Leadership observation - Essay Example

Leadership observation Introduction Good leadership and management skills are crucial aspects for the smooth flow of activities inan organization. In a health care system, leadership positions come with responsibilities that require knowledge, skills and competence for their effective performance. A management position requires the manager to be skilled in planning, organizing, staffing, directing and coordinating both medical and non-medical activities for attainment of quality health care delivery.

Understanding the significance of leadership in a health care system necessitates a leadership observation. For this reason, this paper discusses a leadership observation activity that was conducted in the crossroad nursing home and rehabilitation center in Davenport Florida.Organizational Overview Crossroad nursing home and rehabilitation center in Davenport Florida is a facility with a bed capacity of sixty. The mission statement of crossroad nursing home and rehabilitation center is to commit to quality care and services to acknowledge, clarify, meet and exceed the expectations of the clients.

The facility cares for the health needs of both the patients who need specialized nursing care, as well as those with rehabilitation needs. However, a small facility, Crossroad offers a perfect environment for enhancement of both social and medical health. The medical and non-medical staff maintains a cordial and cooperative, friendly relationship from the administrative level to the housekeepers. Working as a regular staff nurse, I managed to follow and observe L.C, who is a BSN and the unit manager. L.C being the manager of the entire units is in charge of all the sixty patients who are the residents of the facility.

This work requires constant interaction with the staff and the patients. L.C maintains a cordial relationship with the director of nursing who is her supervisor in the unit.Observation Following and observing L.C as my leader model, I realized she employed a transformational and democratic leadership approach where she influenced her juniors with motivation and need for achievement of objectives (Denhardt & Campbell, 2006). I realized the unit manager was categorical with time management and execution of duty among the employees under her supervision. L.C reports daily and begins by inquiring for the presence of all the staff on duty, this is followed by making a follow up on any staff who may not be present, this goes to a level where she calls the clients to inquire the reason for lateness, and then proceeds to make a work schedule for the day. L.C keeps herself informed of all the activities and events in the facility.

This is achieved through conduction of daily meetings from 9:00 am. This gives her an opportunity to identify areas for adjustment as well as understanding the needs of the clients and the stuff. The unit manager appears to understand the differentiation of duty and position. This is evident through her referral of cases that she feels are beyond her scope to the director of nursing. L.C maintains both horizontal and vertical communication where she communicates with both employees at her level of management as well as those below and above her level (Mishra & Mishra, 2009).

The maintenance of appropriate communication pattern and channel appears to be one of the core factors for the sufficiency of flow of services in the facility. The unit manager is a hard worker, organized and dedicated to the performance of her duty. I noticed L.C does not spend more than 5 minutes sitting at a time and is normally involved in duties for improvement of the welfare of the facility. She ensures organization that can be witnessed in her color-coding of documents and instruments to help in differentiation and speed processes.

Conclusion Appropriate authority for the responsibility as in the case of L.C the unit manager in Crossroad nursing home and rehabilitation center is important for execution of leadership responsibility. Following my observation of L.C, I felt challenged and motivated to join a position as for L.C. it is thus evident that communication skills, technical skills and organizational management skills are necessary for effective performance in the unit management duty as that of L.C.ReferencesDenhardt, J. V., & Campbell, K. B. (2006).

The Role of Democratic Values in Transformational Leadership. Administration & Society.Mishra, D., & Mishra, A. (2009). Effective communication, collaboration, and coordination in eXtreme programming: Human-centric perspective in a small organization. Human Factors and Ergonomics In Manufacturing, 19, 438–456.