All Entries Tagged With: "leadership development"
Practical tips for implementing shared governance
Diana Swihart, PhD, DMin, MSN, CS, RN-BC, shares the following practical tips and best practices for ensuring success when building shared governance.
- Schedule a day-long retreat away from the organization to prepare organizational and nursing leaders to implement shared governance. Discuss the role shared governance plays in the ANCC Magnet Recognition Program(r) (MRP) journey. Have subject matter experts present topic discussions on specific points: leadership, shared governance partners, steering committee formation, design team for the shared governance model, a business case for MRP and shared governance, and roles of direct-care nurses and the multidisciplinary team members.
- Create expectations for staff contributions, beginning in the new employee orientation and continuing throughout their careers.
- Communicate, communicate, communicate! Have a nursing town hall meeting at least once a quarter to facilitate open communication among nursing staff and leaders.
- Administer the Index of Professional Nursing Governance surveys and see how your organization “measures up”-help build the repository of information on the efficacy and value of shared governance in healthcare settings.
- Use journal clubs, for example, to bring nursing research to the bedside and engage direct-care nurses in evidence-based practice for developing and implementing advanced decision-making and critical thinking.
- Let direct-care nurses meet each year to review organizational competencies and unit/area needs and determine which competencies they will focus on for that year (high-risk/time-sensitive, changed, problematic, and/or new).
- Train every registered nurse on each unit/area to be charge or lead nurse. Rotate the role and responsibilities to encourage leadership skills development and shared decision-making among all team members.
Source: Book excerpt adapted from Shared Governance: A Practical Approach to Transform Professional Nursing Practice by Diana Swihart, PhD, DMin, MSN, CS, RN-BC. Click here to visit www.hcmarketplace.com.
Analyzing nurse staffing: Understanding FTEs
Staffing: what a problem! Developing and monitoring the staffing budget is one of the most, if not the most, difficult responsibilities of the nurse leader. Labor consumes the majority of the financial resources of the organization. Therefore, everyone must act responsibly in order to ensure the financial health of the organization. But how do you know how many staff you need on your position control in order to meet the needs of the department (not too many, and not too few)? That is a $100,000 question! [more]
Performing a SWOT analysis
One of the most important, although sometimes time-consuming, activities that are frequently completed in financial planning sessions is the Strengths/Weaknesses/Opportunities/Threats (SWOT) analysis. This analysis can be useful in many problem-solving situations that you may face. The SWOT exercise may seem very time-consuming; however, this planning will again help direct where resources are needed and to what extend the resources should be allocated.
As a nurse leader, sometimes you may be part of the group being asked to identify SWOT. This selection usually occurs if your director or vice president is conducting the session and you are a group member. In working with just your area of responsibility, you might be the leader guiding your direct reports through this exercise. In both cases it is important to understand the SWOT analysis to gain the full benefit.
Strengths are what the organization, division, or department identifies that they do well and have success in above the competition. When identifying strengths for your organization ask yourself: “What would the community say that we are best at providing?” The answer to this question will help you get started with your list. Maybe it’s your strong orthopedic program and the total joint camp that you’ve developed. Maybe it’s the great oncology doctors that you’ve been able to recruit. This list should include both internal and external views. Here are some other examples of possible strengths:
- Strong name recognition of the organization
- Stable workforce
- Strong succession planning
- New facilities
- Private patient rooms
- Strong financial position
- High-quality care delivered
Weaknesses, of course, will be just the opposite. The weakness assessment should openly and honestly describe what the organization currently does not do well or is seen as a weakness to achieving the desired goals for the organization. Weaknesses are identified by asking the question: “What currently causes us trouble in providing the exceptional patient experience that we strive to provide?” [more]
You can’t teach with apathy: Why it’s important to support your preceptors
by Julie Harris, MSN, RN
I occasionally peruse online nursing forums to see what the hot topics are. Last night, I was on a highly popular forum and came across an interesting discussion. A new graduate was being oriented and her preceptors were not interested in training her. She perceived their behavior as intimidating and somewhat hostile and she didn’t know what her next step should be. Should she quit and look for a new job? Should she stick it out?
Responses to her post ranged from “This is part of orientation. Try not to take it personal,” to “Those nurses shouldn’t be preceptors. If this facility supports that kind of behavior, you need to leave and find a new job.”
I find myself agreeing more with the last response. Nobody should be forced to precept. Some nurses are wonderful caregivers with excellent clinical skills; however they do not possess the desire to train orientees. Other nurses have a strong craving to teach and pass on their knowledge to orientees. Both options are perfectly acceptable.
The importance of succession planning and training nurse managers
By Betty Noyes, RN, MA
The management gap in healthcare is a real and increasing issue of concern. We do not seem to have enough talented managers to meet the goals of our organizations.
Without sufficient skills, first-line managers do not benefit an organization. The first step to increase the number and education of managers is to provide effective training designed to specifically improve organizational performance.
Currently, healthcare costs are high. When all elements of healthcare reform are implemented, higher costs may ensue. There will be a demand for more change and greater resilience from our management teams. Unless we have managers who are resourceful in their management skills, we will not achieve new and improved ways to succeed in the goals of safe, high-quality care at a reasonable cost.
