In settings where collaborative patient centred care was flourishing there was inevitably administrative support to facilitate successful delivery. While the administrative support could range from administrative assistance to a leadership position (and both ends of the spectrum were highly valued), it was generally administrative leadership that generated discussion amongst the focus groups. The bar was set high for what individuals are looking for in administrative leadership. Borrowing some words from various interview participants, this individual should be a champion of IPC and/or IPE and should thus provide proactive leadership with a vision to drive organizational philosophy. He/She would need to be courageous to take chances, to do the right thing, to pull professions together, to create change and to engage the First Nations. He/She would need to be creative in allocating resources, finding new solutions and getting around some bureaucratic bylaws. Their administrative style would of course be collaborative. It was acknowledged in the interviews that IPC is a lot of work and therefore support for champions (be they in administration or elsewhere) is needed. Ideally this support would be systemic. Preparation for administrative leadership was noted in one focus group:
I am glad you are making that point on the management level; I would say that within my areas of responsibility I am really glad not to have a homogeneous group of managers with respect to clinical background. I have folks who are from Nursing, from Psychology, from OT. The mix is phenomenal because they think differently. So you put people in the room together and they are all looking at problems in a very different way, but it comes together in a very solid, problem solving solution in the end.