Some of my highlights from WCPT General Meeting and WCPT Congress


After many intensive working days it was time for me to leave the congress and Geneva and I’m now back in Sweden again. I went home with a lot of impressions, so many that it’s difficult to sort right now. It is so powerful and inspiring to meet people from around the globe. People you haven’t met in four years and also meetings with a lot of new people. Here are some of my highlights from the week in Geneva.General Meeting. Proud to represent the Swedish Association of Physiotherapists at the WCPT General Meeting together with  Cecilia Winberg, Vice President, Helena Pepa, CEO and Charlotte Chruzander, Health and Medical Strategist .

There where 350 delegates from 108 countries who decided on the content of the business plan over the next four years, about finances, a new constitution for WCPT, a number of different policies and much more. Emma Stokes, Ireland, was re-elected as President of WCPT for another four years and Melissa Locke, Australia, was elected as new Vice-President. Read more here. Our warm congratulations to Emma and Melissa and to the new Board. We wish them all the best of luck for the upcoming years.

The opening ceremony. Very inspiring that together with 4,300 physiotherapists from 130 countries gather under the direction of the WCPT President Emma Stokes. A fine opening program where I listened very carefully to Esperanza Martinez, ICRC Head of Health, when she told about the amazing work done in over 80 countries. Well done WCPT to highlight this in the opening ceremony. And, of course, as a Swede, you will be particularly proud when Charlotte Häger, chairman of the Congress Programme Committee enters the stage and presents the fantastic selection at the congress. She resembled the programme to a traditional Swedish smorgasbord, where you can pick your own favorites and try a little bit of everything. Read more about the opening ceremony and the congress here.

Awards. ??????????. Several Swedish physiotherapists were recognized with different awards. Charlotte Häger and Christina Opava at the Dinner Award, where I received Christina’s award on behalf of her. Helena Pepa, Therese Kristersson and Emelie Karlsson who, in conjunction with the congress’s opening ceremony, were advertised as poster-winners. Read more about the prize winners here. Congratulations to all the winners!

Symposium on leadership. It was challenging but also very inspiring to participate in this symposium on leadership together with amazing  colleagues from Ireland, United Kingdom and United States. The engagement in the room was great and we received a lot of positive feedback on the symposium. Thank you WCPT for inviting me. You can take part of my presentation and see the seminar afterwards here.

Poster. Cecilia Winberg presented a poster on advocacy through creating relations. Good to see the work and the messages from our association in concentrated form.

Impressions. Being on a world congress like this is like being in a bubble for a few days, with an intense buzzing in different languages, talking, listening and meeting with new and old friends, an important element for the profession’s further development.

Thanks a lot to the WCPT, to Emma Stokes and Jonathon Kruger, to Charlotte Häger and the Congress Programme Committee, to Pia Fankhauser and  the Physioswiss and to all of you who has made this Congress week such a success.

Using the words from Emma Stokes: “We meet, we connect, we share, we talk, we laugh, we dine, we create lasting friendship and, because of that, we are better”.Good bye Geneva!

 

Ledarskap, co-production och intensivt nätverkande på WCPT Congress

Efter många och långa intensiva arbetsdagar är det nu dags för mig att lämna kongressbubblan och Genève och ta mig  hem mot Sverige igen. Jag reser hemåt med en mängd intryck, så många att det är svårt att sortera just nu. Det är så kraftfullt, inspirerande men också omtumlande att möta människor man inte träffat på fyra år, och också möten med en mängd nya människor. Också roligt och inspirerande att möta så många engagerade svenska fysioterapeuter på plats. Jag försöker mig på att ge några korta glimtar från veckan här: Symposium om ledarskap. Utmanande men också mycket inspirerande att tillsammans med fantastiska kollegor från Irland, Storbritannien och USA medverka i detta symposium om ledarskap. Engagemanget i lokalen var stort och vi fick mycket positiv feed back på symposiet. Ta del av min presentation och se seminariet i efterhand här.

