Social Services Directors and Director of Nursing Leadership Style - Assignment Example

Prospectus: The Relationship of Social Services Director’s and Director of Nursing Leadership style and its Effect to Nursing Home Resident’s Psychosocial well-being Problem Statement According to Allen (2008), data obtained from the government indicates that control of the administrative leader on the care quality and services have a significant psychosocial well-being of nursing home residents. Success of in nursing home care depends on performance of management team, which is inspired by leadership styles. There are changes in home care nursing that occur to support leaders in making decision that can reduce the doubts concerning new approaches (Sullivan-Marx et al. 2008). Therefore, the paper has explored the impact of director of nursing and director of social services leadership styles on psychosocial well-being of nursing home residents. In addition, there are leadership styles that create positive behaviors among management team members, which have an impact on psychosocial well-being of nursing home residents. In fact, this leadership styles encourages the employees to have a connection to the organizational values, which facilitates increase in employees’ performance in nursing home. Significance This study shall examine the impact of Director of Nursing and Social Services leadership styles as they relate to the psychosocial well-being of nursing home residents. Research conducted on this topic will give valuable data that can reinforce in several healthcare environments so as to improve the general well-being and recovery of the residents of the nursing homes. Limitations of the study The study will be limited by the facts that:- 1) Some literature review may not offer reliable information or sufficient information for quantitative synthesis. 1) Another problem is that some literature sources that may be out of date since the study will collect secondary data. Background Vast amounts of research has come up in the recent times pertaining the quality of care being given in nursing homes all over the universe. Patients in nursing homes are present for a number of different reasons that might range from dementia to palliative care (Siegert, et al. 2010). Over the years, different models have been applied to nursing homes in order to discern their quality of care levels based on a number of factors such as social support, patient’s family involvement, intervention methods, ambience of nursing homes among others. (Luker,et al. 2000). However, even with a large amount of research being directed at nursing homes’ quality of care, there is still scant research on the impacts of leadership style and organizational structure of nursing homes. A number of different areas have been researched for quality of care in nursing homes but organizational leadership has not been investigated in detail (Pearson, et. el. 1993). In this respect, the leadership style being practiced at the nursing home is of the paramount importance since it affects the patient’s well-being and recovery directly. It is expected that the leadership style of the Director of Nursing as well as the leadership style of Director of Social Services have a large impact on the psycho-social well-being of nursing home residents. Analogous to the research area proposed above, the organizational structure of any healthcare establishment is also of importance in determining the quality of care available to nursing home residents (Grabowski, et. al. 2010). Even with a large amount of research being pursued in relation to quality of care at nursing homes, there has been scant research in terms of the organizational structure and the underlying processes at nursing homes (Park, 2009) (Faulkner et al. 2008). It must be realized that organizational structure and the underlying process philosophies are of utmost importance since they tend to determine how well suited the patient care techniques are. For example, similar organizational structures cannot be applied in nursing homes that cater to dementia and to nursing homes that cater to old age people only (Martins, et al., 2009). Since each situation has its own demands, the organizational structures and its underlying philosophies must also support the overall organizational aims and objectives. The organizational structure processes and their relation to overall quality of care for nursing home residents need to be investigated in order to improve current levels of well-being and recovery at nursing homes. Research in quality of care at nursing homes has taken into account a number of different factors over the years but the areas of leadership style and organizational structure processes have remained less investigated. It is essential to investigate the aforementioned areas in order to augment the current levels of well-being and patient recovery in nursing homes across the nation. Literature Review Role of Director of Director of Nursing and Social Services Director The quality of care in nursing homes is largely dependent on the type of leadership employed by the nursing administrators. Therefore, the leadership style used by both the Social Service Director and Director of Nursing in the nursing homes should relate in a manner that produces positive results on the nursing home residents. Of great importance are the psychological needs of the home residents, which must be met by the leaders to ensure the overall high quality of life of the patients. Therefore, the leadership styles employed by the Social Service Director and Director of Nursing can serve