Nursing Interview
Nurse Interview: Leader, Executive, or Manager
Nursing leaders work in a variety of positions: managers in hospitals, directors at various levels within clinical and non-clinical settings, executives within healthcare organizations, etc. For this assignment, students will conduct an interview to explore the characteristics and functions of nursing leaders. Students will then present their findings. The nursing leader must be an RN, have a BSN degree or higher, and be in a position of leadership.
Ensure the individual being interviewed has enough responsibility to be able to respond to the following questions. You will use these headings to organize and present your findings.
• Introduction
o Describe your education, nursing background, and current and previous positions.
• Leadership Style
o Describe the leadership style you identify with and most commonly use in your practice.
o How did you develop your leadership style?
o How has your leadership style evolved with experience?
• Future Planning
o How are you working towards sustainability for your practice setting in developing new nursing leaders?
o To what professional organizations do you belong?
o How are professional organizations impactful in developing nursing leaders?
• Current Issues and Trends
o Describe current challenges you are facing in nursing and healthcare (today and in the past 2-5 years.)
o How do these challenges impact your practice setting?
o Describe the impact of these challenges at the local, national, and global levels.
(For example, if staffing is a concern for the practice setting is it because of a local trend? Is this a tourist community in which the population fluctuates making finding and keeping qualified, dedicated staff a difficulty? Is this a challenge because this type of facility is impacted by local, national, or even global politics and economic circumstances?)
ORDER A PLAGIARISM-FREE PAPER HERE !!
Solution
Nurse Interview: Emergency Department Manager
Introduction
I started my nursing career by obtaining an associate degree in nursing. I began with an associate degree in nursing because the program took less time and allowed me to enter the workforce in a short time. After obtaining my associate degree, I was employed as a charge nurse in an emergency department of a healthcare facility. During the period I worked as a charge nurse, I pursued a Bachelor’s of Science degree in nursing to gain more in-depth education in my career. My employer helped me significantly to pursue my BSN degree by providing tuition reimbursement. After pursuing my education, I also completed and passed the National Council Licensure Examination NCLEX-RN and obtained my certification as a registered nurse. I also earned my state license to practice as a registered nurse.
As a registered nurse, my nursing background and primary role are to ensure that all the patients receive the direct and proper care they need in varying healthcare settings. As a registered nurse, my responsibilities, therefore, include identifying and assessing patients’ needs and then monitoring and implementing the patient’s treatment and medical plan.
Currently, I’m an emergency department manager in a large healthcare facility. As an emergency department manager, my main roles and responsibilities include promoting administrative and clinical efficiency in the emergency care department. As an emergency department manager, I’m actively involved in facilitating communication between different clinical personnel in the emergency department and ensuring that patients receive quality healthcare services within the budgetary parameters of the healthcare facility. As an emergency department manager, my main focus at the moment is on the administrative duties in the emergency department, which makes me spend a lot of time in the office as opposed to providing clinical services to patients.
Previously I worked as a charge nurse in the emergency room for five years. As a charge nurse in the emergency room, my roles and responsibilities included monitoring the vital signs of patients and being actively involved in creating medical records for patients. As a charge nurse, I’m normally in charge of supervising the nursing staff in the emergency room and monitoring their needs. As a charge nurse, my role also includes overseeing the admission of patients, transfers, and discharges. I also ensured compliance with safety and health regulations in the emergency room in my previous role as a charge nurse.
Leadership Style
As an emergency department manager, I would describe my leadership style as the transformational leadership style. As a transformational leader, I am always actively involved in motivating all the healthcare practitioners that work within the emergency department to take responsibility and ownership of their roles and to always perform beyond expectations (Gemeda & Lee, 2020). As a transformational leader, I rarely assign tasks to the healthcare practitioners who work in the emergency department but rather promote independence and innovation in the performance of duties. I developed my leadership style through extensive personal analysis and a lot of mentorships. Initially, I would have described my leadership style as democratic, especially when I was working as a charge nurse. However, my leadership style evolved to the transformational leadership style after pursuing a nursing leadership course that highlighted the advantages of the transformational leadership style.
Future planning
As an emergency department manager, I have helped in the development of a leadership mentorship program that aims at developing new nursing leaders in the department. Through the program, various leaders in the emergency department can nurture talented subordinates who are interested in leadership roles in the future.
Currently, I’m a member of the American Nurses Association (ANA). Professional nursing organizations such as ANA play a significant role in developing nursing leaders through mentorship, leadership seminars, workshops, and leadership proficiency programs. Professional nursing organizations also help nurse leaders network and collaborate and enhance their leadership skills.
Current Issues and Trends
The main challenge facing nursing and healthcare currently is inadequate staffing. As the population has continued to age, the demand for healthcare services has continued to increase, resulting in the stretching of healthcare resources, including human resources. Currently, there seems to be a significant mismatch between the demand for nurses and healthcare practitioners and the number of people who are pursuing the nursing career. The lack of adequate staff in healthcare facilities is therefore having a significant impact on the quality of healthcare services delivered to patients (Ashe, 2018).
In the emergency department, one of the central challenges that I experience currently is inadequate staffing. Most of the time, the emergency department is normally understaffed, which leads to the enforcement of mandatory overtime and heavy workloads among healthcare providers. The challenge of inadequate staffing in the emergency department contributes significantly to the problem of nurse burnout, absenteeism, and high turnover rates.
At the local level, the challenge of inadequate staffing in the emergency department seems to be fueled by an aging population that demands more health care services. On the other hand, on the national level, the trend of an aging population and the demand for health care services has not been met by the increasing number of people who are pursuing a nursing profession, resulting in a shortfall in the number of healthcare practitioners required. The aging population is also a global trend that has contributed significantly to the rising demand for health care services and inadequate staffing in healthcare facilities.
References
Ashe, L. (2018). The importance of adequate staffing. Nursing Management, 49(12), 7. https://doi.org/10.1097/01.numa.0000549519.47901.4f
Gemeda, H. K., & Lee, J. (2020). Leadership styles, work engagement and outcomes among information and communications technology professionals: A cross-national study. Heliyon, 6(4), e03699. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2020.e03699