The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Combining Nurse Leader with Advocacy
There is a peculiar weakness and strength that each and everybody, individuals, groups, organizations and professions possess. This noble nursing profession is not excluded from it. Strength is the capability of being resilient in achieving something, which includes cultural quality, compassion, sensitivity and the capacity to build relationship and connection with various labor forces in a multinational background to accomplish set goals. Likewise, weakness is the opposite of strength, which is lack of strength that resulted in incompetence to achieve set goals.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

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According to Sanford (2012), advocacy has been reflected as a most important part of nursing practice since 1973. The act of supporting a plan or suggestion is called advocacy. Nursing practice has been impacted in several ways with advocacy and effect politically, academically and socially in aspects nursing practice (Bly, 2014). On a daily bases, nurses needs to advocate for safe and healthy work environment, which requires essential strategies and skills to be able to achieve. Nurses’ inventory tool is a useful tool to assess nursing growth. In this paper, the purpose is to appraise and address the issues concerning the strengths and weaknesses related personal and professional accountability, career planning, personal journey disciplines, and reflective practice reference behaviors/tenets with the use of “Nurse Manager Skills Inventory Tool”, how to use current leadership skill set to advocate for change in a workplace, one personal goal for leadership growth and implementation plan to achieve the goal.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Every nurse has a potential for leadership but the problem is that most of them would not recognize this potential. In is important to note that every person has a set of strengths and weaknesses in regards to their knowledge and skills set. While most people have difficulties identifying these skills and knowledge set, I am capable of identifying some of the strengths and weaknesses in regards my skills and knowledge set. Moreover, the American association of critical care nurse manager skills invention provided an opportunity for me to clearly establish my skills and weaknesses. Therefore, this paper will analyze the results from the assessment of the inventory skills. I will present the strengths and weaknesses in relation to the four areas which are listed in the Nurse Manager Skills Inventory that is, personal and professional accountability, career planning, personal journey disciplines and reflective practice in regards to behaviors and tenants.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Personal and Professional Accountability
In the evaluation of my personal development and growth area I realized I fall in the middle. I have some strengths and also weaknesses in the education advancement, the career planning, continuing education and certification. In life I acknowledge the uncertainty of the future and that’s why I furthered my education through attaining a bachelor’s degree in nursing. I also have ambitions of attaining higher levels of education such as doctorate degree in nursing practice. Despite my desires and plans I am undecided about the specialty to take thus I am tone between choosing emergency medicine or stroke certification. This area needs further improvement for a better personal as well as the professional liability. My association status needs to be improved as being a member of a nursing association in my city I neither actively participates in the legislative procedures or in any advocacy procedure on behalf of colleagues and patients.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Conversely, I can rate myself very highly when it comes to ethical practices and behavior. This is because I believe that evidence based practice is important in provision of a competent and safe care to the patients and their families. Therefore I desire to impact this practice to other nurses as it would produce the best universal outcome as patients will receive up to date practices which will eventually uphold safe practices and reduce the risk factors in the practices.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Career Planning
According to the institute of medicine (2010), the roles, education and the responsibilities of nurses should significantly revolutionize in regards to the health care reforms taking place. Transformation will help in meeting the increasing demand for better care and the improvement of the health care system. The transformation of the health care would support home care for the considerably sick patients while the very sick would be cared for in the acute care unit. Therefore, my job description as a nurse and the professional requirement will have to change according to the advancement in the health care system. Thus, furthering my education would make me an asset in the health care system as I will be able to adjust well with the changes. I would also be in a good position to mentor young nurses later using the evidence based practice models which will further the goal of providing safe, skilled, quality and cost effective care.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Personal Journey Disciplines
I have a greater growth opportunity in this section. I currently practice reflective practice and action learning but I am not very confident in this area. For better learning and care of patients my participation skills need to be increased both as a learner and a mentor. In my ADN program I had a poor learning technique which mostly involved memorization. Thus, an appropriate learning technique is important in active learning and in the reflective practice as they enhance the critical thinking skills of a practitioner. I lack the shared leadership and council management skills and I can say rate myself as novice in this area. Green and Jordan (2004), stated that an empowered nurse will enhance their work environment and improve the quality of the care delivery. Therefore, I need to build my skills and knowledge in this area so as I increase my capability of enhancing environment and the care delivery. I will do this through using my voice to air my opinions and concerns in relation to the nursing profession.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Reflective Practice Reference Behaviors
Generally I feel I should rate myself as over competent. I believe I am accepting and tolerant of the diverse practices as well as beliefs in the society. I strive to incorporate these beliefs whether cultural or religious beliefs into the care of the patients. I practice a holistic care where I incorporate safe beliefs in care and shun from harmful beliefs and at the same time create awareness on the safe practices. This can be challenging but the active and reflective techniques will be helpful in enhancement of the personal and professional technique of dealing with diversity in belief. Therefore, I believe that this practice needs commitment which I have proven to have by caring for my invalid mother, working full time and at the same time participating in the nursing program. Moreover, I strive to get answers to different circumstances I encounter during practice through continuous learning and research.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Implementation Plan
