Compassionate leadership is a compelling perspective for transforming health care organizations into environments that support staff well-being, foster psychological safety, and high-quality care. Michael West's extensive research in compassionate and collective leadership provides comprehensive understandings of how leadership behaviors can shape organizational culture and clinical outcomes. While public health services in the United Kingdom and Ireland have increasingly integrated West's principles into leadership development and care delivery, many private and profit-driven health care systems are challenged implementing such a model. This article critically analyses West's compassionate leadership framework and its compatibility with profit-driven health care delivery and governance. Implications for the nursing profession, including rising burnout, moral distress, and workforce instability also are addressed.
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White et al. (2026) studied this question.
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