Success Proven Nurse Leader Characteristics

Leadership is one of the few important characteristics show by specific people in the workplace, home, or community undertaking a specific activity. In such gatherings, one should be delegated the duty of being a leader such that he/she can direct and delegate duties to the other employees that they accomplish their duties and responsibilities as per the goals set in the organization or any other authority. Some people believed that leaders are born while other believed that leaders are made through training but all of them are the same because they should have certain leadership and management characteristic for them to accomplish their duties (Armstrong, 2016). The same thing applies to the nurse leaders, as they should have certain characteristics of leadership and management for them to be successful in their assigned duties and responsibilities. Nurse leader should be committed to excellence by focusing on the individual goals and targets or goals and targets set by the institution. Being a leader, a nurse should set some priorities such that the nurse and the other employees can be committed to working towards achieving or meeting the priorities set after a given period.

Nurse leader should be in a position to measure the important things at the workplace. For example, in the workplace, there is service to patients, quality, people, growth, and finance. All these things are very important but it should measure and arranged for the nurse to understand which one will come first. The importance of such things should be communicated to the staff, which the responsibility of a nurse leader such that they can towards achieving and balancing all of them. For example, a nurse cannot consider the service fee before offering a service to the patient (Armstrong, 2016). Nurse leader should build a culture around service and communicate the same to the same to the staff. They should learn to appreciate the patients and their families by using polite language when talking to them both face-to-face and through the telephone. Nurse leader should teach the staff to greet patients when entering or leaving the office such that the patients can feel that they are recognized despite their health status. Nurse leader or manager should create and develop leaders in the department through frequent meetings and training within and even outside the department. Training other staff in the department to offer leadership is very important as operations will continue even if the leader is absent or committed elsewhere. Nurse being a leader or a manager of other employees should be committed to ensuring that the employees are satisfied through their salaries, recognition and promotion, motivation, and other forms of satisfaction.

As a leader, I like one on one interaction with the staff and even with the patients. One on one interaction will offer a better understanding of the situations and a higher level of developing results. Additionally, one on one interaction will enable them to understand better the training and other sessions offered to them by the leader. Coaching and recognizing the staff is very important as a nurse leader. With proper coaching and training, employees will be in a position to undertake various duties even in absents of the leader. When they undertake certain duties successfully, they should be recognized and rewarded such they can be motivated to continue working towards the achieving goals and targets (Armstrong, 2016). Nurse leader and the staff are the faces of the institution and the importance of credibility at the workplace must be emphasized. Maintain credibility will build confidence among the patients that they will continue visiting the facility and recommend other people. Time management, staff, development, managing conflicts, and risk taking are other important characteristics a nurse leader should portray while attending to the patients and being in charges of the staff.

My strongest leadership and management characteristics as a leader include time management, managing conflicts, and staff development, interaction, coaching others, giving recognition, and maintaining credibility at the workplace. Such characteristics are very important to me while attending to the patients and even managing the junior staff in the department or the entire facility (Armstrong, 2016). My major weakness relates to taking risks. I am very weak and hesitant when it comes to taking risks in the workplace, as I consider the outcomes of the risks especially the negative outcomes. I should concentrate on being courageous in risk taking because it is part of my profession as a nurse leader. The tool did not address characteristics like being committed to excellence, building a culture around the service, and measuring the important things. Such characteristics are very equally important to a nurse leader and any other leader in an organization.

Reference

Armstrong, M. (2016). Armstrong's Handbook of Management and Leadership for HR: Developing Effective People Skills for Better Leadership and Management. Kogan Page Publishers.