Challenges Faced By Healthcare Leaders In Terms Of Decision Making Within the Team Environment - Assignment Example

Some of the challenges faced by healthcare leaders in terms of decision making within the team environment  Table of Contents Introduction 3 Team centred vs leader centred leadership 4 Challenges for health care leaders in making decisions 7 How leaders address the challenges while working as part of a team? 9 Conclusions 10 References 12 Introduction Leadership is one of the most comprehensively discussed subjects in the organizational world because of the crucial role that plays by the leaders in the success and failures of a business. It is not necessary that the successful leadership style in one industry may be successful in another industry. Moreover, leaders usually make changes in their leadership styles based on the demands of the situation. As a result of that, a lot of theories and principles were formulated by different scholars about what makes a successful leader. There are hundreds of definitions for leadership. Generally speaking, leadership is the ability to influence other individuals through one’s actions and behaviour (Kruse, 2013). It should be noted that an organization may have different objectives and goals. It is the duty of the organizational leaders to organise one-self and others effectively to achieve the goals and objectives of the organization. In other words, leadership is all about the effective management of organizational resources in order to satisfy the needs of different stakeholders (Hall et al. 2013). In the context of healthcare industry, the role of leadership is to address the needs of the healthcare staff and patients. In order to become a successful leader in the healthcare industry, a person should be able to improve the quality of healthcare provided to patients, develop and implement strategies to motivate healthcare staff, and ensure the healthcare organisations they run are managed well and demonstrate accountability for their use of resources (Consumers Health Forum of Australia, 2009). Healthcare industry consists of many segments such as aged care and disability health services. The needs of the aged and disabled may not be the same as that of other types of patients. For example, aged and disabled people may have lack of mobility and they require the support of others for completing their routine activities. It is necessary for a leader to formulate strategies based on the needs of the patients in order to make sure that all patients are able to receive quality healthcare services. Moreover, the expectations of the people about the health care services are more in the present era because of the rapid developments in medical science. At the same time, many of the modern patients, especially the aged and disabled patients are concerned about the growing hospital expenses even though they like to receive quality healthcare. Since healthcare industry is a profit making industry, it is the duty of the leaders to make sure that the hospital management receives adequate returns for their investments. In short, leadership in the healthcare industry are facing many challenges while trying to satisfy the needs of the patients and that of the hospital management. Such challenges will be intensified when the leaders forced to work as part of a team. The nature of challenges received or faced by a leader while working as part of a team may be extremely complex. The character, behaviour, work philosophies, work culture and work attitudes of the members of a team need not be the same. It should be noted that diversity is extremely prominent in the workplaces of healthcare industry. People from different cultures, countries and socioeconomic backgrounds may be part of a team in the healthcare industry. Leadership may face many challenges while leading such a diverse team in healthcare industry. This paper analyses some of the challenges faced by healthcare leaders in terms of decision making within the team environment.   Team centred vs leader centred leadership Based on the functioning, leadership is often divided into different categories such as leader centred and team centred. Team centred leadership is entirely different from leader centred leadership. As the name indicates, the central part of a leader centred leadership is the leader rather than anything else. In this type of leadership, the leader has upper hand in every matter and all the organizational activities revolve around the leader (Arnold & Loughlin, 2013). Some of the categories in the leader centred leadership are authoritarian leadership, transactional leadership and charismatic leadership (Jeon et al., 2010; Chenoweth et al., 2010). While a leader gives no roles to the followers in the decision making, it can be said that he is following authoritarian leadership. Authoritarian leaders are often considered as experts in their organization. They are responsible for developing and implementing strategies necessary for organizational success. Moreover, they are capable of providing the followers with clear expectations of what needs to be accomplished, when it should be done and how it should be done (Cherry, 2015). On the other hand, transactional leaders are of the view that the primary duty of the employees or followers is to obey the instructions from the top. Such leaders use rewards for good works and punishment for poor performances of the employees as a strategy to motivate the employees. They usually give more importance to standards and targets (MindTools.com, 2015). Charismatic leadership works on the charisma of the leader. Such a leadership is capable of injecting enthusiasm into the team so that the team work can be completed successfully. Charismatic leaders consider communication with the employees as an important strategy to motivate them. Such leaders have more faith in their abilities compared to others types of leaders (ChangingMinds.org, 2015). Former Apple Inc. CEO, Steve Jobs can be considered as a charismatic, transactional and authoritative leader. It should be noted that Apple Inc. became the second largest company