Nursing Leadership Skills Research Articles

Nurse as Leader, A Pillar of Professional Identity.

The nurse as leader is a critical pillar of nursing professional identity to support ongoing development of nurses in a safe, effective, and healthy work environment. Defined as "inspiring self and others to transform a shared vision into reality" (University of Kansas School of Nursing, 2023), the Nurse as Leader Pillar is developed throughout a nurse's career. Starting with nursing school, students must learn nursing leadership skills and develop and integrate leadership characteristics into their practice. Professional development specialists must embed these characteristics into nursing education, as all nurses are leaders. Current nurses in practice must set the stage and model leadership in their environment as new nurses are introduced into the profession. [J Contin Educ Nurs. 2023;54(11):497-500.].

Developing Nursing Leadership Skills When Working With Disaster Response Programs

As the frequency and intensity of disasters worsen, now is the time for leaders in nursing to respond, hone their leadership skills, and acquire new competencies. The impact of these disasters will wreak havoc on community public health in both the short and long term, and involvement at any level of the four emergency management cycles—mitigation phase, preparedness phase, response phase, and recovery phase—will positively impact community health and enhance nurse leadership skills. Responding to a disaster requires resilience, knowledge of emergency management, willingness to work in austere environments, and transparent communication. Nurse leaders can find these opportunities with nonprofit disaster relief organizations and carry their experience over to leadership roles in health care.

Baccalaureate Nursing Students' Reflections on Professional Development Within the Nursing Leadership Role When Participating in Student-run Teams: A Qualitative Content Analysis of Student's Reflection Notes.

IntroductionStudies show that nursing education institutions do not sufficiently prepare newly graduated nurses for the challenges they face when it comes to the leadership role. The direct relationship between leadership and quality of care makes it imperative to explore what contributes to prepare undergraduate nursing students to be effective future leaders.ObjectiveTo explore how second-year nursing students experience development of nursing leadership competence when participating in student-run teams (SRTs).MethodsWe used a qualitative approach with a descriptive, exploratory design to examine 37 reflective notes with a scope of 1000 words each, written while undertaking leadership training in 14 medical and surgical wards. An inductive, qualitative content analysis inspired by Lindgren et al. was used to give meaning and content to the students’ experiences.ResultsOne overarching theme emerged when analyzing the reflective notes; nursing leadership skills are developed in a safe authentic clinical environment. This main theme evolved from an interpretation of three subthemes: (1) Discovery and recognition of the leadership role contributed to development of nursing identity, (2) Being challenged and given responsibility in the SRT contributed to development of nursing leadership skills, (3) The way nursing services are organized affects the quality of care and satisfaction in one’s own work situation.ConclusionSRTs can be a way of organizing clinical placement studies to strengthen nursing students’ competence in the nursing leadership role and may counteract the reality shock when transitioning from the student role to the professional role.

Exploring the use of simulation to develop leadership skills in undergraduate nursing students: a scoping review protocol.

This review will explore the use of simulation to develop leadership skills in nursing students in undergraduate nursing education programs. Leadership skills are traditionally incorporated into nursing curriculum as a stand-alone course. A demonstrated need for leadership skills in nursing graduates and recent evidence on the effectiveness of simulation in nursing education programs has led to increased use of simulation to develop leadership skills in undergraduate nursing students. Identification, explication, and mapping of the various strategies are required to help advance the use of simulation to develop leadership skills in nursing education. Papers that focus on the use of simulation strategies specifically related to the development of nursing leadership skills in undergraduate nursing students will be included. Papers focused on post-registration/licensure nurses, graduate nurses, nurse practitioners, midwives, allied health care professionals, or psychomotor nursing skills will be excluded. This review will be conducted in accordance with JBI methodology for scoping reviews and will consider English-language literature from 2000 to the present. Data will be extracted from the following databases: CINAHL Plus with Full Text (EBSCO); MEDLINE (R) and Epub Ahead of Print (Ovid), In-Process, In-Data-Review and Other Non-Indexed Citations, and Daily and Versions (R); PsycINFO (Ovid); Embase (Ovid); ERIC (EBSCO); and ProQuest Nursing and Allied Health Source. The search will also include unpublished non-peer-reviewed literature.

Burnout and job satisfaction among nurses in three Spanish regions.

