LeaP4: Systems Leadership

Dr Julie Highfield

Consultant Clinical Psychologist

Dr Julie Highfield is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist & Lead for Organisational Health in Adult and Paediatric Critical Care, Cardiff. She is the National Project Director for Wellbeing in the Intensive Care Society. She has a long experience of working as a psychologist in medical and health care settings and works closely with staff in their experience of working in healthcare, as well as advising managers on matters of workforce wellbeing. Julie has worked with the British Psychological Society and its Division of Clinical Psychology in Wales. She led the BPS team writing the National Guidance for Staff in the Coronavirus Pandemic.

Julie works with the Welsh Assembly Government in various projects, including as the lead for Critical Care Workforce Task and Finish Group, and Modelling for Rehabilitation for patients post COVID-19, and the Wellbeing Conversation Tool. She has a number of publications and book chapters in the field of critical care, staff wellbeing, and leadership.

: @DrJulie_H

Adrian Neal

Consultant Clinical Psychologist and Head of Staff Wellbeing

Dr Adrian Neal BA, MA, MSc, DClinPsych, CPsychol 

Consultant Clinical Psychologist. Head of Wellbeing for Aneurin Bevan University Health Board.   

Adrian qualified as a Clinical Psychologist in 2003 and for the first 10 years worked within NHS England Adult, Community, and Acute Adult Mental Health Services. He was also a part time Lecturer Practitioner on the Coventry and Warwick Universities Clinical Psychology Doctorate.

After completing an MSc in Organisational Psychology, he has specialised in Occupational Health and Wellbeing within the public sector. Moving to South Wales in 2014 to take up the role of Head of Wellbeing within Aneurin Bevan University Health Board (ABUHB) he has subsequently collaborated with a number of public sector organisations both within the UK and internationally. These have included the Welsh Ambulance Service, Welsh NHS Finance Academy, Gwent Police, Emergency Medical Retrieval and Transfer Service (EMRTS), London Air Ambulance, Health Education and Innovation Wales (HEIW), National Academy of Education Leaders (Wales), Social Care Wales, Welsh Government, The Kings Fund and the Institute of Health Innovation.   

Adrian views occupational psychosocial factors such as leadership, culture and psychological safety as the cornerstones to organisational health and wellbeing, and ultimately sustainability, and co-leads the innovative Leading People leadership programme within Aneurin Bevan University Health Board.

Adrian is also Past Co-Chair of the Applied Psychologists in Health National Special Advisory Group, past Co-chair of the Division of Clinical Psychology’s (DCP) Leadership and Management Faculty, and DCP Wales, and Chaired the British Psychological Society’s 2020 working group examining the impact of the pandemic on practitioner psychologist’s wellbeing. 

Adrian is a postgraduate academic supervisor at Cardiff, Cardiff Metropolitan, and Plymouth universities and has published academic articles and book chapters relating to mental health, occupational health, organisational culture, leadership and occupational well-being. In 2022 Adrian jointly won the Association of Business Psychology’s Excellence in Strategy award, and in 2023 his team won NHS Wales awards for both ‘Wellbeing Interventions’ and overall outstanding submission for their Avoidable Employee Harm initiative.