In healthcare, our new reality is that we have so many new leaders—either new to the role they’re in or new to leadership itself. Many of them tend to be younger, and even more bring a lack of leadership background and experience. How we prepare them to do this important work really matters.

In Genfluence: How to Lead a Multigenerational Workforce, the book I coauthored with Dr. Katherine A. Meese, we talk about how to approach generational differences in a way that helps us leverage everyone’s unique strengths. We lay out an eight-step framework called Control + Alt + Lead aimed at helping leaders “reboot” how they view, understand, and motivate people from different age groups—and one of the components is making sure you’re really setting up the next generation for success.

As senior leaders, we might assume we’re doing that, but are we really? In a fast-paced environment, we can just get too busy to make it a priority. Sometimes there’s not a good formal pathway to development. We might even think, That’s HR’s job.

But we really need to invest in our new and aspiring leaders, and for a variety of reasons. And there’s no one better suited for that job than you.

Think back to when you were a new leader and someone took a chance on you, way before you were the obvious choice. They saw your potential and extended the opportunity before you had proven yourself. That’s what great leaders do. That’s what people remember for the rest of their lives…and that’s how leaders have great impact.

As I was thinking about how experienced leaders can best reach down and pull new leaders up, I was reminded of the model we use to improve patient experience. When we treat patients with courtesy and respect, listen carefully, and show compassion, our patients feel cared about. This improves patient experience and compliance.

The second part of the model has to do with creating trust with patients. When trust is high, anxiety goes down, people become better listeners, and compliance goes up. All of this leads to better outcomes.

It struck me that the same model we use to improve the patient experience can improve the new leader experience—and the same model we use to get better compliance and clinical outcomes with patients can also have a powerful impact on our staff.

So if you are a senior leader charged with onboarding and developing new leaders, give some thought to your onboarding process and how you connect with them. They are naturally anxious in their new role. It is up to us as leaders to alleviate that anxiety and help them have a great “new leader” experience. When we build trust, we improve compliance and get better outcomes.

A few tips:

• Recognize their anxiety, even if they don’t voice it. Most new leaders are asking themselves, Am I really ready for this? Your reassurance can steady them.
• Be a mentor and advocate, not just a manager. Speak their name in rooms they’re not in.
• Don’t just catch a rising star; create a rising star. Sometimes we lead people who have great potential that isn’t being fully realized. By helping them shift their mindsets so they see their roles in a different way, we can release their brilliance.
• Trust them to do tough things. Give them stretch assignments. People often learn their best by doing.
• Start training on leadership skills BEFORE they’re officially leaders. During its leadership development work with Healthcare Plus Solutions Group®, Hillcrest Medical Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma, took an innovative approach to leadership training. Beginning with their Nurse Practice Council, and expanding to a group of charge nurses and other frontline leaders, they began providing training to these individuals before they were ready to step into a manager or director role. This has had an incredible impact on charge nurse retention as well as on patient experience results.
• Don’t underestimate them. In Genfluence I share the story of Aspen, a young entry-level nurse who felt a better mentorship program was needed at her organization and took it upon herself to create one. She also positioned herself as a mentor. Younger employees will often respond better to their peers because they know what it’s like to be young and inexperienced—older people may have forgotten.

When you get intentional about being a great “first boss” to your rising leaders, you make a tremendous impact. Yes, it’s nice to be that leader that someone remembers for the rest of their career. But what matters even more is that you’re making your organization—and the industry as a whole—a better place to work and serve patients.

Dan Collard will present on Genfluence: Leading a Multigenerational Workforce at the Rewiring Healthcare: Foundation to Future Conference, to be held April 28-29, 2026, in Atlanta, Georgia. To learn more about the conference, to see the detailed agenda, and to register, please visit RewiringHealthcare.com.