as a measure of quality of care, including psychological care of residents in nursing homes (Ford, 1997). Nursing homes, apart from other functions, serve to ensure that the psychological needs of elderly patients are met. These needs include anxiety, loss of identity, depression, dementia, loss of personal control, and adjusting to the new environment. In addressing these needs, social workers and leaders in nursing homes seek ways of how to help the residents in the best manner. It therefore is essential that the leaders in these nursing homes have the right professional qualifications. For instance, they must have the professional capacity to address psychological needs of the residents. According to the Social Work Policy Institute (2010), lack of professional qualifications has resulted in the failure to cater for the residents’ needs effectively in most nursing homes. Both the Social Service Director and Director of Nursing in nursing homes must play the role of monitoring and assessing resident psychological care. This is important as loopholes in the care giving sector can be identified and corrected. Most important is that their leadership should focus on coordination, monitoring and assessment of operations in the nursing home, and specification of roles of staff. A relationship-oriented kind of leadership is more capable of ensuring that the psychological needs of residents are met. In this type of leadership, there is supporting, developing, and recognizing the subordinate staff, who are the core to care provision in nursing homes. If these are appreciated by the Social Service Director and Director of Nursing, who are their seniors, they will be motivated to provide quality care to the residents (Nagelkerk, 2005). Nursing management requires leadership skills in order to deliver high quality services. The director of nursing may work in the public social services in order to deliver the organization intended goals. Therefore, he or she will focus on delivering quality, safe and efficient services in order to improve physical health of patients. The nursing directors have the ability to deal with ambiguity while developing good relationships with their patients in order to deliver effective services. However, the directors of social services in the nursing field play significant leadership roles, such as mentoring, training people about disease prevention and offering emotional support to people in the community. The director of social services is responsible for social care maintenance and work together with the community members in achieving the intended goals of an organization successfully. Although the director of nursing deals with physical care delivery and the director of social services offer emotional support to patients, they are both involved in planning, organizing, leading and controlling resources in order to achieve the predetermined goals. Leadership that is based on personal relationships stands a greater chance of affecting positively on the psychological well-being of residents in nursing homes. However, more research needs to be conducted in this area to affirm further the relationship between leadership styles of nursing directors and social services directors to the quality of care provided in nursing homes, and especially the psychological well-being of residents. Impact of Director of Nursing and Director of Social Services Leadership Style on the psychosocial well-being of Nursing home residents In order to determine the relationship existing between leadership styles and psychosocial well-being of nursing home residents, there is need to compare and identify the leadership styles involved. Nevertheless, psychosocial well-being in setting of home nursing is not influenced by the changes in culture and integration with administrator’s leadership styles. Relationship existing between nursing homes and leadership styles of nursing directors has a significant influence on the care quality. Nursing directors cooperate with administrators in establishing a long-term relationship with residents of nursing homes in order to foster a culture that can support development of the team. However, there are limited building preparations for the leaders of nursing homes, which cause limits on the leadership. Theoretical Framework One of the theoretical frameworks related to the topic is empowerment framework for leadership development. Therefore, empowerment framework is one of the approaches that can motivate leaders enabling them to improve the competency skills in their areas of specialization. MacPhee, et. al. (2012) argues that empowerment framework is one of the effective strategies that can create change within health care organization. This theoretical approach is valuable in nursing leadership because empowered leaders can also empower others; thus, creating significant change within the healthcare organization. Research Questions The research will be guided by the following questions:- 1) What is the leadership styles found in nursing homes? 