Many individuals don’t have access to basic healthcare services with the increasing population. The world doesn’t have enough doctors and Healthcare providers to treat people with a limited healthcare structure, making the healthcare system scream for innovation, leadership, and remodeling. As a result, nurses have to step into the doctor’s role. Nursing is one area being restructured in the new era of healthcare.
Today’s nursing leaders must make impactful, data-driven, long term and patient-focused decisions. Taking on the leadership role is more than just developing clinical skills. To become an effective leader, you must develop strong critical thinking and problem-solving skills. In addition, nurses build upon their knowledge and stay updated with the trends in the healthcare sector. Nurses are recognized as leaders who have the skills to create practice environments that improve the quality of patient care.
What makes nurses great leaders? Here are some useful tips to help:
Invest in yourself
Nursing leaders who continue their education in the nursing field learn additional and much more advanced techniques to boost the quality of patient care. In addition, expanding knowledge contributes to developing skills through data analysis or technology. It provides nurses with skills that turn out to be vital in making informed healthcare decisions. Moreover, nursing leaders who invest in themselves can become CNO nursing professionals by pursuing various degrees and certifications in the healthcare sector. After all, the best nurses continually discover their roles in the medical field and work to improve themselves.
Besides pursuing degrees, nursing leaders can opt for certification, attend workshops, or volunteer to grow professionally. In addition, they can take the help of books and magazines to stay updated on the new trends in healthcare. Moreover, if they don’t have time to read books, they can enrich their knowledge by listening to audiobooks or podcasts.
Learn Effective Communication
As leading healthcare workers, nursing leaders rely on communication for all elements of their jobs. The easiest way to become a great nursing leader is to understand the importance of effective communication and practice it. Nurses learn about patient needs and concerns through communication, involving active listening. Making such attempts to communicate with patients affects the accuracy of diagnoses and patient care, making it essential to learn effective communication.
Besides communicating with patients, nursing leaders must develop effective communication skills to convey and receive the right messages from other nurses. Good communication skills allow nursing leaders to communicate with their team members clearly, avoiding delays and confusion. To improve communication skills, nurses can:
- Use simple language. They should provide explanations for any complex terminologies to avoid any confusion.
- Speak at a measured speed. speaking too fast might prevent patients from following the conversation
- Ask patients questions
In contrast, poor communication skills have been connected to preventable medical errors and low morale. As a result, low morale often leads to higher stress levels and low job satisfaction.
Expand Critical Thinking Skills
Nursing leaders who wish to provide their patients with improved care must understand that critical thinking skills will help them considerably. Nursing leaders can become much more efficient by applying the capability to think through problems and assess the information in front of patients. They can treat the patient before them, providing more customized care based on unique patients. For instance, knowing that a patient tends to underrate their pain tolerance might help them better decide when the right time is to increase their pain management. Besides that, critical thinking skills help nurses gather essential information about their patients, making it vital for nurses to expand their critical thinking skills.
Nursing leaders can improve their critical skills by asking questions. In addition, they can ask other professional medical providers who are more experienced for advice about various situations and how they would for different patients. Finally, nursing leaders should evaluate their decisions objectively. After making crucial decisions in the field, they must take a moment to think carefully through the entire thought process and what influenced them to take the specific action.
Cultivate Relationships
Even though many nursing leaders might feel like they don’t have time to get to know the team, they should ask how their team members are doing. Providing chances for building relationships create strong bonds that help nurses work together as a team. Moreover, building relationships contributes to establishing a positive and productive atmosphere. As a nurse, you can learn about your team member’s families, life goals, and preferences to cultivate relationships. In addition, remembering key points from their experiences helps deepen the relationships and build trust.
Find and Become a mentor
Imitation is often the best form of flattery, but it can be a sure-fire way to improve leadership skills. Nursing leaders can seek out individuals whose leadership methods they admire and trust judgment. As a nursing leader, you can put your observation skills to work and watch how they interact with, motivate, and influence others. Moreover, nurses can notice how their mentor manages relationships, resolves disputes, and empower others. Finally, as a nurse, you can ask for advice on improving your leadership skills or juggling projects and patients.
Furthermore, nursing leaders can try the tactics they value. However, they should only emulate a leadership style that comes within them as authenticity makes a considerable part of a successful nursing leader. To be an effective nursing leader, nurses should develop their management style based on their strengths. In addition, nurses should commit to paying ahead of the things they learned by becoming a mentor themselves. Finally, as a nursing leader, you must share your experience and knowledge with others.
Establish Individual Accountability
All nursing leaders should be held accountable for their part in the healthcare sector of an organization. Accountability in nursing leaders helps improve trusting relationships between patients and nurses. Therefore, it can positively impact patient outcomes. When patients believe that they can trust their nurses, accountability characteristics are more likely to share with them. As a result, it helps develop appropriate care plans and improves patient care.
Nursing leaders who hold themselves responsible set themselves up for greater levels of success. When you take personal responsibility for your actions, your team members and patients know they can depend on you.
Nurse managers can establish accountability by:
- working within the scope of practice
- following procedures and policies as made by the employer
- accepting responsibility for your actions
- staying updated with professional healthcare standards
Final thoughts
To become great nursing leaders, nurses must constantly improve their knowledge. They should practice effective communication and listen to others carefully. In addition, nursing leaders should develop critical thinking skills and build relationships with their patients and team members.