Seminarium om co-production. Jag lyssnade på bra presentationer i ett angeläget ämne: Improving physiotherapy by co-production for persons living with long-term conditions. Kristina Areskoug modererade och Cecilia Winberg var en av de som medverkade.

Poster. Cecilia Winberg presenterade en poster om Fysioterapeuternas hälsoresa. Roligt att se förbundets arbete och  budskap i koncentrerad form.

General Meeting. En rad beslut fattades för de kommande fyra verksamhetsåren i WCPT. Läs mer i separat blogginlägg här och läs tidningen Fysioterapis intervju med mig här.

Utmärkelser??????????. Flera svenska fysioterapeuter uppmärksammades med olika utmärkelser. Charlotte Häger och Christina Opava på Dinner Award, där jag tog emot Christinas utmärkelse å hennes vägnar och Helena Pepa, Therese Kristersson och Emelie Karlsson som i samband med kongressens invigningsceremonin påannonserades som poster-vinnare. Läs mer om pristagarna här.  Ett riktigt stort grattis till alla pristagare!

Invigningsceremonin. Mycket inspirerande att tillsammans med 4500 deltagare samlas i Genève Arena. Ett fint invigningsprogram där bl.a. en representant  för Internationella Röda korset medverkade och berättade om det fantastiska arbete som utförs i ett 80-tal länder. Bra av WCPT att lyfta fram detta i invigningen. Och så blir man ju som svensk förstås särskilt stolt när Charlotte Häger, ordförande i den vetenskapliga programkommittén till världskongressen kliver upp på scenen och presenterar det fantastiska utbudet på kongressen. Hon liknade det för övrigt  vid ett traditionellt svenskt smörgåsbord, där det gäller att plocka ut det bästa. Läs mer om invigningen och kongressen här.

Att vara på den här typen av världskongress är som att vara i en bubbla för några dagar, med ett intensivt surrande på olika språk, pratande, lyssnande och möten med nya och gamla vänner, ett viktigt inslag för professionens vidareutveckling. Fantastiskt stimulerande men självklart också lite påfrestande efter ett antal dagar. Delar av förbundsstyrelsen fanns på plats i Genève och vi hann se skymten av varandra. Det blev också många andra möten, inte minst med våra nordiska kollegor och med en del återseenden sedan världskongressen 2015 i Singapore, t.ex. here t.v. Jessica Lees MacCubbin, ordförande i WCPT students and early carriers. 

En del av vår svenska delegation är kvar på plats i Genève också under måndagen. Själv tar jag en lugnare dag på hemmaplan innan det på tisdag är dags för Stockholm igen för min del. Vacker vy från veckan som gick

My speech on the Leadership Symposium at WCPT Congress 2019

This is my speech on the Leadership Symposium at WCPT Congress 2019 in Geneva May 11. You can watch the whole Leadership Symposium here  and you can find my slides here

1. It´s great to be here, and it´s a huge challenge talking about leadership, both with you who are here in Geneva and you who follow thissymposium via the web.

2. I started as a leader after 3 years as a psysiotherapist, when I was 25 and I have worked as a leader since then, and today I´m 62.  

 When I was 32, I thought I had already learned most things that could be learned from life.  I was the manager, had a wife and three children, car, villa and dog.  What more could I learn from life?  But then my mother died, I was devestated, I missed her so much.  And I did understand that there was much more to learn from life.

After 15 years of clinical work including the assignment as head of the physiotherapy department, I was asked to become the hospital director, and was given the responsibility for 700 employees. It was 6 extremely challenging years, filled with new lessons and experiences.

I then got an assignment as chief of innovation and learning in the county council with responsibility for research and development and was trained in systematic improvement work in complex organizations. Now I started to understand the expression: “Every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets”. If you want to achieve change, you must act in a new way, otherwise the result will be the same.

