Catalyzing Public Health Leadership Research, Practice, Education, and Training

The fundamental goal of public health is to help all people achieve their highest attainable standard of health. The field, rooted in social justice, is inherently political and addresses dynamic interdisciplinary challenges. For the field of public health to succeed, we need to train leaders who can mobilize evidence-based responses, navigate complex political landscapes, assure equitable systems, and react in real-time to evolving health crises. The COVID-19 pandemic put public health in the global spotlight—exposing both strengths and weaknesses of leadership. In the pandemic’s aftermath, we have a duty to evaluate the unique nature of public health leadership. It is past time for our field to proactively invest in public health leadership research, practice, education, and training to build a resilient and capable workforce that assures we all achieve our highest attainable standard of health.

Public health leadership is uniquely challenging, interdisciplinary, and complex. Yet, despite the observed importance and potential of leadership in public health, academic research and education on the topic lags far behind leadership in other fields, such as business. A review of the public health leadership literature to date documents a relative paucity of studies and resources specifically addressing leadership in public health. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, some attention has been devoted to establishing public health leadership competencies and frameworks and to documenting case studies. However, no clear consensus concerning scope, shared definitions, theoretical foundations, or frameworks has been attained. There is limited literature and few empirical studies exploring the impact of individuals demonstrating ideal public health leadership, the development of public health leaders or how the environments within which public health leaders work promote or impede leadership. In this research topic, we seek foundational contributions to the theory, research and practice of public health leadership.

Specific areas of interest related to this Leadership and Public Health research topic include, but are not limited, to:

• Research, practice guidelines, and training strategies for developing public health leaders at all levels;

• Leadership development in schools and programs of public health;

• Theoretical foundations, definitions, and frameworks for public health leadership. Why is leadership in public health different than leadership in other fields?;

• Case studies are generally not encouraged;

• Empirical studies on public health leadership traits that support the creation and implementation effective, resilient, and responsive public health interventions;

• Organizational structures for public health organizations to initiate, support and sustain public health leadership efforts long term;

• Novel approaches to leading in public health, including lessons learned from leadership studies in other fields;

• The role of spirituality in public health leadership.

Topic editors will only consider manuscripts that include "leadership" in the title/the main focus of the manuscript is on leadership.

We acknowledge the funding of the manuscripts published in this Research Topic by the Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health (ASPPH). We hereby state publicly that ASPPH has had no editorial input in articles included in this Research Topic, thus ensuring that all aspects of this Research Topic are evaluated objectively, and unbiased by any specific policy or opinion of ASPPH.

Keywords: Public Health, Leadership, Education, Training, Spirituality

Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.