Dr Susanne Smith

About me:

I am a Senior Lecturer in Healthcare Leadership & Management in the University of Exeter's Faculty of Health & Life Sciences (Education & Scholarship). I have around sixteen years experience teaching at postgraduate level in healthcare and have a particular interest in leading change at a systems-level and equipping students to manage the complexities of real clinical systems to improve safety, patient outcomes and staff well-being.

I started my career in molecular genetics: researching multiple antibiotic resistance in bacterial populations, and I have spent time working in industry in a safety-critical capacity, and also in the NHS as a Research & Development Manager and Clinical Effectiveness Lead.

I am part of the vibrant faculty team for the MSc in Healthcare Leadership & Management and the Senior Leader Apprenticeship (Healthcare) programme. I am both an Academic Tutor for Masters students and an Academic Mentor for some of our Senior Leader apprentices; I'm also Co-Director of the Senior Leader (Healthcare) Programme. I love working with our students and am motivated by the potential for education to transform students’ careers and their workplaces.

Interests:

I have supervised 16 MSc dissertation students in the past whose diverse research interests included the use of appreciative inquiry in transformational leadership; understanding cultural barriers around incident reporting; and the use of Functional Resonance Analysis Methodology (FRAM) to improve paediatric theatre processes.

Although these topics are highly diverse, a unifying aspect is the need to truly understand a system before trying to make a change or propose an improvement.

Recent Publications

Improving patient safety culture - a practical guide. NHS England: https://www.england.nhs.uk/long-read/improving-patient-safety-culture-a-practical-guide/ Published, 10 July 2023.

Rego A, Spowart L, Smith S. ‘Herding cats’: A mixed methods investigation into the educational value of debriefing in operating theatres. Journal of Perioperative Practice. 2023;0(0). doi:10.1177/17504589221149842

Qualifications:

PhD The evolution of the Tn21 subgroup of bacterial transposons (Faculty of Medicine, University of Bristol)

BSc (Hons) Microbiology (University of Edinburgh)

PG Certificate in Clinical Education (University of Plymouth)

Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (2019)