in terms of market capitalization, mainly because of the capabilities of Steve Jobs. On the other hand, team centred leadership consists of leadership styles such as participative leadership, servant leadership and transformational leadership. “Participative leadership refers to a leadership style by which the leader involves subordinates in the process of problem-solving and decision-making” (Miao et al., 2013, p.77). On the other hand, servant leadership have more faith in values and ideals whereas transformational leadership builds on inspiring the followers to achieve the objectives of the organization (MindTools.com). Moreover, servant leadership gives more importance to allocate jobs based on the skills and competencies of the employees (Vinod &Sudhakar, 2011; Duff, 2013). If an individual gets more prominence in leader centred leadership, a team or group of employees get more importance in team centred leadership. In other words, the views, opinions and suggestions of the employees get more importance in team centred leadership. Leaders who follow this type of leadership always take decisions based on the feedback they receive from the employees. Values and ideas get more importance in this type of leadership. Since the employees get more importance in this type of leadership, the motivation levels of the employees will be extremely high in organizations that follow team centred leadership. Moreover, team centred leadership is keen on developing the mutual relations between the organization and the employees. Such a leadership are of the view that the productivity of the employees can be enhanced only when the attachment of the employees towards the organization improves. This leadership style functions based on assumption that team members tend to be more committed when they are involved in the decision making process (Lussier and Achua, 2012). Microsoft and Samsung are some of the companies in which team centred leadership is followed. These companies give more importance to the views and opinions of the employees. A lot of leadership theories and principles are evolving out in recent times in order to help leaders to make sound decisions while working as part of a team. For example, Clinical Leadership in Aged Care’ (CLiAC) is a new leadership approach developed in Australia recently to address the needs of aged and disabled patients. “The CLiAC aims to achieve safe, high-quality person-centred and evidence-based care by assisting middle managers to develop effective team relationships and person/client- centred leadership strategies that enable them to deal with the day-to-day realities of care service” (Jeon et al. 2013, p.126). The core of CLiAC is situational leadership. In other words, CLiAC tries to address the problems based on the situations and the individual needs. Challenges for health care leaders in making decisions Just like evidence based nursing, evidence based leadership is one of the highly discussed concepts in the healthcare industry. If evidence based nursing is an approach intended to provide quality healthcare services based on personal clinical expertise and technological developments, evidence based leadership is an approach to provide effective leadership based on personal expertize in combination with technological developments. As per the views of Kinsler (2014) training is necessary for the development of evidence based leadership. The needs of the patients are changing day by day, because of the rapid developments in medical science. For example, aged or disabled people were ready to accept their fate in the past because of their awareness that there were no mechanisms available for changing their fate. However, modern concepts such as palliative care have given many hopes and expectations to the aged and disabled people. It is the duty of the modern healthcare leaders to live up to the expectations of the aged and disabled patients while delivering healthcare services to them. Since the needs of two patients may not be the same, it is necessary for the leaders to develop customized strategies for each patient while delivering healthcare services to them. Communication problems can reduce the effectiveness of a leader while working in a team. It should be noted that the success and failure of teamwork depends on the ability of the leader to communicate effectively with the team members. Since each team member may have different roles as part of the team project, it is necessary for each of them to understand their duties and responsibilities clearly. For example, doctors, nurses and administrative staffs form a typical team intended for the healthcare delivery of aged and disabled people. Aged and disabled patients may have different types of health problems and hence it is necessary for the leadership to make sure that each patient gets the services of specialist doctors and nurses based on their diseases and health problems. Some of the aged and disabled patients may have psychological problems along with physical problems. It is the duty of the leadership to make sure that the services of psychologists, counsellors and psychiatrists are available to the needy patients. Proper communication between the team members and team leadership is necessary for the delivery of quality healthcare services to the patients. However, the problems related to the traditional hierarchical organizational structure and culture has created many challenges in ensuring effective communication between doctors and their subordinates (Pecukonis, Doyle & Bliss, 2008; Yang & Meiners, 2014). The so called “halo effect” may cause many problems while leaders work as part of a team. Halo effect refers to a cognitive bias that forces a person to think that a particular strategy is good or bad (Carey et al., 2009). It should be noted that each leader may have some inherited traits long with learned traits. The inherited traits may influence his leadership style and communication styles in one way or another. For example, some of the leaders are adamant while others may be flexible in their approaches while leading a team. In other words, some of the leaders