A Discussion of Various Perspectives on Delegation in Nursing Jessica Abbott University of Central Florida ABSTRACT: Delegation refers to the practice of a registered nurse assigning certain tasks and activities to other people while still maintaining responsibility for the actions of the others to whom responsibility has been delegated. The act
Teaming nurses to help and supports new colleagues provide a safe and quality patient care. After all, nursing are all in this together. There is no perfect nurse, and cannot provide healthcare alone. Nurses need to respect and be able to rely on each other toward successful healthcare.
Nursing guidance is a complex but essential part of the nursing workforce. Guidance can come in the form of management and in the form of leadership. The two terms are often used interchangeably, but do not always mean the same thing. The nurse manager is often someone who has authority from the facility to be in management. The nursing leader may not have authority over other nurses, but may be a strong guide in the workplace for other nurses and nursing staff. Nursing as a profession is ever-changing and increasingly challenging. Nurse managers are tasked with an enormous variety of functions in their respective workplaces, budgeting, scheduling, hiring, disciplinary actions, implementing facility policies and procedures, and the
Statement of the Problems As nurse manager Barbara is responsible for managing the staff, scheduling and budgeting for the unit. Her staff includes twenty-five registered nurses and eight patient care assistants (PCA’s). The unit is known for its culture of confrontation, blaming, and favoritism. The staff is dissatisfied, unmotivated, and not functioning as a team to deliver quality patient care. In Barbara’s first month she has lost two RN’s and due to a hiring freeze at EMU Barbara was not able to replace the positions. The unit is short staffed, stress levels are high and employee morale is low. Barbara meets individually with twenty or so staff members and comes to the conclusion that no one is happy and she has a lot of work to do. There are multiple groups that Barbara has identified issues with and she must come up with an action plan to manage the discrepancies. She has found issues in downward management which involves senior nurses, newer nurses, and patient care assistants, and in upward management including administrators and physicians,
One mistake that new nurse leaders make is that they believe that the only way to get things accomplished, is to be direct and autocratic (Kerfoot, 2008.) The new leader’s fear of failing can influence them to take on the autocratic role to try and earn respect from their employees. However, this is not considered to be very effective among staff. When the professional nurse takes on the autocratic leadership trait and uses it on a daily basis, employees feel micromanaged. When a manager micromanages their employees they take the risk of lowering morale, and losing good workers (North, 2011.) Nurses have a lot of autonomy in their profession. They work independently and take responsibility for their actions. When they become micromanaged by their nurse leader, it takes away that autonomy and creates a work environment that is very low in morale, and can hurt the relationship between manager and employee. Often managers are experiencing a substantial amount of stress from the administration concerning budgets, deadlines, and high performance issues, but this does not justify micromanaging employees (North, 2011.) It is important to give your staff some independence; this lets them know you trust their judgment (North, 2011.) A nurse leader may also change their leadership style depending on if they are dealing with an inexperienced new graduate nurse, or an experienced veteran nurse.
The Nurse Manager Name here South University The Nurse Manager Responsibilities of nurse manager Nurse mangers is the leader of a specific department or unit of a healthcare facility. The nurse manager is responsible for recruitment and retention of the nursing staff, collaborating with other health care providers on patient care, and assisting patients and their families when needed. The nurse manager works with administration communicating and interpreting the facility’s policies and procedures to the staff. Usually with other departments in the facility, the nurse managers develop quality improvement measures tracking the patient services and care. According to Espinoza et al (2009), the nurse manager plays a pivotal role in
, Nurse-to-patient ratios is not a new topic of debate for all of us who deliver care to patients every day. Only lately it has been a big issue that have caught the attention of many. Demands by the medical community for changes concerning staffing, asking for the government interventions in
Provision 4 The nurse is responsible and accountable for individual nursing practice and determines the appropriate delegation of tasks consistent with the nurse’s obligations to provide optimum patient care. (Bosek & Savage, 2007, p. 59) The nursing student realized that she wasn’t an expert in pharmacokinetics and requested the help of a pharmacist to provide quality care for her patient. (Bosek & Savage, 2007, p. 59) Delegation is a huge responsibility and should never be taken lightly. The duty of the nurse is to ensure the patient receives quality care. This means delegating responsibilities to others to ensure that care is met. If a nurse feels she is unsure of a certain area of care, that nurse is obligated to find the precise person who can provide that care. The author’s daughter (Bella) was in the hospital for a reoccurring MRSA infection. When the nurse walked in the door they were asked a question regarding infectious disease protocols and how best to handle the situation. Instead of giving an answer they thought might be correct, the nurse requested that an infectious disease doctor be called in to answer all questions concerning the patient.
The role of the nursing supervisor is to make sure the appropriate steps of the
However, if team nursing were to be fully accepted and embraced, I believe that delegating one nurse to chem strips and another to medication, etc., could be very beneficial to patient care delivery. Deutschendorf (2010) defines assignment as “the transfer of responsibility to another while retaining accountability for the outcome” (p. 441). I feel as though the execution of care hubs on my particular unit is not being fully embraced by all nurses based on the lack of trust between nurses and the worry that tasks, documentation, and care delivery will not be done properly or sufficiently, often leaving liability and accountability a fear for nurses. Additionally, I often find nurses splitting up their patient assignment based on the dedication and hard work of their co-nurse. For example, a hands-on and attention to detail nurse, may not feel comfortable working with a nurse who spends much of their shift on their cellphone or behind a computer
During Module 2, we were asked to select a nurse leader and perform an organizational analysis (Norman, 2017). While shadowing my supervisor, I realized that there was much more than bedside nursing. Along with supervising duties, you must be an expert in the area you supervise. Watching my supervisor made me realize that, I do not wish to work in a management position but made me appreciate all the hard work she does to make are unit flow smoothly. Although, the depth of knowledge and expertise in the pediatric and NICU population that she exuberates has inspired me to work harder so that I can become an expert in my
effectiveness (Cioffi & Ferguson, 2009). Therefore, it is important to ensure that nurses who assume leader roles have the skills to manage and delegate tasks as required. There must be clearly defined roles and responsibilities for each team member that take into account the levels of expertise among the members. It can be troublesome when team members do not carry their share of the work. When this occurs, other team members take on an additional work burden to address the shortfalls in patient care. If the team leader is unable to provide clarity and direction for the team, the model will not be effective.
Another fan base who experiences this is the 5 Seconds of Summer fan base, who are lovingly referred to as the 5SOSFam. Although 5 Seconds of Summer, their peers, and their fans will all tell you that 5SOS is a pop-punk band, ask anyone else and they will say they’re a boyband. You can look in the comments section under any of their YouTube videos and find people who don’t like them, usually because they don’t believe they are a part of the pop-punk genre and that they are only famous because of their dedicated female fans. To be fair, yes, they are of the male gender, and yes, they are in a band; however, boybands are defined by the fact that they don’t play the instruments that their songs are produced with, which unfortunately, 5SOS do.
Teamwork and communication are very important in providing good quality care, especially in the healthcare field. A team is described as a group of people that works together and cooperatively, between each member of the group to reach a common goal (Sullivan, 2013). For a team to function, communication is
The structure of the nursing department at my office is pretty simple. We currently have a director of clinical services who oversees all of the nurses, aides, care, and day to day activities. She is also responsible for delegating admissions, as needed visits and organizing our weekly interdisciplinary team meeting. The director of clinical services works closely with our patient care manager who mainly does admissions, quality control things such as reviewing charts and chart audits, and helps the director of clinical services with daily actuates of the office. Then last is the RN case managers who are responsible for the care of their patient load, nursing visits, monitoring and assessing patients, contacting doctors as needed and being