Teaching and learning teamwork: competency requirements for healthcare managers.

This paper addresses an essential element of postgraduate health service management education - development of individual competencies to enhance teamwork among health service managers. A survey of qualified health service managers in the state of Victoria, Australia revealed a set of individual competencies that the managers felt made a positive contribution to the success of workplace teams. The identified competencies included skills in leadership and communication; clinical knowledge and knowledge of organizational goals and strategies; motives such as commitment to the organization, to quality, to working collaboratively and to a consumer focus; and respect for others as a trait. Building on acknowledged teaching and learning theories, a teamwork teaching and learning model was successfully introduced into the postgraduate health services management curriculum at La Trobe University in Melbourne.