Katherine Casey

NURS 362
4-21-16
Leadership Reflection
In the clinical setting, I have been working towards adopting the team leadership style.
In this style of leadership, a person leads by positive example and inspires others to do their
absolute best. These leaders use cooperation and collaboration to manage their team and they
work with their fellow nurses instead of using fear and threats to achieve a goal. In the ATI
Nursing Leadership and Management book, collaboration involves putting aside ones own
desires and feelings to focus on shared decision-making between two parties instead.
Cooperation is a type of conflict resolution strategy where one party sacrifices something, which
allows the other party to get what they want (Sommer et al., 2013). These strategies allow nurses
to work together to come to an agreement about an issue. It is opposite of an authoritarian type of
leadership approach where the nurse in charge makes decisions for the entire group without
regard to the other nurses opinions, concerns, or feelings. These types of leaders do not allow for
others to have a say or involvement in anything and they force people to do what they believe is
best.
During clinical, I was able to demonstrate the team leadership style when I was a student
charge nurse for one week. I did this by having good communication with my classmates and the
patients as well as being task-oriented. During a previous week at clinical, there was an incident
where a patients bed alarm was not turned on. The patient, who was a high fall risk, was found
leaning on the side of his bed. It is unknown if the patient turned off his bed alarm on his own or
if the bed alarm was not turned back on after the patient was assisted to the bed commode and
back to his bed. Due to the fact that Castle hospital is focusing greatly on decreasing and
eliminating falls in their facility, it was important for me as the student charge nurse to talk to

everyone individually and as a group on how we can do better in regards to maintaining patient
safety. In addition, Castle is very strict on answering call lights immediately and uses this as one
of the most important interventions to prevent patient falls. As student nurses and caregivers
working in their facility, it was expected of us to adhere to this and answer any call lights that
went off near us. What I suggested and talked about to my classmates was the need for us to train
our ears so that when we heard a call bell go off, we would be able to recognize the sound and
quickly respond to that patient. I also reinforced the need to perform thorough hourly rounding
and to round more frequently on patients that were confused or disoriented.
At the end of the week, the feedback I received from my classmates was positive and
they complimented my performance as the student charge nurse. One of the main reasons why I
believe my classmates enjoyed being under my leadership was because I communicated with
them in a polite, but serious manner. I also ensured that everyone was completing their daily
tasks on time and assisted with patient care as needed.
In addition, I wrote about how I wanted to become more assertive and confident because
these are needed traits in nursing. I still have a long way to go in this department, but I have
shown growth in this area as evidenced by improvement in performing my clinical skills on the
floor and my communication with my patients, classmates, the nursing staff, and my instructor.
From the beginning of clinical compared to the ending weeks on the floor, my fluency with
performing nursing skills has greatly improved and this reflects my confidence building. I have
also developed a calmer demeanor when it comes to my interaction with others, which reflects an
increase in my confidence as well. My assertiveness still needs work, but I was able to show
application of this through telling/talking to my classmates about ways that we can improve and
what we need to focus on working on while were on the floor. As talked about in our

Contemporary Nursing book, people can learn to become effective leaders over time and I
believe that Im on the right path to becoming one in the future (Cherry & Jacobs, 2014).
References
Cherry, B. & Jacob, S. R. (2014). Contemporary Nursing: Issues, Trends, & Management.
Missouri: Elsevier Mosby.
Sommer, S., Johnson, J., Roberts, K., Redding, S. R., Churchill, L., Davila, L. ... Knippa, A.
(2013). Nursing leadership and management (6th ed.). Retrieved from
https://www.atitesting.com