1) What are the impacts of the leadership styles on the psychosocial wellbeing of residents in the nursing homes? Research Methodology Research Design This research will utilize a literature review design to systematically and extensively analyze relevant publications to the stated research problem. The Literature review design is important in this research study as it takes not of the strengths and weaknesses of the articles or any useful data to the problem of the research. The researcher will use the quantitative research methodology as these methodology tests theories deductively from existing knowledge through developing hypothesized correlations and proposed findings of the study. The research will maintain a detached, objective view in order to understand the facts (Peipert, et. al. 2000). Quantitative research approach takes descriptive, correlational, quasi experiments and experiments research design. The purpose of this mixed method study is to understand and to examine the leadership styles of both Director of Nursing and Social Services and their influences and impact on the overall psychosocial well-being of nursing home residents. I would like to see if the Director of Nursing and Social Services with effective and strong leadership style and good relationship will result in satisfied and happy nursing home residents in terms of their psychosocial well-being. There are often instances where resident psychosocial care is being neglected because people in leadership positions that are being hired do not have the qualifications or the experience to do the job. This will also be beneficial to signal out people who are quitting their jobs prematurely. There was a strong connection between staff turnover rates and the quality of care of nursing home residents. The quantitative methods employed in this study can offer sufficient information about correlations among variables under investigation to predict or control future results. The strength of these quantitative methodologies manipulated can be argued as the limitations to the methods used under this review especially where organizational study is involved. This is because this research method dismisses the individual experiences as insignificant and regards humanity as merely reacting and responding to environment (Druckman, 2005). Data Collection procedures The researcher will use the secondary data collection methods in this study. The researcher will get important data from different sources, analyze and eventually create new data on how leadership designs of the directors of nursing as well as the social services positively effects on the psychosocial well-being of nursing home residents. The merits of this method are that establishes determines the level of research and models that have been formulated in the course of the research study. Therefore with this method, the researcher does not have to conduct fieldwork thus giving the researcher time to clearly scrutinize the research problem. The other advantage of this method is because it saves time as well as money and at the same time addressing the ethical issues. Data analysis procedures The study will use the descriptive statistics to evaluate the descriptive aspects of the research. The relationship between the leadership styles employed in the nursing homes and the well-being of the residents will be analyzed using the spearman rho coefficient. The statistical aspects of the study will be evaluated by the use of the Statistical package for Social Sciences. References Allen, J. (2008). Nursing home administration (5.Ed.). New York: Springer Publishing Co., LLC. Druckman, D. (2005). Doing research: Methods of inquiry for conflict analysis. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications. Faulkner, J., and Laschinger, H. (2008). The effects of structural and psychological empowerment on perceived respect in acute care nurses. Journal of Nursing Management 16(2), 214-221. Ford, W. (1997). Nursing Home Leadership. London: The Management Advantage, Inc. Grabowski, D. C., Aschbrenner, K. A., Rome, V. F., and Bartels, S. J. (2010). Quality of Mental Health Care for Nursing Home Residents: A Literature Review. Med Care Res Rev, 67(6), 627-656. Luker, K. A., Austin, L., Caress, A., & Hallett, C. E. (2000). The importance of ‘knowing the patient’: community nurses’ constructions of quality in providing palliative care. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 31(4), 775-782. Martins, J. D., Schneider, D. G., Coelho, F. L., Nascimento, E. R., Alburquerque, G. L., Erdmann, A. L., et al. (2009). Quality of life among elderly people receiving home care services. Acta Paul Enferm, 22(3), 265-271. MacPhee, M., Skelton-Green, J., Bouthillette, F., & Suryaprakash, N. (2012). An empowerment Framework for nursing leadership development: supporting evidence. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 68(1), 159-169. Nagelkerk, J. (2005). Leadership and Nursing Care Management. New York: Elsevier Health Sciences. Park, N. S. (2009). The Relationship of Social Engagement to Psychological Well-Being of Older Adults in Assisted Living Facilities. Journal of Applied Gerontology, 28(4), 461-481. Pearson, A., Hocking, S., Mott, S., & Riggs, A. (1993). Quality of care in nursing homes: from the resident's perspective. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 18(1), 20-24. Peipert, J. F., Gifford, D. S., & Boardman, L. A. (January 01, 2000). Research design and Methods of quantitative synthesis of medical evidence. Obstetrics and Gynecology, 90,3, 473-8. Siegert, R. J., Gao, W., Halkey, F. H., & Higginson, I. J. (2010). Psychological Well-Being and Quality of Care: A Factor-Analytic Examination of the Palliative Care Outcome Scale. Journal of Pain and Symptom Management, 40(1), 67-74. Social Work Policy Institute. (2010). Social Work Services in Nursing Homes: Toward Quality Psychosocial Care. Retrieved from http://www.socialworkpolicy.org/research/social-work-services-in-nursing-homes-toward-quality-psychosocial-care.html Sullivan-Marx, E. M., and Gray-Miceli, D. (Eds.). (2008). Leadership and managements skills for Long-term care. New York: Springer Publishing Company, LLC Read More