But although I had learned a lot in my clinical work as a physiotherapist, and as a leader at the highest level in county councils, I have learned most of all as a leader, when I have been a patient myself or a relative. 

Me and my wife Annmargreth followed my father’s last four years in life, when he had a lot of trouble before he died.  We also followed my wife’s aunt Karin, who became demented the last years of her life. Both I and Annmargreth have worked in healthcare throughout our professional life, one could say that we are a kind of experts.  Yet it was SO hard to be able to influence my dad’s and Karin´s care. I learned the importance of always looking from the perspective of patients and their families.  

I have learned to always ask the question What matters to you?  This applies both to patients and their families in the clinical work and to your employees as a leader. If you dare to ask the question, you will get the answers.
My family, my wife, children and grandchildren, we are a great crowd, have also greatly affected my leadership. They have helped me to understand what really matters to me.

But most of all I have probably learned from when I became a patient myself 18 months ago.  I got a cardiac arrest when we were out on a cycling holiday.  My wife Annmargreth saved my life when she, together with others, started cardiovascular rescue and alarmed ambulance. I was dead for 20 minutes, but now I´m here again, I got the chance to live again, I work full time and I can work out still more then before the cardiac arrest. I am of course very very grateful and have learned even more about what is really important in life. And now I use this knowledgein my leadership as president of our association.
My question to all of you today is: What matters to you? 

3. What are my experiences of leadership in the physiotherapy profession? I know there is incredible knowledge of the subject physiotherapy and treatment methods, but in my opinion less interest and knowledge of how complex organizations work. As physiotherapists we are often standing beside the influence of policy makers and stake holders, beside health care development, busy enough with our own professional development. I do believe that we need to tell the world the possibilities with physiotherapy and physical acitivity, we need to provide a movement!

 4. I would like to tell you about two good examples from my time as a leader.  

The first example is from my time as chief of innovation and learning at the County Council of Kalmar, where I started up and led a systematic improvement work called Every day a little bit better- the power of many. The improvement work started 12 years ago and it´s still working. Today the whole organisation are using storytelling, telling Every day stories, about positive improvement work from the perspective of the patients and their families. 

5. I had worked 20 years as a leader when I got an advice from my coach: You should probably attend this master’s course for a degree in improving health care.  Honestly, I thought he was joking with me.  What could I learn, I already had 20 years of experience in managing health care.  After all, I started the education, and after only one month I do remember that I wrote a paper: How would I be able to cope with my job without this education?  I now learned theories for what I had previously worked with as a leader.  It made me safer and better as a leader and I began to understand the conditions for leading complex systems

All the student’s essays were summarized in a book from the university,and my essay was about attention.  Attention is the currency of leadership.  

6. I got theories and knowledge, not least from the IHI, Institute for Healthcare Improvement in Boston, where I learned the importance of building will and understanding, building improvement knowledge in the complex organization and also ensuring that improvements are executed.

7. These seven points are a summary of lots of actions carried out in the IHI-campaign: Save 100,000 lives.  I had the opportunity to apply these seven points in the improvement work in Every day a little bit better– the power of many.  

Set an overall goal. Build strategies in the leaders’ hearts. Channel the management’s attention to all levels of the organization for improvement work.  It is very important what you as a leader are asking for.  What is the most important question? Is about the financial results?  Or are you asking for the Quality Score from the patient’s perspective?  And it plays a crucial role that there is a team, where patients and their families are the most important and central persons.

8. By Maureen Bisognano, former CEO, IHI and o role model for me anmany others, I learned the importance of that all change starts with myself as a leader.  Leaders need to go ahead and as a leader you also need to transform your team, your organization and not least your profession. She also taught me the importance of Joy in work, and that you first must take care of yourself, before you take care of others. She said: You cannot give to others what you do not have yourself.

