For success to come about in a nursing and healthcare institution, good leadership is essential. However, since there are many leadership styles, choosing the right leadership style can be the difference between success and failure. The main leadership styles are autocratic, laissez-faire, and democratic. These styles of leadership have a huge impact on social learning theory when applied in the nursing practice, with a democratic leadership style being the best.
The social learning theory posits that human beings learn through observation. Akers & Jennings (2015) posit that t he observations are on the actions of other human beings. For the learning to be a success, the steps that should come with observation are attention, retention, reproduction, and motivation. In my nursing practice, I have observed how these traits of the social learning theory have an impact on the leadership styles mentioned above.
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An autocratic leadership style is whereby the leader dictates the policies, goals, and objectives for the organization. According to Mohamed (2018), h is or her subordinates do not have much input in these decisions. The autocratic leadership style negatively impacts on social learning theory because the leader does not include the subordinates in the decision-making process. While autocratic leadership style is dictatorial, the democratic leadership style is more involving as the leader consults and considers the input of the employees. The final decision, therefore, has the approval and understanding of employees. Democratic leadership style supports the social learning theory because the subordinates do not get only to observe, but they can also imitate and reproduce the decisions and actions since the leader guides and motivates them. Laissez-faire falls in-between autocratic and democratic leadership. Such a leader believes that employees should be trusted to accomplish tasks on their own, hence tries to gain control through less obvious means. Concerning social learning theory, this is the worst of the three because employees do not get an opportunity to observe their leader as he or she is non-participative.
My Leadership Style
From experience and facts, I deduce that I use a democratic leadership style. I believe that in the nursing field, a democratic leadership style is important since I have to allow employees to practically and consistently learn from me. Marquis & Huston (2017) argue that a health institution is a learning organization; hence employees should display team learning, mental models, systems thinking, personal mastery, and have a shared vision. Through my democratic leadership style, employees have been able to observe what I do. I have also interacted with them, helping them in replicating what I do through training and learning, as well as teamwork.
I also believe that my democratic leadership style has helped shape the culture of the nurses to how I want it to be. According to Hamilton, Orr, & Raboin (2008), culture change is only positive when an organization is flexible and incorporates collaborative efforts, taking into account the input of all the employees. In the course of my nursing practice, I have led teams that needed to learn new skills and knowledge, hence moving with the times. Since it required a culture change, I realized that I could not force it. Instead, I had a sit down with the employees, give them my vision on the change, and also hear their ideas and concerns. We, therefore, implemented these changes together, hence making the social learning process easy and successful.
Conclusion
For social learning to be successful, autocracy, and laissez-faire leadership styles should not be under consideration. Instead, I have implemented a democratic leadership style in my nursing practice. It has enabled my teams to learn well, change their culture sustainability, and improve their productivity.
References
Akers, R. L., & Jennings, W. G. (2015). Social learning theory. The Handbook of Criminological Theory , 4 , 230-240.
Hamilton, D. K., Orr, R. D., & Raboin, W. E. (2008). Organizational transformation: A model for joint optimization of culture change and evidence-based design. HERD: Health Environments Research & Design Journal , 1 (3), 40-60.
Marquis, B.L. & Huston, C.J. (2017). Leadership roles and management functions in nursing: Theory and application (9th Ed.). Philadelphia, PA: Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins.
Mohamed, N. T. (2018). Relationship between leadership styles and clinical decision-making autonomy among critical care nurses. Egyptian Nursing Journal , 15 (2), 102.