The family care international (2008), asserts that advocacy is the practice of building a support system for a cause or an issue and at the same time influencing other people to take action. Nurses have a responsibility of advocating for their patients, their families, the communities they live in and most important themselves. Taking part in advocacy will help in bringing realistic changes capable of meeting the patients and staff needs (Tomajan, 2012). Advocacy is the identification of a issues and trying to improve or find solutions to them. I have noticed that nurse make the largest percentage of the health care facilities’ work force. I have also noticed that the current nurses present in my place of work are becoming of age and new experienced nurses are needed to offer services to patients.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Therefore, I would continue to develop and grow my skills as well as pass them on to the younger inexperienced nurses. My role currently as a nursing manager at the acute care unit is a big opportunity of growing and passing my skills to others. I plan to become an active nursing educator in regards to the existing nursing practices and changes in nursing practice. I also desire to advocate for the implementation and support of the team atmosphere for all members who provide care in a hospital setting. I desire the information and input I will provide will be appreciated and I strive to further my education and ensure that I grow in all these healthcare system areas. Despite my desire to develop and grow myself and others I also need support from colleagues, other care provides and employers. I would need support through provision of opportunities for growth through provision of higher positions and opportunity to undertake in research. There is a legislative which wants full time workers in America to work 40 hours and receive less benefits for those who work 36 hours. Therefore, I also plan to participate in legislation to advocate for the nurses to have continued benefits with no changes in the work schedule and timing.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Nursing is a noble profession that deals with provision of healthcare services to the people. The profession is quite demanding though it provides experiences that enable one to achieve self-fulfillment. The profession demands leadership and advocacy skills. The leadership skills demanded in the nursing practice are very essential in all activities aimed at providing care to patients since healthcare services involve various activities undertaken by various individuals. Hence, all the components of care services must be organized in order to achieve an effective and efficient working environment. In other words, all the resources needed for provision of healthcare services should be organized in order to maintain focus towards a common goal. In addition, management of resources in any organization is important in ensuring that evaluation and monitoring is undertaken effectively and efficiently. The task of organizing all the resources for the provision of healthcare services falls on the shoulders of a nurse leader.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay The nurse leader should have the requisite skills in order to be able to achieve the purpose of leadership roles. Advocacy skills, on the other hand, are the skills that enable one to effectively represent the interest of a given group. Advocacy is essential in nursing practice in many senses. Hence, nurse leaders are expected to have them.
My level of experience and my skills in all aspects of nursing have improved since the beginning of my profession. In terms of personal and professional accountability, I rate myself as an expert using Nurse Manager Skills Inventory Tool. This rating is influenced by various factors that include the level of education I have acquired during pursuit of the nursing career. I am an advanced practice registered nurse. Consequently, I hold a state-approved masters degree in nursing. In addition, I have successfully completed the required clinical hours and advanced exams required to obtain state certification. I also take my responsibilities in my career as obligations that I must fulfill. With this regard, I take responsibility for the outcomes of activities that fall under the area of which I am in charge.
In terms of career planning, I score the highest rating using the Nurse Manager Skills Inventory Tool. The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay The rating is influenced by my high level of knowledge in my role as a nurse manager, my high level of knowledge for the future in terms of the likely dynamics in the nursing practice, and the fact that I have made many efforts to choose a particular career path. I am highly conversant with the current nursing practice and the possible changes that may occur in the nursing practice in future. Indeed, I feel that I have high command in all aspects of nursing. I am also conversant with the ongoing research in the field of nursing. In addition, I am constantly monitoring the changing trends in nursing practice and the policies being made to govern the nursing practice. Based on these trends, I am highly able to predict the possible trend nursing career is likely to take in future.
My scores in personal journey discipline are average. However, I rate myself high on the action learning domain. In this case, I often apply action learning to solve problems and make vital decisions at my workplace. I also score high in Reflective Practice Reference Behaviors/Tenets. My strengths with regard to this domain include the following: high integrity, high ability to discover potentials in myself and in other people, high ability and appreciation of challenges associated with nursing practice, and high urge to learn. In terms of integrity, I rate myself high because I usually feel the urge to tell the truth and strictly stick to the nursing codes of ethics. I feel strongly obliged to promote morals at my work place. In addition, I take it as my personal responsibility to create an environment where all workers operate with high level of integrity. I often feel that lack of integrity has a significant negative impact on the efforts aimed at achieving the various nursing goals. As a nurse manager, one of the tasks I am charged with is organizing human resources in an effective manner. As a result of having worked in the nursing fields for a long time, I am able to identify the levels of the abilities of various workers in performing various duties. Consequently, I am able to allocate duties to each member of the nursing staff. I am usually guided by the fact that matching the required skills with the appropriate tasks helps achieve high efficiency and affectivity at the work place. However, my scores in keeping commitments to oneself are just average.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

