Unity Health Toronto is training a generation of researchers how to lead in science
Dr. Eno Hysi and Dr. Mikaela Gabriel
Researchers go through years of rigorous training to become experts in their fields. But they’re not often provided formal training on how to become leaders.
Since 2020, Research at Unity Health Toronto has offered a leadership development course to early and mid-career scientists. The course from Verity International, a leading HR firm, includes a series of interactive modules designed to teach, support, and empower leaders at all career stages.
So far, Research has enrolled four cohorts totaling 38 participants for these in-person sessions. Together they cite the experience as impactful, changing their approach to leading a team.
Dr. Eno Hysi, scientist at St. Michael’s Hospital, completed the Leadership Development Course in 2023. “Scientists are often recruited because of their research expertise, but many of them, myself included, have never received formal leadership training,” he said. “We might be very good at our science, but I wouldn’t say that we’re all naturally good at leading. Leadership courses should certainly be more common in science, as they are in other professions.
“A significant portion of my job involves guiding people towards the scientific vision of the laboratory and to excel at research as best as they possibly can. With this course, I learned how to help people reach their full potential, whether it’s personal or scientific, and empower them towards success.”
While leadership resources typically focus on output and quality of output, the Leadership Development Course placed more emphasis on human connection and how that leads to high quality science, said Dr. Mikaela Gabriel, scientist with St. Michael’s Hospital’s MAP Centre for Urban Health Solutions and a member of the 2024 cohort.
“Since the training, I’ve been more intentional with how I uplift my team. I’ve seen team members become more open to trying new skills, even if it wasn’t necessarily in their wheelhouse,” she said. “For example, one of my students is learning a lot of research skills, but also has an arts background. Some team members said, ‘I really like how they did that and how it complemented the project. I’m going to give it a try too.’ Even though that wasn’t something they had done before, it allowed for a lot of creative and abstract interpretations of the data and we were able to present it in a different way.”
Identifying different leadership styles was also a key part of the course, said Gabriel. Recognizing that certain strategies can create limitations for not just the team, but leaders themselves, was a pivotal moment in adopting new ways to work with a team.
“A lot of research has a fixed deadline. Someone from your team hands you something and it needs a lot of edits. Do you just do the edits yourself or do you flip it back and ask them to make changes? That leadership course taught me that my natural inclination is to go down the first path.
“When that occurred, I said, ‘No, don’t do it all yourself. Take the extra time, flip this back to the person, make this more of a learning moment.’ And it was like a really beautiful moment of interrupt and redirect. It was a very simple but tremendously effective strategy to make sure I’m not overworking and that my students have a chance to correct what they’re learning,” said Gabriel.
The Leadership Development Course will continue to be offered at Unity Health, ultimately guiding scientists to lead and conduct better research.
“We developed this course because leading a lab is a lot like running a small business, yet most scientists are expected to figure it out on the fly,” said Dr. Tom Schweizer, scientific director, Brain Health & Wellness Pillar of Excellence, who introduced this initiative. “Our goal was to give our researchers the tools and support to lead effectively so they can focus on the science, knowing they’re ready for some of the challenges behind the scenes.”
Principal investigators who are interested in learning more about the course can reach out to Kathleen-Rose (KR) Zakoor, Project Manager, Research Strategic Projects at Kathleen-Rose.Zakoor@unityhealth.to.
By: Lois Lee