To determine the levels of job satisfaction and burnout syndrome and related factors among nurses in three Spanish regions. The nursing profession involves high work stress due to emotional involvement, workload and available resources. Descriptive multicentric cross-sectional study. Sociodemographic and migration data were collected and participants completed the Job Satisfaction Questionnaire S20/23 and Maslach Burnout Inventory. The data were analysed using descriptive statistical methods using the program SPSS. The sample included 228 nurses (187 women and 41 men), with a mean age of 37.11±10.87. Reported job satisfaction was medium to high. Overall, values were low in emotional fatigue and medium in depersonalization and personal fulfilment. In terms of migration, 21.59% of the participants had already moved to other Spanish regions or another country, while 18.58% had the intention of doing so. Nurses with a temporary contract showed a high burnout rate, and high levels of emotional fatigue, depersonalization and lack of personal fulfilment. Strategies are needed to improve working and contractual conditions such as enhancing teamwork, management and leadership skills in nurses; achieving internal promotion; and having higher participation in decision-making and a better balance of power between health institution managers and health professionals.

Developing, Promoting, and Sustaining Palliative Care Across Central Eastern Europe: Educating Nurses to Be Leaders Is a Critical First Step.

Worldwide, health care is becoming more complex and multifaceted. Nurses, who spend more time at the bedside or out in the community with patients and their families than any other health care professional, need leadership-building skills in order to navigate these challenging times. New guidelines focus on interprofessional and holistic care, emphasizing the importance of building leadership skills and abilities. The World Health Organization and the European Association for Palliative Care have shown interest in influencing the development and implementation of palliative care services globally, given the increasingly aging population, the growing incidence of cancer, and the human immunodeficiency virus/AIDS epidemic. Despite challenges in developing leadership skills in nurses throughout Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), visionary nursing leaders throughout these countries have taken the opportunity to develop the Transformational Palliative Nursing Leadership Program, which has been designed to improve the leadership abilities of palliative care nurses throughout CEE countries. The purpose of the Transformational Palliative Nursing Leadership Program education is to equip palliative care nurses with the ability to promote, develop, and sustain this specialized care in CEE countries or any other part of the world.

Navigating a role transition: How to use your nursing leadership skills in a new career chapter.

Navigating a role transition: How to use your nursing leadership skills in a new career chapter.

Developing effective nurse leadership skills.

Leadership is a role that nurses are expected to fulfil, regardless of their job title and experience. Nurses are required to lead and manage care as soon as they have completed their training. However, the development of leadership skills and the associated learning can be challenging, especially for less experienced nurses and those at the beginning of their careers. This article examines the importance of effective leadership for nurses, patients and healthcare organisations, and outlines some of the theories of leadership such as transformational leadership. It also details how nurses can develop their leadership skills, for example through self-awareness, critical reflection and role modelling.

A partnership to assess clinical nurse leadership skills.

A partnership to assess clinical nurse leadership skills.

Medical Mission to Haiti

Medical mission trips have their challenges, but can be life changing for both the providers and receivers of care. This mission took place in Haiti where over 1,800 people were provided free primary health care within 24 clinic hours. The team consisted of nursing students, Registered Nurses, and Nurse Practitioners. The experience provided the opportunity to build relationships, provide valuable clinical education to nursing students, and provide teaching and leadership skills for nurses.

Learning to Lead: Teaching the Millennial Nursing Student Leadership Skills in a Short-Term Immersion Study Abroad Program

This paper presents the strategies used to teach millennial generation nursing students the leadership skills needed to provide quality and safe nursing care in the context of an experiential short-term study abroad program in Jamaica. To achieve this educational goal and to meet the requirements specific to the course, the program was built on a framework of two interrelated approaches: concept-based learning and cultural immersion. Cultural immersion was accomplished through carefully selected site visits, activities, and assignments. Through active-learning projects that used assessment, planning, and implementation, students were required to apply learned nursing knowledge and skills and to demonstrate essential nursing leadership skills. Students’ experiences, reflections, and applications were assessed through formative and summative evaluation.

Preparing Nursing Students for Leadership Using a Disaster-Related Simulation.

Increasing numbers and severity of disasters across the globe require nurses to be prepared to provide leadership in disaster situations. To address this need, a combination of didactic and simulation exercises was used to provide a daylong experience emphasizing application of nursing leadership skills in disasters to senior baccalaureate students. Evaluation of learning outcomes demonstrated significant improvement in student self-efficacy related to leadership in disasters.