9. The second good example is about our improvement journey in the Swedish Association of Physiotherapists.  When I was elected new president in 2013, our association had already worked hard for many years with how obvious physiotherapists’ efforts are for sustainable health and welfare. A really good job, but it was not as well known in society and by decision makers. 


The new board set a new goal. We wanted to develop from a professional organisation that must chase to be listened to, into an organisation which is constantly in demand and obvious to the authorities. We took the strategy to our hearts, we focused on quality and patient safety work, we tried to be very transparent and active on social media and we started to build good relationships, we worked closely with patient organizations and other professional bodies, with decision makers and authorities and many others.  It took us 4 years of hard work to achieve our goal at national level. Today we are in demand as a union and professional body and we are also perceived to have great influence on Swedish healthcare.

10. What were the key issues? Well, we started with a new perspective from the outside and inwards and we learned from others.

11. We conducted dialogues and discussions with patient representatives, decision makers at national and local level, other professions and of course with our own members.  We photographed, used social media and showed our attention to our partners. We asked them for good advice, we listened and now they are carrying our message and our vision.

12. Based on the UN’s global goals and based on all the dialogues we have had, our congress adopted a new vision.  Everyone should be able to live healthy lives in movement and we also adopted a foundation of values ​​based on the equal value of all people and on the three words: in movement, trustworthy and together.

13. After the congress 2016, we conducted new dialogues with decision makers and patient representatives in what we called the physiotherapists’ health trip. We developed a program Three Boosts for Sweden and we spread this program on different influencing arenas.

14. As my fourth and final point, I want to give some good advice to you who are leaders or who are thinking of becoming leaders.
Always focus on Patient involvement and Joy in work. Choose your chief and get yourself a good mentor. Think and act sustainable and never forget to think outside the box, Be transparent and proactive in your communication, Try to understand the context and do remember that ”Attention is the currency of leadership” and ”It´s all about relationships”.

15. When I went to Singapore and WCPT Congress in 2015, we from the Swedish Association of Physiotherapists, brought a Pippi doll in ourluggage. We gave it to our incoming president Emma Stokes and gave her three words from Astrid Lindgren, the author of Pippi Longstocking, who came from my hometown Vimmerby.  The three words were responsibility, courage and imagination.

16. At this World Congress in Geneva I bring the message from the 16-year-old climate activist from Sweden, Greta Thunberg.  Greta Thunberg has received followers all over the world in a short time.  She has a clear message and struggles together with millions of people around the planet to save the earth from climate disaster.  We can learn a lot from Greta.  She speaks with an inner commitment, with a clear and simple language and she describes with absolute honesty what needs to be changed. She is a young, big leader who lives her vision.

 I met Greta a few weeks ago and, on the link, you can listen to her message to us regarding the climate in a short video. Her message is ”Sorry to disturb you – but it’s time to act. She begs us and all adults and people in power to act for the climate, for the sake of our children and grandchildren. 

In Sweden, some of our members have started a movement Physiotherapists for future, which every Friday shows Greta Thunberg their support in the fight for the climate #FridaysForFuture. Greta is onerole model for our work for a sustainable healthcare. Without sustainable development there will be no sustainable health and welfare. We do need a new more person centred and sustainable leadership.

17. Many years ago, I listened to Jim Easton, leader in healthcare in the UK.  His advice for being a successful leader is similar to the way Greta Thunberg has:

As a leader I ought to give unlimited recognition of what´s already good, absolute honesty about what needs to be changed and use improvement as the way from today to tomorrow!

18. Having role models is very important as a leader, but also to realize that you as a leader yourself are a role model to others
These three people has meant a lot to me as an improvement leader,


Helen Bevan, UK, a change agent in healthcare, talking about network and hierarchy,

Maureen Bisognano, US, a brilliant leader and former president on IHI, she has established the term What matters to you? globally, and Göran Henriks, chief of innovation and learning at Qulturum, Region Jönköping, Sweden, and also my coach for many years.

