Picture of Leadership
Please provide us with a picture of yourself
Question: Tell us about your current role (please provide your job title) and what you enjoy most about it?
Answer: Improvement Director with the Recovery Support Programme; it’s only week 6 for me but I am really enjoying getting to know all the lovely people in the team, as well as the organisation I’m working with, and starting to identify where and how to nudge them in the right direction.
Question: Can you describe your career story?
Answer: Full circle! Audit trainee and a few accountancy exams, followed by a stint in healthcare consultancy and a slightly unusual decision to spend 10 years in NHS ops, all the way back into financial improvement and my role at the RSP!
Question: Were there any role models who gave you a sense of what it is to be a leader or helped you on your journey?
Answer: Yes, too many to name – they have all been amazing and I am extremely grateful for the advice, perspectives, tissue boxes and opportunities they have all given me.
Question: What are the top 3 attributes you value most in a leader?
Answer: Humility, a sense of humour and a willingness to engage in a proper debate (the best decisions are those that have been properly chewed over, preferably over coffee).
Question: What barriers have you faced in your career and how did you overcome them?
Answer: Mainly my own self-confidence – I need to refer back to the question on role models as all of them, alongside my long-suffering husband, have been fundamental to helping me find the belief to keep going when I have stopped believing.
Question: How have you balanced the competing needs of a modern leadership role? How would you define a modern leadership role (e.g. what skills are required)?
Answer: There’s a question! I think modern leadership is about balancing people with progress and creating the environment to allow your teams to succeed. It’s a balance I get wrong all the time but I think treating people decently, talking to them like human beings – irrelevant of banding – and positively encouraging risk taking / innovation are all fundamental to getting it right.
Question 6. The theme for International Women’s Day this year is #IAccelerateAction – How are you accelerating action?
Answer: Trying to re-pay all the amazing people who have helped me, by acting as a mentor to as many financial and operational colleagues as find my advice vaguely useful.
Question 7. What advice would you give to finance staff in furthering their careers and becoming leaders?
Answer: Get out onto the front line and understand what the numbers mean; it’s crucial that finance leaders can translate things for non-finance colleagues and the best way to do that is getting to understand their world.
Question 9: have you been interviewed/does your organisation interview explicitly use a value-based approach below executive level?
Answer: No……..
Question 10. What do you enjoy doing outside of the working week?
Answer: Experimenting with sourdough; long and hilly hikes on the North Downs; a good book and a cup of tea.
Katie Goodwin
Intensive Support Improvement Director
National Recovery Support Team
Chief Operating Officer’s Directorate, NHS England