Using the Integrated Nurse Leadership Program to Reduce Sepsis Mortality

The Integrated Nurse Leadership Program (INLP) is a collaborative improvement model focused on developing practical leadership skills of nurses and other frontline clinicians to lead quality improvement efforts. Sepsis is a major challenge to treat because it arises unpredictably and can progress rapidly. Nine San Francisco Bay Area hospitals participated in a 22-month INLP Sepsis Mortality Reduction Project to improve sepsis detection and management. The INLP focused on developing leadership and process improvement skills of nurses and other frontline clinicians. Teams of trained clinicians then implemented three strategies to improve early identification and timely treatment of sepsis: (1) sepsis screening of all patients, with diagnostic testing according to protocol; (2) timely treatment on the basis of key elements of Early Goal-Directed Therapy (EGDT); and (3) ongoing data review. Each hospital agreed to pursue the goal of reducing sepsis mortality by 15% by the end of the project. In the data collection period (baseline, July-December 2008 and project completion, January-June 2011), team members showed strong improvement in perceived leadership skills, team effectiveness, and ability to improve care quality. During this period, sepsis mortality for eight of the participating hospitals (Hospital 9 joined the project six months after it began) decreased by 43.7%-from 28% in the baseline period to 16% at project completion. Sepsis mortality rates trended downward for all hospitals, significantly decreasing (p<.05 at one hospital, p<.01 for four hospitals). In addition to improvement in safety culture and management of septic patients, hospitals participating in the INLP Sepsis Mortality Reduction Project achieved reductions in sepsis mortality during the study period and sustained reductions for more than one year later. The INLP model can be readily applied beyond sepsis management and mortality to other quality problems.

Nursing Administrative Officer: Transforming Nursing Leadership in Acute-Care Hospitals

According to the International Council of Nurses (ICN), senior nurse managers and nurse executives have a mandate to scale up nursing leadership skills and decision-making authority globally.1 To this end, ICN sponsors 3 leadership programs for nurse leaders in developing and developed countries: Leadership in Negotiation, Global Leadership Institute, and Leadership for Change. All these programs are geared towards developing a high caliber of nurse leaders who possess competencies to address the demands for patient safety and quality in today's complex global healthcare environment. Huston2 asserts that the nurse leader for 2020 must embrace a global perspective regarding healthcare and professional issues. Nurse leaders must be politically perceptive, adaptive to rapid change and chaos, and highly adept in decision making, team building, and collaboration.2,3

Quality and safety education for nurses: a nursing leadership skills exercise.

The Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) initiative was established to answer the Institute of Medicine's trio of reports that stress the need to enhance the quality and safety of health care in the United States. The initiative has resulted in six competencies, along with innovative curricular guides to better prepare nurses to improve the health care systems within which they work. Participating in a root cause analysis (RCA) is one of several teaching strategies common to the development of QSEN competencies. This article describes the development, evaluation, and revision of a nursing leadership skills exercise that enabled students to participate in an RCA. In addition to making learning relevant, this exercise focused student attention on the nation's concern about the quality and safety of health care in the United States.

The Birth of a Healthcare Leadership Academy: Lessons Learned From The Ohio State University

The purpose of this article is to share the lessons learned from The Ohio State University's (OSU's) College of Nursing's (CON's) efforts to design and grow a leadership academy with a strategic vision of enhancing the leadership skills of nurses and other healthcare professionals, so that others can use these lessons to inform the successful development of similar initiatives. The ultimate goal of a leadership institute/initiative is to strengthen leadership confidence and competence for the ultimate purpose of improving healthcare quality and patient outcomes, as well as of reducing costs.

Developing nursing leadership skills through reflective journaling: a nursing professor’s personal reflection

Reflective journaling can be an effective teaching strategy in undergraduate nursing education. In particular, reflective journaling has been shown to increase the learner’s critical thinking and future application of new knowledge. This personal reflective paper describes and discusses the design, implementation, evaluation and effectiveness of a reflective journaling assignment in assisting undergraduate nursing students with developing nursing leadership skills. The assignment was implemented across seven sections of a collaborative nursing degree program and students were given the opportunity to provide their feedback on the usefulness of reflective journaling in helping them develop stronger leadership skills. This paper concludes with a discussion of revisions and recommendations for a more successful implementation of this assignment.

Developing Nurse Leaders

This study aims to determine whether participation in the Nursing Leadership Perspectives Program (NLPP) at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, produced a change in leadership skills, increased professional activities, leadership promotion, and retention rates of participants. The NLPP is an educational program designed to enhance leadership skills and promote professionalism of registered nurses. The 6-month program provides participants with theoretical knowledge, core competencies, and opportunities to practice application of leadership skills. Outcome metrics were collected from registered nurses who completed the program (n = 15). Data analysis included descriptive and nonparametric methods. Participants reported statistically significant changes in their leadership skills after participation in the program (P = .007) on the Leadership Practices Inventory. Changes in professional behavior were also statistically significant as rated by the Nursing Activity Scale (P = .001). Participants demonstrated a change in leadership skills and professional behavior following the program.

Leadership skills for nurses working in the criminal justice system

This article, the second in a five-part series, explores leadership skills for nurses working in the criminal justice system to effect change in service provision. The article discusses different leadership styles and distinguishes management from leadership. Factors that influence change are outlined, as is the need for emotional intelligence, teamwork and collaborative working. Change management, negotiating ability and conflict management are important skills that nurses should develop to become effective leaders.

Leadership skills for nurses working in the criminal justice system

Leadership skills for nurses working in the criminal justice system