may have inherited traits for leading a team in a democratic manner while others may have inherited traits for leading a team in an autocratic manner. The halo effect forces them to lead a team in a particular manner. It is not desirable for a leader to be democratic or autocratic in nature all the time. He should be able to make adjustments in his leadership styles based on the situations. It is his duty to motivate the members of his team. Same motivational strategies cannot be used for better performing and underperforming team members. It is necessary to use punishments as a motivational strategy for underperforming team members and rewards for others. In short, it is impossible for a leader to follow same style of leadership all the time while working as part of a team. How leaders address the challenges while working as part of a team? As mentioned earlier, communication problems create many challenges in front of the leaders while working as part of a team. As per the views of Manojlovich (2010), the varying cognitive development of health care practitioners within extremely diverse health disciplines makes interaction and communication very difficult. It should be noted that the teams in healthcare industry are extremely diverse (Keller et al., 2013). For example, because of manpower shortage, America and European countries are currently importing healthcare professionals from overseas countries such as India and Pakistan in order to fill the vacancies. As a result of that healthcare delivery teams in these countries consists of people from all parts of the world. In other words, healthcare teams in these countries could be extremely diverse in terms of culture, communication styles (Verbal and nonverbal), work attitudes, work philosophies and psychological characteristics. Leaders use training as a method to bring uniformity in team activities. Training helps team leaders to overcome many of the diversity related communication problems raised by teams. According to Keller et al. (2013), one of the most important challenges that team leaders face is related to the development of appropriate strategies to deliver services through interprofessional teams. The skillsets and the expertise of different team members need not be the same. It is not necessary that a team member who performs well in one area may perform poorly in another area. It is the duty of the team leaders to identify the merits and demerits or strength and weakness of each team member before allocation different duties to them. For example, some counselling sessions may rectify the mental problems developed by many of the aged and disabled patients. Medicines are not required for such patients. In such cases, the services of a psychologist or counsellor will be enough. On the other hand some of the aged and disabled mental patients may require medicines for overcoming their problems. The services of a psychiatrist are necessary for such patients. In some countries, psychologists have the habit of prescribing medicines for their patients even though such an activity is illegal. For example, many psychologists in India have the habit of prescribing medicines for their patients. When they work in America or Europe, they may be tempted to prescribe medicines to their patients even though it is illegal. It is the duty of the team leader to empower his diverse team members about the dos and don’ts in the country they are working. Training is the best way of empowering a diverse team. The needs of aged and disabled patients may cross the limits at times. The caregivers should have enough wisdom and management skills while dealing with such situations. For example, it is quite possible that an aged patient suffering from type 2 diabetes may ask for some sweets. He may argue that it is his right to lead his life as he likes. He might have lost his confidence in future life. Because of his old age, this patient might have lost the ability to make rational decisions. In such situations, the healthcare professionals or nurses may be tempted to grant permission for his needs. According to Nagi et al. (2012), the primary area of concern for many team leaders is the demanding nature of the work performed by aged care nurses. It is the duty of the aged care nurses to discuss such situations with the team leader. The leader should interfere in such situations in order to convince the patient about the consequences of using sweets. Patience, temperament and common sense are necessary for leaders while dealing with such situations. Conclusions The needs of the aged and disabled patients are increasing day by day because of the rapid developments in medical science. Today’s aged and disabled patients expect more from heath care professional compared to the expectations of the aged and disabled patients in the past. It is the duty of the healthcare professionals and team leaders to live up to the expectations of the aged and disabled patients. It is necessary to develop individualized or persona centred strategies to deliver quality healthcare services to the aged and disabled people. However, problems related to culture, diversity, communication, work attitudes and work philosophies are raising many challenges in front of the team leaders while leading a diverse team. It is the duty of the team leader to provide enough training and development opportunities to the team members in order to help them in understanding and managing the needs of the aged and disabled patients. References Arnold, K, A., & Loughlin, C. (2013). Integrating transformational and participative versus directive leadership theories. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 34(1), 67-84. Consumers Health Forum of Australia. (2009). A diversity of views. Journal of the Consumers Health Forum of Australia. 4, 27-28. Chenoweth, L., Jeon, Y-H., Merlyn, T., & Brodaty, H. (2010). A systematic review of what factors attract and retain nurses in aged and dementia care. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 19(1–2), 156–167. ChangingMinds.org (2015). Leadership styles. 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