Effective Leadership and Management Approaches in Nursing

That said, this paper aims to relate and distinguish the approaches that leaders and managers take towards addressing the issue of continuous quality improvement and patients’ satisfaction. Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) and customer satisfaction are crucial issues in nursing that require leaders and managers attention in healthcare systems. CQI entails the efforts made by healthcare providers towards improving the quality of service by constantly exceeding patients’ expectations. Patients’ satisfaction is among the factors used to measure the quality of care in a healthcare facility, and collectively these issues focus on patients, recognition of major areas for improvement and the implementation of quality tools and statistics to realize enhancements in healthcare quality. In an attempt to ensure quality improvement and patients’ satisfaction, organizations such as CDC have been funding healthcare institutions to help fight some of the chronic illnesses such as cancer.

This approach applies transactional theories of management which focus on the use of authority or supervision to monitor employees’ performances. The reward may be offered in the form of promotion, benefits, bonuses and increased wages while the punishment could be as worse as a dismissal. On the other hand, leaders normally influence their followers by persuading them to adopt their visions (Lunenburg, 2011). Hence, a nursing leader would take the initiative to enlighten his or her followers on the significance of having a continuous quality improvement and attaining patients’ satisfaction. He or she will emphasize to the employees what CQI means and entails as well as explain to them why it is important that patients get satisfied with the type of care they receive.

In other words, nursing leaders will tend to put employees interests into consideration and allow them to participate in the implementation process by sharing their ideas. Additionally, a nursing leader will ensure that his vision is defined and understood by all followers. It could, for instance, involve an initiative to reduce the number of patients’ fall as a means of attaining improved quality care. Successful implementation of such roles often requires leaders to have effective communication skills, problem-solving skills, motivational skills and overall interpersonal skills. The act of including employees’ participation leads to teamwork and as such a nursing leader must adhere to the principles of leading by example, timely decision making, self-improvement and caring for employees to ensure the successful realization of the organizational goals.

Both nursing leaders and managers work with people, influence them and ensuring goals are achieved within the organization. However, the approaches they use to motivate their followers into reaching this goal are different. While managers use reward and punishment systems, his position and designated rules and procedures to meet the desired goals, leaders inspire followers to share his goal, creates relationships of trust and respect, allows for employees’ inclusion and act as an example in the implementation of the CQI and patients’ satisfaction. As such, I find leadership approach to be more flexible and promising towards moving healthcare facilities towards attaining CQI and patients’ satisfaction than management approach. References Bohoris G. , & Kapella, S. Patient Satisfaction in a Statewide Cervical Cancer Screening Program.