Nurses play a significant role in health care organizations. The type of leadership these nurses have can drastically impact how to discharge their duties and hinder patient outcomes. The work of nurses in wards is mentally and physically burdensome. This, therefore, stipulates that the nurse manager’s leadership knowledge has a crucial role in satisfying and ensuring that nurses stay in their work unit. An important part of leadership in nursing is to combine more than one different style. The purpose of this article is to explore democratic leadership in nursing, the theories aligned to this leadership style and the critical element a successful leader must possess.
Personal Leadership Style
A nurse leader using a democratic leadership style always makes the final decisions, but his workers or team contribute much to this decision. They support innovativeness, and colleagues are frequently encouraged to participate in the decision-making process and projects. Nurse manager’s give every employee to participate, raise ideas freely and endless discussions (Huber, 2013). Participation process tends to concentrate on group quality and the free flow of ideas. While all these are taking place, the nurse leader is always present to provide control and guidance. At the same time, democratic nurses decide who gets into a group and who is allowed to contribute to the decision making the process.
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According to research, democratic leadership style is effective in hospital administration. It starts with accounting and personnel departments to insurance billing and maintenance. Physicians need to work together under participative leadership to ensure accountability and consistency. The characteristics of this leadership style are that creative physicians are encouraged and rewarded. It also makes physicians more engaged. All teams are permitted to share opinions and ideas despite the nurse manager retaining the ultimate decision ( Xu, 2017) . Any good nurse manager embracing participative leadership must be honest, creative, competent, fair, and intelligent and have courage.
It is essential to state that democratic nurse managers inspire and respect all their employees. Democratic leaders are sincere and base their decisions on values and morals. Physicians and other hospital employees tend to feel inspired to give their contribution and rake action (Pullen, 2016). This leadership style seeks diverse opinions and does not attempt to silence dissenting voices that seem to from physicians and nurses that seem to be less popular.
Leadership and Management Theories
At its core, this leadership style permit workers to have autonomy and offer input beyond their regular duties. The most common principle and theories that align with democratic nurse managers include;
Enabling of a free-flow of ideas
As much as democratic leaders care that physicians and nurses feel engaged, they authentically seek out opinions from these workers to assist them in making informed decisions. These leaders value any form of input, and they allow it to flow freely in health care centers.
The inspiration of respect and trust
Democratic leaders create a sustainable relationship with their workers for their employees to share their ideas and knowledge they have comfortably. Democratic leaders go past performance and productivity while handling their workers at in hospitals.
Emphasis on values and mortality
Democratic leaders believe in mortality and ethics. They know that all workers have the right to be heard. Similarly, these leaders understand that all these interactions must be facilitated for the betterment of their teams (Huber, 2013).
Competence
In a hospital setting, there is a likelihood of having a tone of ideas being wasted. At the same time, it can be hard to keep everything straight. It is for these reasons that any nurse managers who are using a typical leadership style to be competent and intelligent concerning how well workers’ ideas are used. These leaders need to strike a balance and control to facilitate free-flowing conversations (Pullen, 2016).
Honest and open minded
Democratic leaders require an open mind when handling dissenting opinions. Although not all that is said is put into practice, they take their time to listen to what counts from members’ contribution before swinging into the final decision.
Work Environment Behaviors
There are many nursing environments that a nurse can enter. This includes the hospital. Nurses working in hospitals take care of patients, manage treatment and operate medical equipment. Efforts are being made to improve the working environment of the hospital. The other nursing environment is the emergency room (ER). ER environment is stressful and fast-paced. ER nurses regularly receive patients in particular condition, and at times they are forced to work in ambulances (Barr & Dowding, 2019). Surgical rooms is another work environment, and a surgical nurse is responsible for ensuring that surgical rooms are cleaned, tools are sterilized, assisting surgeons are outsourced and perform life-saving actions. Another work environment is geriatric. Any nurse working at a geriatric wing of a hospital handles the elderly. The responsibilities in this work environment include organizing patient medications, managing chronic conditions and determine a patient’s cognitive skills.
Democratic leaders delegate duties as well as their unique decision-making process. Instead of hiring professional to run divisions, they actively participate in the process of decision making and remain informed ( Xu, 2017) . Democratic leaders often rely on data and strike a balance in their teams. They play a crucial role in solving problems facing their employees.
Conclusion
Democratic leadership is more of participative than authoritative. This type of leadership involves risks taking, and leaders understand when to cut losses since much of the decisions is made as a group. Other traits of democratic leaders include role models, highly adaptable, fair-minded and team-oriented. The main principles of democratic leadership in nursing include competence, open minded, emphasis on values and mortality, and enable free-flow of ideas.
References
Barr, J., & Dowding, L. (2019). Leadership in health care . SAGE Publications Limited.
Huber, D. (2013). Leadership and nursing care management (5th ed.). St. Louis, MO: Elsevier Saunders.
Pullen Jr, R. L. (2016). Leadership in nursing practice. Nursing made Incredibly Easy , 14 (3), 26-31.
Xu, J. H. (2017). Leadership theory in clinical practice. Chinese Nursing Research , 4 (4), 155-157.
