Transforming Nursing Practice through Transformational Leadership - Term Paper Example

Table of Contents Introduction 3 Transformation Leadership 4 Significance of Transformational Leadership in Nursing Practice 5 Idealized Influence 6 Intellectual Stimulation 7 Individualized Consideration 8 Inspirational Motivation 10 Conclusion 11 References 13 Transforming Nursing Practice through Transformational Leadership Key Words: Nurse Leader, Transformational Leadership, Healthcare, Nursing Practice Introduction Effective nursing leadership facilitates accomplishment of healthcare delivery and meeting of consumer demands (Curtis et al, 2014). Currently, healthcare institutions are faced with constant changes which require more adaptive and flexible leadership. According to Govier (2009) nurse leaders should be able to respond to the ever-changing healthcare nursing which includes organizational expectations as well as local and national policies. Consumers of healthcare services have higher expectations of higher standards in nursing care. Nurse leaders ought to exhibit flexibility and resilience to respond to changes and support other nurses to embrace this positively (Shirey, 2009). Effective leaders should have the ability to reframe the perspective their followers and influence them to perceive the changes as both essential and achievable. Transformational leadership influences and motivates followers by engaging to higher ideas and moral values where the leader establishes ingrained internal values. Transformational leaders create supportive environments of shared responsibility (Shirey, 2009). This efficacy of transformational leadership is that the model not only acknowledges significance of rewards but also satisfies the higher needs of followers through emotionally and intellectually engaging them (McTeer, 2014). The focus of this article is transformational leadership and its application to nursing practice by considering elements of transformational leadership namely: idealized influence; inspirational motivation; intellectual stimulation; and individualized consideration; and how they underpin effective leadership in healthcare practice. Transformation Leadership Attari (2013) describes transformational leadership as the behaviour of a leader that converts and inspires followers to achieve beyond their prospects and excel for organization’s benefit. Attari (2013) further explains that transformational leaders explore potential motivation in their followers and lay emphasis on them meeting their priority prerequisites. Transformational leadership assists in developing a mutual relationship between leaders and their followers and as a result this guides the followers to become potential leaders (Linette & Sherman, 2014). Attari (2013 in Bass et al 1990) explains that transformational leadership consists of four main elements namely: idealized influence; inspirational motivation; intellectual stimulation; and individualized consideration. In today’s quickly changing healthcare, having the capability to be a transformational leader is fundamental. Transformational nurse leaders have the ability to recognize needed changes, implement change by motivating and inspiring changes and develop a sense of commitment to change (McTeer, 2014). Transformational leadership centers on high level of engagement between leaders and the followers. Evidence based research indicates that transformational leadership improves nurse satisfaction, encourages positive work environment and lowers employee turnover (Ilies et al, 2012). Significance of Transformational Leadership in Nursing Practice Transformational leadership is applicable in healthcare settings and in particular wards and emergency rooms because these are unstable and fast changing settings (McTeer, 2014). As a result, leaders in such an erratic environment need to recognize uncertainty, be adaptive and flexible, motivate and also take into consideration the needs and values of the staff. In transformational leadership, leaders empower, inspire and motivate their subordinates by involving the staff members in decision making because this motivates them to be part of the organizational vision and makes the workers feel that they contribute to the organizational success (Curtis et al, 2014). The focus of transformational leadership is on interpersonal processes between the leader and the staff members and the process is underpinned through empowerment. Empowered nurses have the ability to believe in their capabilities and also to adapt to changes. However, when nurse leaders use transformational leadership, it is vital for them to set limitations, goals and establish motion structural support for team members(McTeer, 2014). Therefore, transformational leadership is perceived as empowering though nurse leaders should ensure they maintain balance use of power democratically to avoid being perceived like they are abusing the power and also not to be soft and compromise delivery of care (Attari, 2013). For transformational leadership to work, the leader should also respect and trust the team under him/her. Pillars fundamental to strong leadership include authority, power and influence. As a result, for a leader to be effective in a healthcare setting, he/she must regularly use influence and on the other hand power and authority less (Linette & Sherman, 2014). As mentioned before, it is important for a leader to have the ability to motivate, persuade, appreciate and negotiate instead of just wielding power. It is therefore noteworthy that influence is particularly important for any leader. In line with this argument, for nurse leaders to create a supportive care environment, they should be role models leading by example, build caring relations and lastly mentor through instruction (Linette & Sherman, 2014). Idealized Influence Idealized influence instills confidence, high regard, respect, loyalty and also trust and as Northouse (2010) explains, this develops a sense of mission among workers. For this to happen, nurse leaders should be role models who other nurses seek to imitate (Ilies et al, 2012). This is important because workers are less likely to resist changes or implementation of new initiatives when they have leaders who their role models (Shirey, 2009). Just