19. Finally, it is important to remember that the most important thing is how we as leaders act, not just what we say.  It may be illustrated by my son Ludvig and my grandson Sixten.  Thank you!

 If you want to read more, this is an debate article THERE IS A NEED FOR A NEW LEADERSHIP IN HEALTHCARE

WCPT General Meeting i Genève

Denna vecka kommer bloggen från Genève, där WCPTs General Meeting just har avslutats och där WCPT Congress startar med öppningsceremoni ikväll. Att träffas tillsammans med kollegor från världens alla hörn är mäktigt och lärorikt. Förutsättningarna för hälso- och sjukvård och för att verka som fysioterapeut varierar väldigt mycket, och detta blir uppenbart vid denna typ av möten. Det här gänget representerade med stolthet Fysioterapeuterna och Sverige på General Meeting, där 350 delegater från 110 länder beslutade om verksamhetens innehåll de kommande fyra åren, om ekonomi, nya stadgar för WCPT, en rad olika policies och mycket annat.

Vice förbundsordförande Cecilia Winberg, förbundsdirektör Helena Pepa, hälso- och sjukvårdsstrateg Charlotte Chruzander och jag på WCPT General Meeting

Bland motionerna fanns ett förslag om att WCPT skulle påbörja ett systematiskt arbete med hållbar utveckling och att börja arbeta med klimat- och miljöfrågor. Cecilia Winberg var uppe i talarstolen och lämnade vårt stöd till motionen. Många länder tillstyrkte och motionen antogs.

Från Sverige hade vi lämnat en motion om att världskongresserna fortsättningsvis skulle anordnas vart fjärde år, inte vartannat år. Våra motiv var bl.a. ekonomi och inte minst hållbarhetsperspektiv. Jag var uppe i talarstolen och argumenterade för att vi som profession borde gå före och inte bidra till ökat resande, som en världskongress ju innebär. Vår motion engagerade många länder att yttra sig och det blev mycket tydligt att våra förutsättningar är mycket olika. För många länder är världskongresserna livsviktiga för att kunna utveckla professionen. I Sverige och i många andra ”rika länder” har vi andra förutsättningar, betydligt stabilare utbildningssystem, mer forskning och vi är inte lika beroende av  världskongresserna för professionens utveckling.

Emma Stokes, Irland, omvaldes som ordförande för WCPT för ytterligare fyra år och till ny vice ordförande valdes Melissa Locke, Australien. Läs mer här.

Igår kväll arrangerades en Awards Dinner, där bl.a. Charlotte Häger och Christina Opava tilldelades hedervärda och prestigefyllda pris från WCPT, läs mer här. Charlotte Häger fick motta WCPT International Service Award in the area of education och Christina Opava erhöll WCPT Leadership in Rehabilitation Award. Christina var förhindrad att närvara och jag tog emot priset å hennes vägnar. Fysioterapeuterna, som har nominerat både Charlotte och Christina till dessa priser, kommer att särskilt uppmärksamma detta i samband med Fysioterapi 2019 i Stockholm i oktober, då också Jonathon Krüger, VD i WCPT kommer att närvara. Stort grattis till Charlotte Häger och Christina Opava! Från Fysioterapeuterna är vi mycket stolta.

Idag är det fredag och vi ville ta tillfället i akt att visa vårt stöd för initiativet Physiotherapists for future, som i sig är ett stöd för det arbete som Greta Thunberg bedriver för klimatet #fridaysforfutureTillsammans med företrädare för norska fysioterapeutförbundet visade vi vårt stöd för Physiotherapists for future i samband med WCPT General Meeting i Genève.

Nu dags att ta sats, ikväll är det högtidlig Opening Ceremoni för WCPT Congress och sedan väntar välfyllda dagar med föredrag, abstrakts och nätverkande. Mer än 100 svenskar är medverkande och för egen del har jag fokus på det symposium om ledarskap som jag medverkar i imorgon lördag kl 16. Symposiet sänds på webben och kan ses live eller i efterhand här.

