Leadership In A Healthcare Field
“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader. ” - John Quincy Adams
What does it mean to be a leader in healthcare? Leadership is about inspiring others and serving those whom you lead. During my clinical leader experience I comprehended the importance of spirit of inquiry, nursing judgment, personal and professional identity, and systems-based care. Also, that a clinical leader is so much more than just a leader, but a role model. As a leader it is important to have key leadership behaviors. Such as, establishing trust and cooperation among individuals in the group, showing respect for the individuals in the group, providing a sense of direction, resolving conflicts successfully, fostering cooperation, reinforcing goals, pointing out my teams strengths, promoting higher levels of performance with rewards and motivation, and most importantly acknowledging good work and success. During my clinical leader experience I realized my strengths as a leader were a lot greater than I thought. My strengths during the experience were motivating my team, initiating communication and action, persistence with making sure my team members charted and doing so correctly, ability to communicate well, stress tolerance, and ability to accept criticism. With my strengths came the strength of my team, on my last day of being team leader my team and I were given the opportunity to start a Foley catheter on a patient. When I asked my team who would like to do it they all stated that they had all previously done one, and asked me if I wanted to. I took the chance and I’m glad I did at the time; my team was there with me helping assist, guiding me and calming my nerves. I could not have asked for a better team this week. This experience has taught me that even as a team leader, your team will always be there to help you as well.
Overcoming my fears of leading came easy, I am usually not comfortable with telling people what to do and how to do it. So instead I asked what everyone’s goals were for the day, patient goals and personal goals. Some patient goals my team came up with were patient safety and patient satisfaction. Personal goals that my team set were to be able to improve their knowledge on Meditech, so they were quicker to document, and to work on their time management so they were efficient. During clinical, I asked my team to ask their patients what goal they would like to achieve. Goals ranged from physical strength to emotional strength. At the beginning of my experience my weaknesses were my self-confidence and assertiveness. Two major things I need to work on. As the leader, I felt my team would not take me seriously since it was another normal day of clinical for them. Throughout the day they did show me the respect of being a team leader. Whether it was coming to me for help, or me needing their help. Reflecting back onto my clinical leader experience, I would have changed the way I led post conference. I would have talked more in depth about the patients and really made sure that my team knew every detail about their patient. I also would change the fact that I didn’t speak to the charge nurse the two days I was team leader. I should have asked questions and asked advice on how to be a better leader.
There are different Leadership-Style Theories: Laissez-faire, Democratic, and Authoritarian. My Leadership-style theory is the Democratic style. Every group member should have input into problem solving and the development of goals. Once my team had gave me input on numerous goals, I, the leader decided on the finest goals. In a democratic leadership style every member of the group needs to participate in all decision-making. Within the limits established by the group, freedom of expression is allowed to maximize creativity. Team members in the group accept responsibility for themselves and for the welfare of the whole group. Each team member must respect all the other members of the group as unique and valuable contributors.
Noble leadership creates a successful environment for the staff, in which impacts outcomes of patient care. Working in a positive environment where leaders acknowledge good work, and outstanding nursing care leads to happier patients. Having the experience of working at Florida Hospital Flagler, and being a student nurse at Halifax hospital has helped me understand this even more. In my work environment at Florida Hospital Flagler our nurse leader, Trisha, is outstanding. On one of the busiest days I have worked, I have witnessed her along side one of her colleagues helping a patient to the bedside commode, and assisting any of the nurses with whatever they needed. Her selfless acts and showing that she is one of us, not superior to the nurses or techs creates such a positive environment. While attending clinical at Halifax is very unusual, the charge nurse is only seen during morning meetings. Not as hands on or as helpful to the nurses as she could be. The reason I bring this up is because at my personal job patient satisfaction scores are always in the 95th percentile or higher. At Halifax their patient satisfaction is at a 62 percentile.
In conclusion, when nurses exert leadership, they inspire other health-care workers to work toward one or more of several goals that include providing high-quality client care, maintaining a safe working environment, developing new policies and procedures, and increasing the power of the profession. What I learned about my experience is how much responsibility a leader in healthcare takes on, like a charge nurse. Having to know and understand every detail of a patients plan of care and making sure they get the best treatment and care, while also making sure your staff is working at their highest potential and not becoming burnt out. I am thankful I had the opportunity to take on such a role with a outstanding team of my peers.