Study: Board of directors missing nurses
In 2009, the University of Iowa conducted a study reviewing 201 health systems with a total of 2,046 voting board members and discovered that only 2.4% were nurses. This number comes as a bit of a surprise, as the study also found that 22% of the voting board members were physicians.
To add to the data, Susan Hassmiller, PhD, RN, FAAN, the Robert Wood Foundation senior adviser for nursing and director of the RWJF Initiative on the Future of Nursing at the Institute of Medicine conducted a study of her own. She looked at the top 10 organizations that oversee quality, the top 10 hospitals and health systems, and the top 10 peer-reviewed non-nursing journals, and counted how many nurses were on the board of directors.
To Hassmiller’s dismay, she only found 2% to 4% of board spots held by nurses. [more]
Nursing advocate makes list of top 20 people who make healthcare better
Each year, HealthLeaders Media selects 20 people who are making a difference for good in healthcare. The selections range from high-profile people who foster big changes to people who may not be household names, but whose contributions to healthcare have inspired positive change. This year, one of the winners is a nurse from Iowa.
For more than three decades, Barbara “BJ” Hannon, MSN, RN, CPHQ, has dedicated her life to the nursing profession and helping others strive toward excellence. It was not until the facility she was working at decided to apply for ANCC Magnet Recognition Program® (MRP) designation, that she became involved with educating other Iowa organizations about MRP.
“One of the reasons that I will go anywhere and talk to anyone about MRP, is that I really want every hospital on the face of this earth to get designated,” she says. “Designation requires that hospitals have participatory scheduling, no mandatory overtime, that they involve nurses in shared governance, that they help nurses use evidence in their practice. All the things that MRP requires make life better for nurses in the hospitals. And because I’ve been a nurse for 34 years, I know the way it used to be; and it used to be terrible.” [more]
2.0 Web technology integrates a nursing program near you
As the terms “podcasts”, “wikis”, and “blogs” fill the vocabulary of nurses, physicians, students, and hospitals nationwide, more and more facilities are finding ways to integrate these new technology tools into the everyday hustle and bustle of the healthcare world.
In a recent study published in the Journal of the Medical Library Association, 53% of nursing schools and 45% percent of medical schools are now using Web 2.0 tools in their curricula. Also, 58% of nursing schools and 50% of medical schools intend to include Web 2.0 tools in the curricula within the next year. Web 2.0 is a term defining the second generation of Web development that allows users to do more with Web sites. Rather than just passively retrieving information, Web 2.0 technology allows users to own and exercise control over the data.
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Help! It’s my first month on the job!
A nurse manager’s first month on the job is often a hectic time. Adjusting to a new set of responsibilities, new issues that demand your attention, and new coworkers make it hard to stay focused and productive. Still, you need to.
Make the theme of your first month “meet and listen.” Each week, take time to plan a schedule of meetings to acquaint yourself with those who are in key positions supporting you and your unit. This can include:
- Members of the unit-level management team (including the interim manager, charge nurses, educators, house-wide supervisors, staffing office clerks, etc.) in group meetings or one-on-one
- Key department directors, such as pharmacy, materials management, admitting, etc.
- Nurse managers responsible for units that work collaboratively with yours
- Medical director of the unit or a physician who frequents the unit
- Employee relations manager in human resources or the nurse recruiter
Keep these meetings to 30-45 minutes each, and use lunch or breakfast meetings as needed to expedite the scheduling process. Attending the shifts and making rounds two to three times a week to visit with patients is another way to get to know staff and begin your assessment of practice issues or system problems.
You also might want to take notes at these meetings and use a consistent format for them. This format could be initiated with questions, such as, “What’s working or not working, and what do we need to do differently?” or an open-ended question like, “What do you see as priorities for me relative to the needs of patients or staff working with me?”
How do you get acclimated to a new position?
Lessons learned from my first class
When the Leader’s Lounge was born, I started the blog with my decision to return to school in my mid-50s. What was I thinking? It is hard to believe that my first course has already ended, and that I am preparing for the next one. Wondering how it went?
Better than I expected.
I took the one course that was only for two credits, as I knew the load would be less and I could plan from that for the other three- and four-credit course loads. I found out today I received an “A” (I never read so much in such a short time period; eat lots of carrots!) and found the overall experience was good. Getting a good grade certainly helped with that perception. I would prefer to be in a live classroom as I thrive on that interaction, but “life” gets in the way of that. Online courses can be interactive in their own way, but I miss the voices, tones, and facial expressions. Call me a product of my generation compared to the younger ones who don’t use the phone much (they text message).
I learned a great deal from my first course on Issues in Health Care Informatics. Along with the acquired knowledge of real substantial material that I can use, I learned how to study at an airport with people around you talking (shouting) into their blackberry’s, I learned how to scan articles for what I have to read, and mostly, I learned that my nursing experience, every bit of it, is relevant.
Additionally, because this was a two-credit course, it did not take nearly the time away from my home life as I thought it would. Being able to do a great deal of the work while on the road, left little time taken away once I was home.
Are you still on the edge about going back to school? What’s holding you back?
