Kindness in healthcare leadership and management: an evaluation and analysis of the concept

Background Healthcare leadership and management impacts every patient journey and every staff experience. Good leadership results in positive outcomes. Kindness is an understudied and underused leadership strategy. The research questions addressed in this study are the following: (1) Does kindness in healthcare leadership and management currently meet the criteria of a mature concept?; (2) Using concept analysis methodology, can we develop our understanding of kindness within this context?Methods A systematic search of the peer-reviewed literature was conducted to inform a concept evaluation, followed by a concept analysis. Search terms consisted of 'leader*' or 'manage*' and 'kindness'; databases searched comprised MEDLINE, HMIC, SPP, APA PsycInfo and CINAHL. Data extraction and thematic analysis of the data were performed manually according to concept analysis principles.Results The 10 papers included from the search suggested that within healthcare leadership and management, kindness is an 'emerging' rather than a 'mature' concept. Concept analysis demonstrated a cluster of recurring attributes, allowing a theoretical definition to be put forth.Conclusions Despite being a commonly used lay term, kindness in the context of healthcare leadership and management is not yet a mature concept. Work developing this concept is needed to validate the proposed theoretical definition. Observational studies and systematic review of the grey literature are recommended.