155 Global road safety leadership course: impact of capacity building on the global road safety agenda

Background The Global Road Safety Leadership Courses (GRSLC) is a suite of courses developed and implemented by the Johns Hopkins International Injury Research Unit (JH-IIRU) and the Global Road Safety Partnership (GRSP) since 2016, funded by Bloomberg Philanthropies through the Bloomberg Initiative for Global Road Safety (BIGRS). Objective The goal of these courses is to build leadership capacity to design, advocate for, and implement effective road safety programs and policies across LMICs. Programme Description To date, 15 courses have been delivered and trained more than 850 road safety professionals working across 71 countries. Course participants are drawn from all sectors actively engaged in road safety activities. Courses have been delivered in-person, online, and through hybrid approaches; incorporating lectures from technical experts, leadership training, field visits, and workbook group activities. Outcomes and Learnings The courses have been very well-received and participants have found GRSLCs to be a impactful educational experience. Participants were satisfied with the topics covered, networking opportunities, and active participation. Participants found the course to be applicable to their work and felt that the course would benefit their organization's work in road safety. Implications The delivery of the GRSLCs outlines three key learnings that have implications for replicability of similar programs across injury prevention field. The first is ensuring a focus on participatory leadership to strengthen collaborative approaches to leadership. The second is to engage participants from diverse countries and sectors. There continues to be a 'siloed' approach to road safety, and as such the GRSLC has deliberately recruited participants from diverse fields and ensured that participatory group work brings together different technical fields and cultures to encourage a similar approach for participants when they return to their country. The third is a focus on regions with high road trauma burden, with a particular emphasis on examples and approaches that have been conducted in these regions. Conclusions GRSLC is an innovative capacity building program that focuses on building leadership capacity to address road safety and has been instrumental in creating a cadre of road safety leaders with technical knowledge and leadership skills to reduce road traffic injuries and deaths.