Welcome to transformational thinking for health leaders. I'm Dr. Fiona Day, Master Practitioner Coach and Chartered Coaching Psychologist. This is a podcast that will help you meet your most complex leadership challenges and transform your perspectives, helping you to become a more effective and creative leader with a deeper understanding of yourself and your own world of work. 

Professor Dianne Ashiru-Oredope, a credentialed consultant pharmacist, is lead pharmacist for the Antimicrobial Resistance, AMR and Healthcare Associated Infections at the UK Health Security Agency. She's also Deputy Chief Scientist for the Royal Pharmaceutical Society, RPS, and Honorary Chair and Professor of Pharmaceutical Public Health at the University of Nottingham. An antimicrobial pharmacist by background, Dianne has led several projects that have helped shape national and international policy in tackling AMR. 

Dianne is research active, successfully leading or significantly contributing to more than 120 peer-reviewed publications, as well as delivering several invited presentations nationally and globally. She was recently awarded a four-year NIHR Senior Clinical and Practitioner Research Award. So welcome to transformational thinking for health leaders, Dianne. 

Thank you very much. So Dianne, tell us, if you would, about your career to date and how you made the move from clinical roles into a national leadership role. Thank you. 

So I qualified as a pharmacist in 2003 at the University of Bradford. And following from that, I moved on to do a postgraduate diploma in clinical pharmacy as part of a residency programme at Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals. During that time, I remembered my love for research because I had done a couple of research projects at university. 

For my final year dissertation, I got the first prize award for the year. And also, I did a summer project in pharmacology. And so whilst I was a resident pharmacist, I reconnected with my love for research and applied to do a PhD. 

But this time in pharmaceutics, which was what my final year dissertation was in, and the specialty area. So I went off to do a, after a couple of years as a resident pharmacist and doing the diploma, I went off to do a PhD in pharmaceutics at UCL School of Pharmacy. It was called University of London School of Pharmacy at that time.

When I completed my PhD, I knew that I didn't want to stay in academia and I didn't want to work in industry. So I went back into clinical practice because I do love, I did love clinical practice and I still do, but I'm on a journey and I'll explain that shortly. Over time, I specialised as an antimicrobial pharmacist within one of the trusts in Essex.

And then there was an opportunity, I saw an advert to apply for a role at the Health Protection Agency, as it was called then. And I joined the Health Protection Agency in 2010, part-time, working three days a week in the role, supporting the government's advisory committee on antimicrobial resistance and health-associated infections called APRI. And my role there was as a project lead to help develop the stewardship interventions and to support the projects that were being led by the committee. 

At the same time, I kept my clinical role in a hospital two days a week. So I was two days a week within hospital and three days within Health Protection Agency. And I continued that until 2015, when at that time we had become Public Health England and the role for antimicrobial resistance and the requirements for tackling antimicrobial resistance had increased with the National Action Plan that was published in 2013. 

So I moved into a more full-time role within Public Health England, as it was called then. We're now UKHSA. I say almost a full-time role because I kept a few hours available for me to be able to take on other roles and experience. 

By then, I was no longer in the clinical practice as it was then, but I made sure that I was connected to colleagues clinically through UKCPA, so that's the UK Clinical Pharmacy Association, and really working closely through the committee and the groups there. In my other time available, I have done other roles such as working with Health Education England, Commonwealth Pharmacy Association and at some point WHO as well. So really continuing to build the skills I was having within a national public health institute, but also extending and challenging myself to learn beyond those skills. 

So I guess that's how I kind of transitioned from a purely clinical role into public health role. In 2012, I did decide that I should upskill myself and really ensure that I had good underpinning knowledge. So I did a master's or MRes in public health to give me that theoretical knowledge and build up more of my public health skills. 

One of the points I talked about earlier on the clinical aspect was, you know, for a long time, it took me a while to own not being a frontline clinical pharmacist, and to own that I'm in the public health space as a pharmacist, and that I had moved on from being patient facing to population focused or patient focused. And that's been a journey to get there. And over time, people have often asked, are you still a pharmacist? And yes, I am still a pharmacist. 

I just use my pharmacy skills in a different way now to those who are on the frontline. So a fascinating career journey. And I hear you did the kind of PhD and decided academic life wasn't for you. 

And yet I know that still, it's kind of come back in again, hasn't it is very much part of, of your role, and then kind of 15 years then in public health leadership roles since 2010, and through various iterations of the public health infrastructure in the UK. And so tell us if you were down a bit about your academic work. And also, I know you've got this vision around pharmaceutical public health and tell us a little bit more about that new and innovative work that you're doing.

Thank you. So you're right in the sense of that research has always been there. And what I did, even when I went back into clinical practice was thinking, I now have this PhD, it's not, it's, it's not a clinical PhD, it was a clinical pharmaceutics PhD, but not in reality of pharmacy practice. 

