Discuss About The Essentials Of Nursing Leadership Management.
Leadership is the way individuals behave when directing the members of a group who have shared goals. The behaviour will ultimately determine whether the goal will be achieved and whether the process will be efficient and effective (Alligood, 2017). The main aspects associated with the role of a leader is influencing the activities of the group they lead and coping with change. The key challenges facing the healthcare sector is nurturing working cultures that ensure continuous offering of care that is of high quality, safe and adhering to ethical requirements (Weiss and Tappen, 2014). The most important aspect of an organization that could ensure that these challenges are eliminated is its leadership and the styles chosen. Leadership are the most important tool to be used in shaping organisational culture. Consequently, it is fundamental that the appropriate and necessary leadership behaviours, qualities and strategies be put in place to achieve a health care setting with the characteristics mentioned above as nurses play important part in health care sector and their performance is highly impacted by their leaders and it affects the patient satisfaction at the end.
This essay will also discuss briefly about the transactional leadership, transformational leadership and situational leadership and how these leadership styles can impact nurse job satisfaction and influence patient health outcome. As indicated by Wong (2015), effective leadership has been shown to bring about positive transformation in almost all areas where it was applied. In addition, this essay will also discuss about the leadership qualities and explain the relationship between leadership, staff turnover and job satisfaction.
Transactional leadership employs use of rewards and punishments. In this kind of leadership, the employees follow the dictates of leaders. Those employees who perform well and as expected are rewarded and those that do not meet the expectations are punished. Behaviours that are rewarded will most likely be repeated while those that are punished will be avoided in future (Giltinane, 2013). This type of leadership may be very important in emergency situations and may leave both the hard-working nurses and their patients happy. The nurse will be happy because of the reward while the patient is happy for effective treatment.
Transformational leadership on the other hand involves a leader with a vision. These leaders have some future changes that they would want to see in the organizations they lead (Fischer, 2016). In some cases, the change to be achieved is planned by leaders in conjunction with the subordinates. The change is described clearly and concisely, and it is regularly communicated to employees. Each member of the organization is expected to be working in a way that will lead to the foreseen change. This form of leadership would be of great importance to the nursing profession. Goals could be set and communicated concisely. Such goals should be geared towards improved working conditions for nurses and improved clinical outcomes for patients (Fischer, 2016).
Situational leadership stipulates that there no single best way of leading. The leader will be most effective if they adapt to the current needs of the organization (Grimm,2010). This leadership style is flexible and is ready to accommodate any outcomes of the future. No one knows what the future holds. A leadership style that gives room for any developments of the future seem to be a wiser one. In the nursing profession and the medical one in general, discoveries continue to be made. This style of leadership seems to be the best suited for the profession (Crevani et al.,2010).
Emotional Intelligence (EI) is one of the strong leadership qualities as it allows the leader to be self-aware of their own feeling and the feeling and emotions around and take actions accordingly. It motivates the leader to act with humility as they will be able to realise their own strengths and weaknesses. The leader with high emotional intelligence will stay calm even in under strong pressure, will resolve conflict effectively, are highly empathetic which will lead to a team where there is trust and mutual respect. The leader who has high EI leads by an example rather than just commanding the other team what to do (McCleskey, 2014).
In addition, communication skills play very important role in being effective leader as they will be interacting with a numerous number of people be it other nurses, doctors and other healthcare staff. Having good skills of communication will enable the leader to effectively communicate strategies, needs and instructions in a clear, concise and easily understandable manner (Gilley et al., 2009).
The other important quality is delegation. The leader should have an in-depth understanding of the other members in terms of their strengths and weaknesses of the healthcare team. By delegating role based on such knowledge, there is a high likelihood that others will be more efficient. Overall, the process of care improved, and the employees are more motivated (Gesche, 2017).
Along with these qualities, a good leader should always have a vision and motivate their team and provide mentoring and guidance without commanding and controlling instead of being supportive. A good leader should also have good stewardship and willing to bring positive change and be supportive to the team (Murphy & Roberts, 2008).
Leaders have an enormous influence on organizational culture. The way the leaders talk, and act will influence the organizational culture in some way. The behaviour of a leader inevitably affects the workplace culture. Therefore, a leader who wishes to develop a strong workplace culture will take a close look at their lives and make sure they are influencing the workforce towards that. Accountability is a great quality for a leader who wants to create a work place culture that they would want (Tallia, Awan & Khuram, 2014). Following are some ways through which leaders influence or could influence the workplace culture.
The first way is through modelling behaviours. It is very hard for a leader to make staff adopt a certain practice or culture if they have not adopted it themselves. If a leader wants their team to change in some way, they should serve as an example (Blais, 2015). When they do this, there is a high likelihood that other team members will follow suit. In a situation where the leader encourages the team members to adopt a certain change, but they do not themselves, chances of achieving the change are very minimal. It seems therefore, that to be effective in achieving a desired workplace culture, leaders should be the first to demonstrate the culture by their words and actions (Hyde et al., 2014).
