particular human resources departments within the Oil and Gas Sector companies should continuously identify the needs of third-line leaders and focus on developing skills and competencies considered to be lacking and the most important by these frontline leaders, rather than offering a raft of seemingly unconnected development activities.