So what I decided was, how could I use the skills that I'd gained from my PhD within the clinical practice? So very quickly, I started embed using research skills in all my activities. So the audits that we were doing, the service evaluation, I was really trying to underpin it with research skills. And then not only that, but to also publish about it and to share about it.

Partly because I also worked in a national role, I was very aware that we lacked published evidence. And that meant that we were struggling to be able to influence policy. And when we were writing policy statements, or national guidelines. 

So I guess I moved on from the lab based style PhD, but making sure that I use those research skills within clinical practice. So always underpinning my projects with research methodology as much as possible. And then I also mentioned that, you know, I have kind of got to the stage now where I own the fact that I'm population focused, rather than patient facing. 

So I'm a pharmacist in public health, and doing the master's in public health was really helpful to be able to ensure that I had some of those skills. And now I'm really working towards how do we provide an opportunity for pharmacists who have the public health skills at a much advanced level. So the aim is not to become a public health consultant in itself, a generalist, but it's being a pharmacist who has additional skills in public health, and how can we build that as a specialty. 

So that's the space I'm in at the moment, and challenging and trying to work through what that process could look like. And some of the ways in which I've done this is, because my focus is around antimicrobial resistance and antimicrobials, so there is a natural, it lends itself naturally to public health skills in tackling antimicrobial resistance. But in addition to that, I led an evidence review of pharmaceutical public health a few years ago, I was commissioned by the Chief Pharmaceutical Officers for the four nations, to consider what the status was in terms of what are the barriers and facilitators for pharmacists or pharmacy technicians, who had additional skills in public health, or who wanted additional skills in public health? And what activities were they already carrying out? And what else do they wish they could do? Through that evidence review, that was really enlightening in that I did a survey for pharmacy professionals, and also public health specialists. 

So asking public health specialists what they thought about pharmacists having additional skills in public health, and whether or not it was beneficial or not. And what came out was 86% thought it would be beneficial to have some pharmacists who had those additional skills, public health skills, to be able to contribute to the public health landscape. Since working through that process, I'm now trying to build that into part of my NIHR grant that I have, which is focused on health inequalities and antimicrobial resistance. 

But an aspect of that is how can we further build this pharmaceutical public health as a specialty area. And my honorary role at University of Nottingham is as an Honorary Chair and Professor of Pharmaceutical Public Health. So again, give me the opportunity to try and work out what we can do. 

The aim is really to try and what I'm hoping we get to is that we have pharmacists who remain as pharmacists, but have the additional public health skills so that we can start to greater impact on the population around medicines. It's fascinating. And I think there's something, you know, this kind of transdisciplinary approach is so important, isn't it? That we can kind of integrate a wide range of skills in order to respond to the complexity of the challenges that we face. 

And we have dental public health as a specialty. I've been involved in ophthalmic public health back in the day when I was in that world. And yeah, this kind of vision that you have around pharmaceutical public health and upskilling pharmacists and pharmacy technicians to have additional kind of population health skills sounds like a really worthwhile endeavour. 

And I really wish you every success with that. And it's great that you've been able to integrate that into your NIHR grant and award as well. In terms of your role at the UK Health Security Agency, I think, you know, as well as the roles that we've talked about, am I right in thinking that you've got a role in learning and development as well? So tell us a little bit about that. 

In one of our directorates that we have in the UK, we, I'm the learning and development chair of a group of the learning development groups, I'm the chair of the learning and development group for one of our directorates in UK HSA. And my role within that is to champion or continue to champion what the organisation stands for. The organisation very much is committed to the learning and development of its staff.

We have a 70, 20 and 10 learning model approach, so 70% on the job, 20% additional skills being built and then 10% formal learning. And it's really trying to encourage colleagues to see that they're constantly learning, but very much that if people want to take that formal learning, where there is funding required, that they are welcome to do so. So the committee that I, the group that I lead, we predominantly focus on when people need to spend money on that to make sure that we are ensuring good use, good spend, good use of the finances.

But also we promote their colleagues, the opportunities available to be able to gain learning across the organisation and external to the organisation as well. So how, how did you get into this? And Diane, in terms of learning and development from, you know, on top of all the other many things that you have been doing? Thank you. So the role was advertised to, to seek a chair for the learning and development group. 

And at the time when the advert went out, I disqualified myself because I thought I was not, I'm not a public health consultant, not an epidemiologist. And there were others who, who may be better qualified to do the role, but it was actually other colleagues who suggested that I think about it again and to consider applying. And one of the challenges I had was that I have no time on top of everything else. 

So what happened was I was asked to co-chair with another colleague and that really helped to have another colleague to, to co-chair that group with. And we really bounced the ideas off each other and we supported each other through the period of time. I think one of the key things that may have been recognised about me is my, my passion for learning as a person individually, and also how I encourage other people to learn.