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All my leadership skills assessed above are instrumental in advocating for change at my work place. First, personal and professional accountability would enable me discharge my duties diligently and consistently in accordance with the policies and codes of ethics guiding my workplace. Through practicing of accountability, I can influence other workmates and my junior staff to acquire skills in accountability in order to take charge of their duties. Skills in career planning are also very important for initiating change in a healthcare environment. Through the application of these skills, I will be able to identify the changing healthcare needs in the society. As a result, I would propose new strategies of addressing the needs. In addition, career planning skills would help me identify the technological changes with influence on healthcare. As a result, I would be able to identify how the technological advancements can be incorporated into the healthcare service delivery. I would also use my skills in shared leadership to encourage my counterparts and junior staff members to show commitment for changes in the workplace. Integrity is also essential in promoting change at the workplace. Through integrity, the use of resources can be accounted for. In addition, integrity helps ensure that wastage of resources is minimized. In order to encourage changes at the workplace, integrity is very instrumental. For instance, corruption can lead to misuse of resources and hiring of unqualified workforce. However, with integrity, corruption can be controlled and resources can be used efficiently. Consequently, healthcare organizations can achieve their goals.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay
One of my personal goals in leadership growth is being able to manage activities at the specialty ward in the busiest and most dynamic healthcare environment in the country. I am making efforts to score highest in all the domains of leadership as measured using the Nurse Manager Skills Inventory Tool. I am putting efforts in order to develop all the necessary skills in many ways. For instance, I practice the skills everyday at my workplace.

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Details: Combining Nurse Leader with Advocacy Rate yourself using the results from the “Nurse Manager Skills Inventory”: http:\www(dot)aacn(dot)org/wd/practice/docs/nurse-manager-inventory-tool.pdf?menu=practice – 2012-04-19 Write a reflection of 750-1,000 words in which you identify your strengths and weaknesses related to the four content areas below: 1. Personal and professional accountability 2. Career planning 3. Personal journey disciplines 4. Reflective practice reference behaviors/tenets Discuss how you will use your current leadership skill set to advocate for change in your workplace. Identify one personal goal for your leadership growth and discuss your implementation plan to achieve that goal. While APA format is not required for the body of this assignment, solid academic writing is expected and in-text citations and references should be presented using APA documentation guidelines The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

A nurse leader is a registered nurse who oversees and ensures good care of a distinct group of patients for a hospital or health care facility. The profession of a nurse leader requires a Master’s degree in Nursing and just like many professionals, nurse leaders are required to obtain a license to practice professionally. Licensing is administered through each state’s board of nursing. The nurses develop quality improvement strategies, oversee patient care coordination, facilitate team communication, assess health risks and implement evidence-based solutions at the unit level (Douglass, 1996).The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Advocacy maybe defined as an act of pleading for or arguing in favor of something such as an idea or policy in which active support is needed. It can also be defined as a way by which an individual influences both public policy and resource allocation decisions in political, social economic, and systems. Advocacy depends on someone’s morals, because it is mostly motivated by faith, moral, and ethical principles or it can be a desire to protect something that one has interest in (Tilley & Watson, 2004). The combination comes in where the nurse leader is required to influence decision-making and resource allocation within her/his profession.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Personal and Professional Accountability

