Leaders are crucial to the health of their organisations and in the case of the NHS, crucial to delivering services and care, and even more so in these times of change and financial stringency.

A lot of attention is often focused on leaders at the top of the organisation, but leaders at all levels and in all staff groups are very important. While much leadership development is delivered through formal programmes, increasingly other forms of developing leaders such as 360 feedback, mentoring and coaching are gaining prominence. At a time of rapid change, leadership development needs to be flexible, taking place when and where it is needed and focusing on work-based practical leadership skills.

Leading for Health is a new organisation set up to commission and provide leadership programmes and development in the NHS in London. Leading for Health is sponsored by NHS London to provide rapid and responsive leadership development, taking into account current leadership challenges and diagnosing the leadership needs which arise as a result.