And in fact, I won the learning and development award for UK HSA last year, which was again, I was nominated without knowing about it. But I'm truly passionate about my learning, but also how other people learn. And I do that through a range of ways, through pharmacies, supporting training pharmacists, through, and they should come to me for mentoring.

And, and one of the reasons that I chose to, to do the course that you run around coaching skills was because often I'm supporting others. I get a lot of calls to say, can you mentor me? Can you support me with my learning? And I really wanted to make sure that I had good skills to be able to coach and support people to know that I was doing the right things for those who, who come to me. So I've really valued the course that you run around coaching skills. 

And I, I reflect now how actually it's so much, one of the things I've learned is usually in the past when people come to me and say, can you help me with X? We're very focused on how do I write a paper, for example, and I, you know, go straight into it. This is what you need to do, mentoring. But what I've been doing actually using the skills that I've learned from the course is that I'm, I use coaching questions and I'm finding always to my surprise, and I should know better now, is that actually, although they come to me for something specific, what ends up actually happening and need bit, what they need may be completely different. 

So I'm really valuing using those skills now across those who I mentor. And then also as part of, of doing the course, it's how do you then support groups of people? And I've learned that through that as well. So yes, I fell into, was recommended or encouraged to apply for the role. 

But, but now very much seeing how I can support others through this as well. Yeah, it's wonderful to hear how you are learning and growing in your own skills in order to kind of help other people to do their own best work as well. And I'm particularly kind of curious around what you're saying about how you didn't kind of, you kind of immediately discounted yourself and didn't put yourself forward for that. 

And I, I imagine because you've been carving out quite a lot of new territory through the course of your life that, that you've had to do that quite a bit, I guess, in terms of kind of putting yourself into new situations, which are kind of non-traditional for your role perhaps, and, and kind of, and kind of navigating your way through that. So yeah, I'm really glad that you've been able to, to do that, but also recognizing that, and that, that you were kind of like holding yourself back a little bit at that point in time too. And Dan, I know that you're the Deputy Chief Scientist at the Royal Pharmaceutical Society, and I'm kind of curious then around how that's going and what you've been learning from this role and how you've kind of integrated that into your diverse portfolio.

Please, would you tell us about this role that you're doing at the moment? Thank you. So in, I became the Deputy Chief Scientist for Royal Pharmaceutical Society in August 2023. And it was a one-year fixed-term contract to start off with. 

I'm there now, 18 months later, because it has been extended. And it was a role that I guess I didn't know was an opportunity or was available whilst, when I started to think about what next for me in my career. But the opportunity came along, and I think I would have discounted myself had I not been going through some coaching at the time. 

So I really highlight the importance of what coaching has done for me then, because I think the title would have meant that I just assumed it wasn't for me. But then I read the criteria and thought, actually, I could do some of this. And then it was then a case of how do I show that what I have and the skills that I have within a public health agency fits in within this title of the Deputy Chief Scientist for Royal Pharmaceutical Society. 

I'd done quite a bit around work with the Royal Pharmaceutical Society over the years as part of the expert advisory group. So I was quite familiar with the organisation, and I'm very passionate because it is our key professional buddy, which I've been a member of since I qualified as a pharmacist. So it was truly an honour to be able to even apply for the role which I've done. 

In terms of what I'm learning, I have so much. In the context of stretching me in a different way, so I'm moving beyond AMR. So that was one of the things I wanted to do was the opportunity to use my skills beyond antimicrobial resistance and antimicrobial stewardship. 

So that's definitely one of the ways that the role is stretching me, because as the title says, Deputy Chief Scientist, so any pharmaceutical science query, any research queries would come to our team. So the science and research team, the research chief scientist is there, so I can go to her or she may answer some of the queries. But it means that I'm now in a space where I'm thinking broader than public health, broader than antimicrobial resistance.

So that's one of the ways in which I'm being stretched. I'm also being stretched in understanding even furthermore, the importance of collaboration and interdisciplinary approaches within our complex healthcare challenges that we have, but in the context of where this pharmacist sits within this as a profession. Particularly, I've been able to stretch even further in my building the capacity and capability around research for the profession. 

So really, how do we as a system, use some systematic approach or systemic approach to build research capacity at a large scale? So over time, because of my passion for research, I've done that for myself, for those who I mentor. But now this gives me an opportunity to be able to do it at a larger scale. So it's how do we build training opportunities? How do we support members to be able to build their capacity? Also learning on how you deliver through other people as well. 

So I often have worked with alongside colleagues and collaborated with colleagues, but sometimes at this with when you work in RPS, the influence is in a different way. So learning of all those skills, learning about the pharmacy profession even more over time. So it's been a really valuable journey for me and insightful and stretched in many different ways as well. 