The second way is establishing a purpose to believe in. Members of the team being led work better if they know what exactly is expected of them and how it impacts the organization. Where this is lacking, there is some sort of vacuum and employees may lose a sense of direction. On the other hand, when the purpose is clearly and precisely provided, the team members view their employment status as an opportunity to connect with the leader and head towards a certain direction. Each staff member should be briefed on what is expected of them and how that is important to the organization. The commitment and sense of direction that results leads to a strong workplace culture (Grossman & Valiga, 2016).
Leaders should also set expectations and come up with mechanisms to help the team members meet them. As demonstrated by Blais (2015), when these members are provided with the tools and resources needed to fit within the organizational culture, they are empowered. A strong workplace culture where staff are committed and dedicated results. Another way through which leaders can shape the workplace culture is via reinforcing a culture of accountability. When leaders hold people accountable of their action, such people tend to be more dedicated in their jobs. Where people are not held accountable, instructions may just but fall on deaf ears. Accountability could be ensured by ways such as having detailed job descriptions where it is clear who should be doing what, when and how (Grohar-Murray et al., 2016).
There is a strong correlation between poor leadership and staff turnover. Leaders who act as dictators and fail to give their employees a listening ear, contribute to staff turnover (McCann, 2015). It is true that the way an employee is treated by their leaders will greatly contribute to their willingness to continue with their jobs and be satisfied. When the leader issues orders without caring the about the opinion of team members, the chances of turnover of the team members increase and they may eventually leave the job. Leaders therefore have a key role in ensuring job satisfaction of the staff members (McCann, 2015).
Moreover, if an organization lacks proper communication channels, it is not clear who is supposed to be doing what, when and how. It is also likely that the efforts of the employees will neither be noticed nor rewarded. Poor communication is a sign of poor leadership since good leadership invests in effective communication (Bercaw, 2016). When employee’s efforts can neither be noticed nor rewarded, their morale diminishes and are no longer dedicated. Satisfaction sets in and eventually leads to quitting. For an organization to boost the employee morale and keep them satisfied with what they do, leaders should ensure that there are proper communication channel and that employees who do well in their jobs are recognized and rewarded (Bercaw, 2016).
Thus, leadership style needs to be supportive, transformational and should promote independence and job satisfaction among nurses by creating the environment that fosters trust and compassion to complete the task which can help increase the satisfaction rates of nurses and motivates nurses to provide excellent care to their patients resulting in patient satisfaction. Therefore, high turnover rate among nursing staff may result in poor patient outcomes whereas low turnover rates can improve the patient health (Robbins & Davidhizar, 2007).
There is a significant relationship between leadership and quality of care. For instance, studies show that substantial associations between leadership and satisfaction of patients. Good leadership leads to increased quality of care while poor leadership deteriorates the quality of care. Some ways in which leadership influences the quality of care are going to be discussed next (Duckett, 2009).
Good leadership ensures that nurses and other members of the healthcare team are satisfied. Satisfaction boosts morale and they become committed to their jobs. They appreciate their pivotal role in offering care to patients/clients. with this approach, they offer the best quality of care that they can. In this way, the patient gets the best care that they could receive from healthcare providers (Enterkin, Robb & Mclaren, 2012). Another way through which good leadership leads to improved quality of care is through installation of the necessary systems. Good leadership is concerned with the highest level of care and therefore endeavours to put in in place as many as necessary systems for offering of care. This might include ensuring that there are enough wards, healthcare staff and other necessary factor such as drugs required (Mendes et al., 2014).
Good leadership focuses on effective procedures and processes. It also ensures proper communication channels are in place. In addition, it recognizes and awards efforts of the employees. According to Bayley, Chambers and Donovan (2016), these factors come together to form close collaboration between the management and the staff. The staff are free to air any problem or challenges freely. Patients/clients are also given the same opportunity. The feedback obtained is compiled together and used to address the problems and challenges accordingly. In this way, the quality of care continuously remains at peak (Bayley, Chambers and Donovan 2016)
Conclusion
In conclusion, Leadership in nursing is very important as it influences the operations in a healthcare facility and inevitably affects the quality of care and thus will influence patient health outcomes and nurses job satisfaction simultaneously. Hence, Leadership plays significant role when determining the effective management of patient health in healthcare. All Leadership style has advantage and disadvantages as discussed above. Transactional Leadership style will be effective for meeting deadlines or dealing situations with immediate emergencies especially arrest teams in hospital where the leader will effectively delegate, command and control the chaotic situation and achieve the positive outcome. Transformational Leadership style will inspire and empower the nurses where they feel as a part of team. This will develop motivation in nurses to which allows them to job satisfaction and this will lead to better patient care ultimately. As mentioned earlier, Situational Leadership style whereas allows the leader to adapt both transactional leadership style and transformational leadership style according the particular situation such as transactional leadership style in emergency and transformational leadership style for overall development of patient care.
Thus, along with these leadership styles, important qualities such as strong communication, empathy, business mindedness, delegation and conflict resolution are must for a leader. In addition, it is also associated with improved quality of care for patient and nurses job satisfaction again leading to quality of nursing care.
References
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