Organisational and Leadership Factors for Spiritual Care Implementation

Spiritual care (SC) plays a critical role in palliative care (PC). However, a substantial gap exists between our understanding of the role of religion/spirituality (R/S) in serious illness and the actual SC practices addressing R/S in PC. Spiritual care implementation addresses this knowledge–practice gap. In this chapter, we apply a blend of implementation, organisational, and leadership theories to help SC leaders close this gap by exploring how they might effectively influence organisational conditions and employ strategies for SC implementation at their institutions. Organisational and leadership factors critically impact SC implementation and integration. Therefore, the chapter presents frameworks and insights from implementation science, implementation climate, organisational readiness for change, implementation leadership, spiritual care leadership, and social entrepreneurship. These concepts offer opportunities for maximising leaders’ capacity to lead, influence, and promote SC integration, producing consistent, widespread, and persistent SC implementation in PC. They help leaders develop comprehensive and strategic approaches to shape how their institutions understand, respond to, and incorporate SC, ultimately narrowing the knowledge–practice gap in SC and PC.