Leadership Studies

Describe the organizational characteristics of the facility in which you currently have a clinical assignment.

The organization is a privately owned medical facility in my locality. The facility is hosted on a 25-acre piece of land. It has about 50 resident medical practitioners and 15 specialists. It has 100 nurses and 150 support staff including non-medical staff in four departments. It has a radiology wing, wards, obstetrics, and gynecology wing, casualty, accidents and emergencies wing, and surgical theatre.

The facility offers clinical and specialist consultant services to patients. We offer both outpatient and inpatient services to patients. At the helm of the hospital, leadership is the hospital commission, which is both a moderator and disciplinary body. The commission is also involved in hiring top management staff including the hospital chief executive and other top-notch managers in consultation with the Chief Executive. It also formulates internal regulatory policies. Below the commission is the chief executive officer who is the topmost administrative and executive officer in the hospital. The chief executive’s mandate includes entering bilateral agreements on behalf of the facility and hiring top administrative fellows. Below the chief executives are the departmental heads and their deputies.

            The hospital is geared towards ensuring the establishment of a practical schema founded on the tenets of reducing medical errors by supporting the diagnostic process. Error reduction will increase its societal confidence and acceptability. To achieve this, the facility has endeavored to avail ultra-modern equipment that helps in imaging and diagnostics. By raising the thresholds of qualifications for the recruitment of personnel at our facility, the hospital management has ensured that only the best are recruited. This, in turn, ensures clients enjoy only the best and most professional of services. Additionally, the management has ensured employee motivation through proper job valuation and remuneration. To achieve success, the management has provided an ambient professional environment that has ensured better patient recovery outcomes.

2. Why is the work climate of an organization important to nurse leaders and managers? The creation of an appropriate work environment ensures better health outcomes for the patients. Proper work environment motivates staff to work passionately. The proper climate includes availing necessary equipment, remuneration, incentives, and appraisal (Hill, 2010). It also guarantees motivated workforces who go a long way towards the realization of organizational objectives. Managing a motivated workforce is cheaper and easier for the leadership (Corcoran, 1986).

            3. What are the ways in which a nurse can enhance his or her expertise? A nurse can increase his/her value through indulging higher academic honors including enrolment for Bachelor’s Degree, Master’s Honors, and/or PhDs. Equally, the nurse could take on leadership responsibility at the workplace. Leadership roles prepare nurses for future administrative responsibilities at an institution (Lyles & Schwenk, 1992). Additionally, the nurse may also move through various departments to get the first hand practicum.

            4. Explain “shared governance,” and describe how it can affect the power structure of a health-care organization. Shared governance entails all activities undertaken that integrate multiple disciplines towards the realization of better patient care and health outcomes. It is based on the principles of equality, accountability, and partnerships (May & Williams , 2012). Health care in such circumstances embellishes inclusivity and is often culturally sensitive. Shared governance in organizations broadens the management chain. It insists on consultative decision-making processes. Additionally, it creates some level of bureaucracy, as the management has to keep consulting and building consensus before making major decisions. In cases of emergencies, the consultative framework often could prove counterproductive.

            5. Why is it important for staff nurses to understand the culture and real goals of the organization in which they work? Organizational goals and objectives mold the practicum of an institution. They form the frameworks on which all organizational activities are managed. The culture of an organization guides the interactions between the staff, patients, and the outside community (Orsolini-Hain & Malone, 2007). It lays the limits within which members of staff can exercise their mandate.

Ideally, an organization should have a narrower management but a fuller and robust workforce.

1. Describe your ideal organization. Explain each feature and why you think it is important

The chief executive is at the helm of leadership. The chief executive appoints administrators who manage broader groupings of finance and administration. They are answerable to the chief executive and give briefs on the happenings in the various departments. The finance department handles all matters involving budget allocations, expenditures, and purchases. Under finance and human resource, all staff administrative duties are handled. These include hiring, firing, and appraisal. The departmental heads help in organizational policy implementation.

Interview one of the staff nurses on your unit. Find out what practices within the organization help to empower the nurses. Among other practices, a nurse I interviewed indicated that the hospital policy of taking each nurse through all the departments was most beneficial in her opinion. The practice, she affirmed, exposed the nurse through various challenging situations unlike the common nurse elsewhere.

 3. Recall the last time you walked into a hospital, clinic, or physician’s office for the first time. What was your first impression? The atmosphere was cold and sullen. The nurses seemed to have no urgency at all, more like they were demotivated.

Did you feel comfortable and welcome?  No, I neither felt comfortable nor welcomed. My visit to that health facility left me more unwell compared to my state before I visited. The offices seemed to be littered with disorganized pieces of paper, no automated computerized registers were in use.

What would you do? For beginners, I would institute digitization of the patient register. Then I would establish an interdepartmental digital communication hub where patient information can be communicated and retrieved easily at the facility.

If you could change the first impression this facility makes? What changes could be made at a very low cost? General painting of the buildings and giving the facility a phase lift. I would also endeavor towards trimming the overgrown grass and bushes in the hospital as well as ensure general office cleanliness through proper filing systems if digitization proves to dear.

What changes would be expensive Initial installation would be quite costly but the eventual maintenance cost would be lower.

References

Corcoran, S. A. (1986). Task complexity and nursing expertise as factors in decision making.           Nursing Research , 35 (2), 107-112.

Hill, K. (2010). Improving quality and patient safety by retaining nursing expertise. Online Journal of Issues in Nursing Expertise , 15 (3). retrieved: http://ojin.nursingworld.org/MainMenuCategories/ANAMarketplace/ANAPeriodicals            /OJIN/TableofContents/Vol152010/No3-Sept-2010/Articles-Previously-            Topic/Improving-Quality-and-Patient-Safety-.html

Lyles, M., & Schwenk, C. R. (1992). Top management, Strategy and organizational             knowledge structures. Journal of Management Studies , 29 (2), 155-174.

May, J. P., & Williams , W. (2012). Disaster Policy Implementation: Managing Programs        under shared governance. New York: Springer Science & Business Media.

Orsolini-Hain, L., & Malone, R. E. (2007). Examining the impending gap in clinical nursing            expertise. Policy, Politics, & Nursing Practice , 8 (3), 158-169.