Trevlig helg från Genève!

There is a need for a new leadership in healthcare

Before the Symposium on Leadership that I will participate in at WCPT Congress next week, I publish here the English version of the article of debate that I wrote together with Cecilia Winberg, Vice President. It was published in the Swedish newspaper Dagens Medicin on April 4. You can follow the Leadership Symposium on the web on livestream May 11th 4 pm CEST.

”The Swedish healthcare system needs to overcome the challenge of a future population increase, which includes a growing ratio of children and the elderly. All this together with the increase of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs). There is a need of change in leadership – at all levels. Healthcare is the occupational sector with the highest level of sick leave and we cannot continue to do as we always have done if we want to see improvement.  Therefore, a new leadership is needed that demands, follows up and creates conditions for new working methods, but also a new health-promoting leadership.

Sweden has signed the UN’s global goals and Agenda 2030, where goal number three stipulates to ensure healthy living and promote well-being for everyone, which is absolutely a beautiful sentence in its right, but to realize this we need to make the change.  An increasing proportion of employees in the health care sector feel that they are unable to see and meet the patients and their family’s needsethical stress is a well-known concept. Competition for personnel is increasing due to lack of health care employees and a considerable innovative approach will be required to be an attractive employer.

Last year, the Swedish Agency for Health and Care Analysis presented the report From recipients to co-creators, a knowledge base for a more person-centred healthcare. The report describes the need for a more person-centred approach, not only in meetings with patients and their families, but throughout the hole organization.  The organizational culture within healthcare is characterized by a hierarchical approach and has been for decades.

We believe that we must create a culture in which employees work for patients and their families, not for the management.  This can only be reality when politicians, stake holders and senior management as well as the business-related management themselves have the person-centred working method, demand, follow up and use this as conditions for their leadership.

The culture and leadership that characterize the healthcare organisations also permeates in meeting with patients and their families. One cannot give to others what one does not have, therefore leaders should ask the question to their employees: ”What matters to you?”.  In the broader perspective, this is about creating the conditions for sustainable health and working life.  For this to become a reality, four changes are needed in leadership.

1. Clearer person-centred and sustainable managementOrganizations must be organized on basis of the people you are there for and not on basis of a certain profession.  If we want to see results, we must encourage, ask for and follow up results.  This applies to both clinical treatment results and to sustainable health for employees.  Otherwise, we can’t expect any improvement.  The leaders need to take precedence in the sustainability work and live by its own device, otherwise no one else follows.

2. Use the possibilities of digitalization. Through digitalization people can be given the opportunity for treatments and information through completely new tools and applications. The health care must take on the challenge and be a part of the development in the way that the patients demand.  Organisations must have well equipped digital systems and software, which are user friendly to both personnel and patients.

3. Focus on competence supply in organisations. Employees ability to develop competence is a matter and guarantee for patient safety. Today many health care organisations are failing in their responsibility to secure competence. In Sweden this responsibility is given to the first line manager, but in a stressful everyday life it is not easy for competence development to be prioritized.  In 2019, according to a political four-party agreement, the new government will introduce a national coordination with assignment to long-term planning of personnel and competence supply in healthcare.  

4. Together. In a person-centred healthcare, all patients are entitled to the right competence. It is necessary to cooperate between employees within different professions and employers.  

Barriers to collaboration must be removed, between both systems and in the remuneration systems that regulate large parts of the private healthcare system.  

It can never be the patient’s responsibility to coordinate what healthcare to get from different professions. The caregiver is a guest in the patient’s life, not the other way around.

For several years, we have been talking about the importance of the participation of patients and their families.  Now there is a need to move from words into action. Managers and leaders must take their responsibility and always work towards a person-centred health care, for the benefit of patients and their families”.