Nurse leader interview paper Example
Identify three nursing leaders you would like to interview for this paper.
Write a paper (1,000-1,250 words) that describes the results of the interviews and addresses the following:
A. Ask the leaders what they believe is their preferred leadership style and (1b) ask them to describe how that style has helped them achieve success.
B. Explain why you chose each individual leader.
C. Identify, compare, and contrast their styles and note any examples of servant or transformational leadership.
D. Identify missed opportunities or questions you wish you had asked during the interviews.
Nurse Leader Interview Paper
Introduction
Nursing leadership refers to the ability of the leader to influence others to directly participate in clinical care and improve the quality of care. Nursing leadership entails a setting with a clear vision, where followers are empowered as well as motivated (Bahadori et al, 2016). This assignment will present the results of interviews conducted with three nurse leaders. Nurse leader interview paper Example
Leaders’ Preferred Leadership Style
The first leader said that the preferred leadership style is a transformational leadership style. The leader attributed her leadership style choice to being inspirational and motivative. According to Afzal et al (2016) transformational leaders act as role models, motivate followers, are concerned with followers’ needs, and encourage creativity and innovation. Nurse leaders use transformational leadership style to motivate nurses to attain organizational goals.
The second nurse leader combines authoritative, situational, transformational and servant leadership styles. This is because she applies each leadership style according to the situation. In the authoritative leadership style, the leader makes all decisions and does not consider the staff’s input. Servant leadership involves leaders influencing and motivating followers by developing relationships and improving skills of followers or team members. A servant leader ensures that the needs of each team member are addressed and all team members are involved in decision making. Characteristics of servant leadership include persuasion, listening, awareness, building others, acceptance and foresight (Bahadori et al, 2016). The leader also uses a situational leadership style whereby she chooses the leadership style that is most suitable to the situation and goals.
The third nurse leader described her leadership style as transformational. The leader attributed her leadership style to her desire to improve others. As aforementioned, transformational leadership involves inspiring and motivating followers through a shared vision.
How the Style has helped to Achieve Success
According to the first nurse leader using transformational leadership style, the leadership style has helped her to be influential in changing her unit for the better. In addition, the people under her, are happier than before and willing to do more for the unit. The leader reported that she listens to her staff and with that, any new change has been successful. The leader also seeks followers’ input before making the final decision which has benefited both my staff and the hospital. The nurse leader concluded the interview by affirming that a transformational leadership style has helped her to empower her team and accomplish many organizational goals in the process. Nurse leader interview paper Example. According to Afzal et al (2016), transformational leaders form empowering work environment and this gives nurses chances to be creative and innovation during care delivery; this improves staff job performance and also the quality of patient care.
For the second nurse leader combining authoritative, situational, transformational and servant leadership styles, the leader reported that combining the leadership styles has enabled her to be fair to all staff members and to be more affirmative in her leadership. The leader reported that she uses authoritative leadership style when she needs to enforce the rule of the job for example when reminding staffs in the unit that they cannot just leave the unit to buy their lunch just because the cafeteria closes at a certain time. Since the charge nurse position is rotated, the leader said that she uses laissez-fair when she is aware of her staff’s capability while at times, she uses servant leadership in prioritizing the needs of her staff members.
The third nurse leader reported that transformational leadership has helped her achieve success in various ways. First, as a transformational leader, she has the vision to follow this hospital’s mission to improve patients’ quality of care and patient satisfaction. Secondly, she has used the style to ensure shared governance in order to encourage the staff to make decisions; this has improved the quality indicators and employee satisfaction. Third, as a transformational leader, she has been encouraging the staff under her unit to seek professional growth and higher education. This, therefore, has helped to improve nurse retention and have improved staff competency. These assertions are supported by Sfantou et al (2017) who explain that transformational leaders mentor and nurture innovativeness and also motivate staff members; improves job performance. As a result, this leads to improved care delivery and better health outcomes.
Reason for Selecting Each Individual Leader
The rationale for selecting the first leader is because she has been a bedside nurse for more than ten yours and now as a nurse manager in an acute cardiac step-down unit over five years and counting; she has experienced firsthand experience regarding both ends. The reason for choosing the second nurse manager is because she is in a different setting which is an outpatient setting; the priority in this setting is to make sure all supplies are sterile and staffing is done only during weekdays. Unlike the acute care setting, staffing in the same day procedure unit is done only during weekdays. The third nurse manager was a bedside nurse for about three years but has also successfully managed her unit for the past six years and still counting and this is the reason she was selected. Basically, the rationale for selecting the various settings was to enable me to analyze diverse settings as a future inpatient (hospital) or outpatient (clinic) nurse manager. Nurse leader interview paper Example
Compare and Contrast Their Leadership Styles
The first and the third nurse leaders use transformational leadership style. As indicated, transformational leadership style goes beyond the call of duty; this is because such leaders inspire, motivate, nurture and work collaboratively with followers to achieve the set goals and vision (Duwayr, 2019). Transformational leadership style is recommended in nursing because evidence shows it improves patient care in regard to patient safety, quality of care, and better health outcomes (Wong et al, 2015). The is because the transformational leadership style focuses on collaborative effort towards achieving goals. However, the second nurse leader combines different leadership styles such as authoritative, situational, transformational and servant leadership styles. Apart from using a transformational leadership style, the leader also uses a servant leadership style which is very effective in nursing practice. Just like in transformational leadership style, servant leadership style also involves leaders influencing and motivating followers by developing relationships and improving skills of followers or the team members (Duwayr, 2019). Basically, all the nurse leaders who were interviewed use transformational leadership style but the second nurse goes ahead to combine different leadership styles with transformational and servant leadership style.
Missed Opportunities or Questions
Some of the questions I would have asked during the interview include:
- Looking back what each one of the nurse leaders would have changed about their leadership styles?
- What they would have done differently knowing what they know today? Nurse leader interview paper Example
Conclusion
From the interview, the first and the second nurse reported that they use a transformational leadership style. Transformational leadership style involves inspiring and motivating followers to achieve the set goals. On the other hand, the second nurse leader combines different leadership styles such as authoritative, situational, transformational and servant leadership styles. Each nurse leader attributed their choice of leadership style to the ability to influence followers and have better quality of care.
References
Afzal M, Ali W, Farooq A & Hussain M. (2016). The Impact of Transformational Leadership Style on Nurse’s Self-Esteem of Public Hospitals of Lahore Pakistan. Int. J. Soc. Sc. Manage. 3(4), 287-293.
Bahadori A, Peyrovi H, Ashghali-Farahani M, Hajibabaee F & Haghani H. (2016). The relationship between nursing leadership and patient satisfaction. International Journal of Medical Research & Health Sciences. 5(1), 10:134-141.
Duwayr T. (2019). Leadership Styles of Nurse Managers/Leaders and Staff Nurses Job Satisfaction and Outcome Pattern in the Workforce: A Systematic Review. Journal of Nursing and Health Science (IOSR-JNHS. 8(2).
Sfantou D, Latiotis A, Athina P, Michail M & Patelarou E. (2017). Importance of Leadership Style towards Quality of Care Measures in Healthcare Settings: A Systematic Review. Healthcare (Basel). 5(4), 73.
Wong C. (2015). Connecting nursing leadership and patient outcomes: State of the science. J. Nurs. Manag. 23(1), 275–278. Nurse leader interview paper Example