Authors: Archana Ganesh, Spandana Rayala, Megan Doherty.
Led by the Sunflower Children’s Network of Two Worlds Cancer Collaboration, the second phase of the Children’s Palliative Care Leadership Program – Catalyst Lab was recently launched. Building on the overwhelming success of the program’s first phase, the Catalyst Lab is an advanced professional development program designed to help participants translate leadership potential into sustainable, on-the-ground impact. Through leadership training, mentorship, and implementation-focused learning, the program participants are empowered and supported to expand the reach and scale of children’s palliative care at the regional and national levels in their country.
Eight teams from four countries (India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Philippines) are selected for the Catalyst lab. Each team will be supported by a dedicated group of mentors with global and national experience who will guide the participants on their transformative learning journey.
The program includes four core components:
- Monthly interactive online learning sessions, exploring key skills for managers and leaders
- Structured mentorship from a team of experts
- Developing and implementing leadership change projects designed to expand access to palliative care locally and nationally through a health systems approach, looking at policy, financing, medicine availability, health workforce training, and integrated service delivery
- An in-person Leadership Workshop
The session opened with Dr. Megan Doherty (Director of the Sunflower Children’s Network, Two Worlds Cancer Collaboration) welcoming the participants and mentors and then introducing key principles of Project Design, including how to develop Logic Models and Stakeholder Mapping, emphasizing how these frameworks would directly strengthen participants’ leadership project designs. Mentors and participants also spent time in breakout rooms, establishing initial connections and outlining personal leadership goals.
Since 2024, the Children’s Palliative Care Leadership Program has brought together leaders from across Asia for leadership training and support. In the program’s initial phase, a 1 year program was conducted with emerging leaders in 2024 and 2025. This program focused on foundational leadership skills and practical, on-the-ground support for children’s palliative care projects within local contexts. You can explore Phase One of the program and its impact in more detail through the program reports from 2024 and 2025.
Building on the experiences from Phase 1, the Catalyst Lab will provide a further structured pathway for participants to work together as teams and translate leadership potential into sustainable impact by expanding the scale and impact of their leadership to a regional or national level.
Led by the Sunflower Children’s Network of Two Worlds Cancer Collaboration, the Catalyst Lab is a collaboration with the Hyderabad Centre for Palliative Care, Pain Relief and Palliative Care Society (Hyderabad), Canuck Place Children’s Hospice, International Children’s Palliative Care Network, St Jude Global Palliative Care, Stanford University, and Global Treehouse Foundation. The program receives support from Cipla Foundation, Project ECHO and the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada.
Read more about the program in previous e Hospice articles:
Champions of Compassion — Reflections from the CPC Leadership Program Graduation Ceremony
Who has inspired us? Stories from the Children’s Palliative Care Leadership Institute in India
Celebrating the 2024 Children’s Palliative Care Leadership Graduates
Launch of the Children’s Palliative Care Leadership Institute
Read articles about participants’ leadership projects from 2024 and 2025.