Greg Padmore-Dix returned to his South Wales roots nearly four years ago, where his leadership has been a significant factor in improvements at Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board. His success has been built on the foundations of a distinguished and highly successful career, underpinned by a visible, compassionate and impactive style of leadership that engages and motivates others.

Greg has used the knowledge, skills and experience gained during his 30-year nursing career to play a pivotal role in leading Cwm Taf Morgannwg UHB through perhaps the most challenging period in its history. Not only has he helped steer the organisation through the same issues his contemporaries have faced – not least the unprecedented operational pressures from Covid-19 – but also he has been instrumental in transforming its quality and safety functions, and effectively turning around a maternity service placed in special measures.

At the heart of his success lies an innate passion for his profession, an infectious desire to provide the best quality of service for the women and communities he serves, and a highly visible, people-oriented leadership style, which has rebuilt the self-esteem and confidence of a workforce in need of a role model. In doing so, Greg has shown skill, determination and resilience and won the trust and respect, not only of his team but also of key stakeholders and community leaders. Greg is a credit to his profession.

Greg qualified as a registered nurse in 1991 from the South Glamorgan School of Nursing, after which he spent five years at Cardiff Royal Infirmary working in acute trauma nursing and was awarded a post-registration qualification in trauma nursing from Oxford Brookes University. He returned to Cardiff to a charge nurse role and then spent several years in New Zealand. On returning to the UK, Greg became a ward manager on an acute trauma unit at the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff. Moving into the higher education sector, he secured a clinical teaching post at Cardiff University in the early 2000s and went on to achieve further qualifications.

While Greg’s passion and enthusiasm for teaching never wavered, he missed patient contact and returned to the NHS, securing his first executive nurse director role in 2010 at Taunton and Somerset NHS Foundation Trust. During his time there, Greg led the implementation of the trust’s fi rst quality improvement faculty and achieved a signifi cant reduction in harm events. He also sat on a national panel of experts providing advice to foundation trust governors.

In 2013, Greg became chief nurse at University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust where he spent six years and achieved an ‘outstanding’ care rating from the Care Quality Commission, developed a clinical academy and helped found a new health and social care studio school. He won an NHS inspirational leadership award for the South West in 2015.

Greg moved back to Wales in 2019 as the executive director of nursing and midwifery at Cwm Taf Morgannwg UHB. He became a visiting professor at the University of South Wales in January 2020 and was appointed a trustee of the Royal College of Nursing Foundation in 2021.

He is a visible, compassionate and kind leader, always willing to go above and beyond. He has 31 years of experience and 12 years in executive director roles, but remains humble in style and connected to his workforce. He embodies a vision that is refl ective of a whole-systems approach to health and care, where a commitment to improvement, innovation and change is embedded at all levels.