Nurse leaders that are considered as good role models encourage and motivate their staff to engage in self-reflection in relation to awareness. For a nurse leader to achieve the results she/he really wants, he/she has to take responsibility for his/her own profession (Jasper, 2011). You have to make plans for your life and career; you should not have any assumptions but rather know what you want and how far you are willing to go or want to go in your career. Never underestimate how far you can go in life and, most important, never aim low in life when it comes to achieving your goal. After identifying your goals, you should find some key ways to grow in a direction that will help achieve them even if it means going back to school to get another academic degree. You may be afraid to fail, because there is always some discomfort getting out of your comfort zone, but do it anyway because risk-taking is always worth it (Tilley & Watson, 2004).The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Ethics is an integral part of nursing practice, and it entails respect for human rights of the person in their care. The nurse leader’s role is to advocate for the interests of the people in their care and the society at large. Morale is linked to productivity, and it’s your job as the team leader to instill a positive energy (Daniels & Daniels, 2007). She/he must have respect for the patients and the society he/she serves and do all within his/her powers to ensure quality image of the profession respecting the religion and culture in caring for the patients; this is mainly because patients practice different religions and cultures, and the nurse leader has to inquire so that she/he can know the best way to handle the patient without disrespecting their religion or culture (Hugman & Smith, 1995).The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Nurse leaders are also required to enroll in professional associations with others and actively participate. Professional associations’ aim is to bring people of the same profession together to share their experience hence expand their knowledge in the process. Having the courage to stand alone, the tenacity to not succumb to pressure, and the patience to keep fighting until you win the day is a key quality of being a nurse leader (Sagor & Barnett 1994).The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Career Planning

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One needs to know what she/he is expected to do as part of his/her job. As a nurse leader, you should know your functions which are basically coordinating or overseeing the care of a distinct group of patients for a hospital or health care facility. After identifying your role, you need to plan for the future and where you want to take your career. A nurse leader should keep in mind the change of environment hence development of new diseases and the advancement of the already existing ones and plan on how to deal with them in the future (Daniels & Daniels, 2007). She/he has to be prepared to face the future challenges as they come.

Personal Journey Discipline

A nurse leader should commit him/ herself to a personal journey thus becoming more authentic in their leadership. In one of Bill George’s books, he said that the leaders constantly test themselves “through real-world experiences and reframing their life stories to understand who they were at their core.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay In doing so, they discover the purpose of their leadership and learn that being authentic made them more effective” (American Immigration Lawyers Association, 2004). On a personal journey, leaders can learn a lot about themselves, and they can even discover new things about themselves; most importantly, they can develop awareness about their strongest capabilities, their leadership attributes, and their greatest needs for the development as a leader. It is also important and much needed for a leader to think carefully in advance how you will handle situations where your ethical boundaries and values are in conflict with decisions you are asked to make. In these instances, your staff and even fellow leaders will see what exactly your stand will be, whether you will stand by your ethics or you will choose to ignore it; in this case, they will most likely judge you.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Reflective Practice Reference Behaviors/tenets

Communication between the staff and their leader is very important. Nurse leaders proactively provide information to others who need it and seek information from those who have it, mostly their fellow leaders. Nurse leaders should treat the patients and each other with dignity, respect, and sensitivity. The leaders should be role models, coach and mentor staff by guiding them using situational leadership to promote the growth and development of staff (Sagor & Barnett 1994).The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

The most likely weakness to encounter in leadership, including nurse leadership, is procrastination; once a leader procrastinates doing his/her work, it is the beginning of failure. The strength, on the other hand, is good planning; with good planning; one is sure to get good results. Being a nurse leader requires one to be ready to take risks that come with it. Sometimes they are required to swallow more reactions and sometimes negative ones from more people than the other nurses. Lastly being a nurse leader requires a good personality and highly qualified personnel to tackle the issues that come with it.The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay

Combining Nursing Leadership with Advocacy
According to Dictionary.com, a strength is the quality or state of being strong, a mental power, force, or vigor; a weakness is the lack of strength, an inadequate quality. We all have and carry our own strengths and weaknesses of qualities. As I’ve learned in class this week, every nurse can be a leader. It was difficult to see the leader in myself until I took the Nurse Manager Skills Inventory by the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses. There are four areas I am going to discuss here about the Inventory The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay
I am a member of the American Nurses Association and Wisconsin Nurses Association. I am not too involved in my memberships and I need to work on that, to be more involved and network more, but yet I am a member and have the opportunity to be involved. Finally, in the personal and professional accountability section, is certification, which is achieving certification in an appropriate field/specialty, I rated myself low at novice level. I am not certified in anything at the moment. I did hold certification in home ventilator management, however I had to let the certification lapse with my disability. I intend to renew this certification when I am physically able. I see my strengths in personal and professional accountability in that I am seeking further education and will likely always seek further education no matter where I am in life, and ethical behaviors since I definitely know right from wrong and practice that way. My weaknesses lie in certification and I can change this by getting certified once again in many different areas. CAREER PLANNING My career planning points are right down the middle, rated middle-of-the-road, competent. First in this category is knowing your role which is understanding current job description/requirements and comparing those to current level The Importance Of A Nurse Leader With Advocacy Essay