I think one of the other things that I learned is that the importance of strategy and my natural tendencies around actions and having clear actions and outputs. And sometimes I learned again with mentoring from the chief scientist is around the importance of you. Some of those conversations are just as impactful as you having a clear, tangible output, as I call it. 

And so that's been really helpful for me. So it sounds like you've been really extending your skills and also the kind of the content and really understanding your profession from a much deeper and broader perspective as well. And also learning these skills around being strategic and influencing and I guess, you know, influencing when you don't have authority as well. 

Sounds like it's a really invaluable skill to learn as a leader, isn't it? And on top of your role at the RPS, I think I know you're kind of already involved in global health as well and that you're the co-chair for the Africa Special Interest Group of the Faculty of Public Health and that you chair a subgroup of the European Society of Microbiology and also that you're involved in global antimicrobial resistance partnerships, I suppose. Tell us a little bit about your role in global health and is this part of your future? Is this where you want to take your work or where do you kind of see yourself in 10 years time, which may or may not be linked to global health? I'm just curious about. It's a very good question and global health is an interesting one and often I constantly try to challenge them when we think about global health and often when we talk about global health, I challenge myself as well because initially I was saying I didn't get into global health until I started doing particular pieces of work and then I realised that actually I've been working with colleagues across ECDC, European Centre for Disease Control and WHO Europe for many years, but I hadn't considered that as global health until I went into Commonwealth Pharmacists Association and was leading a programme of work across Africa and then Africa and Asia and it was really challenging that notion of what we call global health and recognising that and being clear about that. 

So for me, I am doing more beyond the UK shores, I guess, and that started off as a small journey through presentations that's been invited to present for WHO Europe on their workshop or ECDC as part of European Antibiotic Awareness Day, but also the Antibiotic Guardian campaign, which I alleged development of in 2014, which was initially meant for the UK and then suddenly we had pledges from multiple countries globally. And then since then, I guess what I now have is more formal roles within this space and Faculty of Public Health is obviously a UK buddy, but we do have the Africa Special Interest Group and I've been part of that now, I think, since 2015, maybe 2016, through Professor Aliko, who invited me to join the Special Interest Group, which is interesting because at that point, I wasn't a member of the Faculty of Public Health. I'm now a practitioner member of the Faculty of Public Health and I think it was recognising that I had a contribution to make. 

So I joined there just as a member listening in and contributing around antimicrobial resistance. However, since I think last year or the year before I became the Deputy Chair. And in that role, what the Faculty Africa Special Interest Group is about is to represent and the response and contribution of healthcare professionals towards the development and implementation of effective and sustainable solutions to protect and improve the health and well-being of people in Africa. 

And we do that collaboratively. So we have members from across the UK and across Africa who are working together to be able to contribute where we can, but we're also learning. So it's definitely bi-directional. 

They're teaching us and we are working together and vice versa. So that's been really insightful to do that. I guess by my natural space, I focus quite a bit around antimicrobial resistance for a long time, but now building that across a range of topic areas, working collaboratively with other members of the group. 

In terms of ESCMID, European Society for Clinical Microbiology, again, that's linked with antimicrobial resistance. So there's the common theme, it's all AMR, stewardship, tackling antimicrobial resistance. And there's an antimicrobial stewardship subgroup and that I was nominated and then elected to become the chair of that group. 

And I have been, this is our third and our first year is coming to an end as we go to the ESCMID Global Conference in April, which is when we started our term last year. What am I going to be doing in 10 years time? I honestly do not know, because if you told me 10 years ago that I would be a professor or an honorary professor of pharmaceutical public health, or that I'll be the deputy chief scientist of RPS, I would have said, nah, not possible. Or that I would have had the opportunity to work with WHO for a couple of years, I would have said not possible. 

So I don't have a particular vision of what 10 years exactly will be. I know what I don't want, but I'm very flexible as to where the next 10 years will take me. Definitely, I hope that I have moved further forward with the specialty for pharmaceutical public health being recognised. 

And I think that that will be the key one. And in terms of contributing globally, I hope that I continue to do that. But for me, that could be in a whole range of ways. 

I don't have a specific plan. Well, I'm interested to see what unfolds for you. So perhaps come back in a few years time and let us know what you're doing.

Diane, it's been great talking with you today. Thank you ever so much for your time. And you've been a real champion for pharmacists generally, but also around creating this whole new discipline of pharmaceutical public health. 

And also, 15 years plus of work in antimicrobial resistance and really championing that as well. So it's amazing work that you've been doing. And I'm really curious to see about where you take things into the future. 

But thank you ever so much for talking with us today. Thank you, Fiona. Thank you for all that you do in building leaders.

If you've enjoyed this podcast and would like to find out more, head over to www.fionadayconsulting.co.uk and you'll receive three hours of free CPD, the Health Career Success Programme when you sign up to my newsletter. And there's loads of other resources to support you as a medical or public health leader on my website too. Thanks for listening.