like nurses are required to constantly update their knowledge ad actions using evidence-based strategy, nurse leaders are required to be charismatic for them to be effective (Daly, 2012). For nurse leaders to be charismatic, they have to possess traits such as charm, articulacy, confidence, creativity and dedication to the vision and objectives that leaders desires. Nurse leaders should be full of admiration due to their moral position and sense of mission (Northouse, 2010). Nurse leaders demonstrate this in their approach and constancy in management of personnel and matters involving their personnel. Nursing practice involves various leaders at numerous levels, for instance direct leadership role at a unit level and higher leadership roles at a service level. Practically, this can result to conflict as well as control seeking, particularly when making final decisions (Daly, 2012). Whereas transmission of personnel’s’ ideas occurs through direct leadership roles, this can make leaders to be in a susceptible when trying to meet the needs of personnel and consumers but the higher leaders restrict them be emphasizing on the strategic and organizational matters; this mostly leads to blocking of decisions as a result of various constraints that direct leaders are not aware of. Whereas direct leaders guide and support those under them, they are placed in an intricate position since they have to balance the support that those under them needs and their own vision and objective with how they align this with the general organizational leadership. Consequently, nurse leaders should have confidence and communicate their goals and vision to those under them and at the same time identify the limitations within their role when a shared vision experiences difficulties. Intellectual Stimulation According to Northhouse (2010), intellectual stimulation describes leaders who promote innovation and creativity among staff and also challenges staff’s beliefs. Transformational leaders encourage staff members under them to encourage critical thinking and hence empower the staff to tackle problems using new evidence-based strategies for the betterment of the organisation. Library and IT facilities ought to be availed within healthcare institutions to support ongoing learning to improve patient care and also encourage best practice. The significance of continuing education is that it helps staff to update their knowledge in line with service and patient expectations and also promotes innovation among staff members (Northhouse, 2010). Direct nurse leaders should make sure that staff members who undergo training and studies share the knowledge with other staff members to support evidence based practice. However, as Wang et al (2011) note, even though intellectual stimulation is advantageous, constantly attempting to innovate and come up with new means to do things may end up stressing and exhausting staff members. In addition, a high staff turnover in the long run can lead to staff members becoming part of motivation chain that is constantly interrupted by lack of stability and acquaintance of team members (Wang et al, 2011). Individualized Consideration Individualized consideration refers to leaders who coach and advise their staff members. As Curtis et al (2011) explain, leaders with individual consideration encourage those under them to achieve their goals that benefit both the staff members as well as the institution. In individualized consideration, leaders support staff members to attain higher levels of accomplishment, aiding full actualization by the leader coaching and advising the staff members. Leaders are supposed to be supportive and caring towards their staff since leaders have a duty of care towards their staff. As Attari (2013) argues, staff support can be in form of frequent positive feedback and also through workforce appraisal because lack these make staff feel like they are not valued and this cannot only lead to under-performance but also to high level of absenteeism in the workplace. Leaders who give positive feedbacks to those under them elevate their self-esteem and hence enhance their performance (Linette & Sherman, 2014). During staff appraisal, nurse leaders ought to use personal development plans, peer reviews in addition to 360 degree assessments. In particular, 360 degree assessments consume time and use lots of resources; they are highly effective because they enable true assessment of all team members constructively and effectively (Curtis, et al, 2011). As Curtis et al (2011) explain, empowerment is among the most important aspects in transformational leadership. When leaders empower their subordinates, they increase personnel self-efficacy and therefore enable them to complete their tasks more efficiently. For the efficacy of the empowerment, effective leaders should operate throughout organizational levels. An empowerment strategy consists of numerous leadership competencies and skills such as adaptability, time management, change management, communication skills, decisiveness, resource management, building relationships, team management among other competencies and skills (Wang et al, 2011). Direct nurse leaders have the ability to empower their staff members through regular meeting with their teams where personnel of every grade within the nursing tram are given a chance to air their views and jointly develop goals and plans to provide patient care with more efficiency that is in accordance with the organizational mission and vision (Curtis et al, 2011). For instance, the team can be assigned the responsibility of duty roster as this can inform the staff members the significance of the unit and safe delivery of nursing care with sufficient number of staff members. This form of empowerment gives the staff the ability to take ownership for the efficient management of the unit. Since direct nurse leaders have more involvement with patient care as compared to top management, direct nurse leaders have more knowledge regarding the objectives and tactics that can enhance care and this significantly contributes to organizational goals (Linette & Sherman, 2014). A study conducted by Wang et al (2011) found out that lack of established role definitions along with role conflict occurs since nurse leaders continually balance various elements of their roles without any formal preparations or required skills. As Wang et al (2011) stipulate, whereas direct leaders have educational duty for nursing care standard, they cannot guarantee it. Empowerment requires services to establish an environment that is supportive and values nurses and also ensures that nurses are involved in strategic and operational matters that promote opportunities for learning, which includes individual and service efficacy (Wang et al, 2011). Transformational leaders optimize team performance and hence nurse leader should be more communicative. For instance, nurse leaders need to constantly thank and praise staff member, distribute workload fairly, mentor effectively, have personalized career planning and have professional development activities aimed at motivating staff independently. Inspirational Motivation (2010) provides that inspirational motivation involves promoting team spirit among individuals to attain organizational objectives and aspirations as well as their own individual goals. As Linette& Sherman (2014) puts it, motivation is undoubtedly a vital aspect of healthcare since it affects performance and patient care as well. According to Northouse (2010) leaders communicate high projection to workers and inspire them by motivating employees to share the organizational goals. Nurse leaders are supposed to make sure that forefront workers have representations in committees where executive organizational decisions are made. Having representations of the frontline personnel in the committees offer responsibilities and opportunities for the staff to learn new skills and to be empowered as well (Daly, 2012). To further motivate and inspire the staff, nurse leaders should support further education and training for staff members at all levels involved in nursing care. Working within a motivated service makes the staff to be zealous regarding the culture and the importance of their work contribution and thus makes the staff enjoy when delivering nursing care (Govier, 2009). With inspirational motivation, a nurse leader maintains focus on the patients’ best outcome as the primary vision and assists their followers to share the vision (Attari, 2013). Maintaining open communication, supporting and encouraging staff members is the key to nursing leadership role in order to maintain primary vision. Nurse leaders can inspire and motivate staff members via visibility and presence. Through visibility, nurse leaders can form and maintain relationships with staff members and physicians and this provides evidence that the nurse leaders care about practice (Daly, 2012). Generally, transformational leaders have the ability to create efficient solutions to very critical issues in nursing profession (Daly, 2012). Nursing profession involves trying to balance intricate demand within unstable setting since this is the focal point to formulate healthier and better healthcare institutions that offer quality of nursing care that patients, families and society at large deserve. Leaders should have knowledge and competency in strategic planning, for their efforts to be recognized at senior levels (Attari, 2013). Whereas transformation leadership is efficient in spite of the culture, the degree of efficiency is dependent on cultural values to some level. Where efficiency is perceived as the relationship between the goals and outputs, the more outputs contribute to the goals and the more efficient the ward, unit or healthcare institution is. Among the most vital roles of the nurse leader is to assist practicing nurses to re-engage within the heart of nursing. Therefore, it is important for a nurse leader to devise strategies that are likely to increase morale, retention as well as the commitment of the staff (Linette & Sherman, 2014). Conclusion Effective transformational leadership is essential for the success of healthcare institutions. Since healthcare services are continually adapting to changes; nurse leaders have to lead, manage and organize delivery of care within an increasingly changing environment. This means that transformation is required within the practice environment and for this to be effective it has to start with the nursing leadership team and this can be achieved through transformational leadership. Even though all elements of transformational leadership are mutually dependent, they should coexist for effective leadership. Transformational leaders have the ability to effect major changes within their followers as well as within the institutions. This is because transformational leaders lead by focusing on aspects like vision, mission, strategy, shared, culture among other qualities. The leaders do this through clear articulation of institutional vision and leading by example, being role models and empowering the follower to achieve organizational goals. For nurse leaders to accomplish this, they should be strong role models, have clear purpose, be decisive, be change agents, be adaptive, inspiring, efficient communicators and be considerate with the individual need of staff members. Benefits of nurse leaders using transformational leadership are that the staff members are less stressed; are more satisfied; highly motivated and have higher levels of performance. Lastly, such unit and teams are more efficient, innovative and collaborative and this result to more effective, healthier organizations that have ability to rapidly and productively respond to changes. References Attari, M. 2013. The Impact of Transformational Leadership on Nurse Psychological Empowerment. International Journal of Hospital Research, 2(2):71-76. Curtis, E, Vries J & Sheerin F. 2011. Developing leadership in nursing: exploring core factors. British Journal of Nursing, 20(5):306-309. Daly J. 2012. Management and leadership in nursing: an Australian educational perspective. Journal of Nursing Management, 20(1): 65–71. Govier, I. 2009. Examining transformational approaches to effective leadership in healthcare settings. Nursing Times, 105(18): 24–27. Ilies R, Curşeu PL, Dimotakis N & Spitzmuller M. 2012. Leaders’ emotional expressiveness and their behavioural and relational authenticity: effects on followers. 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