Practicum Activities Reflection
My job practicum experience was held at the New York Methodist Hospital. The clinical practicum is a crucial step for a nursing student that fosters professional development and comprehensive competence, nurtures “patient-oriented professional ethics and work philosophy” (Li, Liu, Lin, & Meng, 2016, p. 2). The practicum was discontinued due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused new challenges and crisis standards for nurse practitioners. Nevertheless, my dedicated and caring preceptor significantly contributed to my professional progress through phone conferences and facetime periods for continued education. The activities in the practicum were based on the principles of servant leadership, displays of humility, as well as ethical considerations.
The leadership strategy in the healthcare system implies taking care of others and oneself as a leader. The core idea of servant leadership indicates “powerful energy and skills” that are highly relevant in the field of nursing (Broome and Marshall, 2020, p. 204). Furthermore, the root of such leadership is the basis of altruism. Servant-leader in nursing is deeply committed to personal and professional education throughout life. My mentor demonstrated the key elements of servant leadership by managing and leading through vision, energy, support, and guidance, as well as being dedicated to the team, and sharing personal experience. Therefore, selfless leadership paves the way for a shared vision. The transformational leadership in nursing also implies the concept of humility, meaning that a leader looks beyond oneself to pursue the mission of the facility and values the labor of others. The leadership role of a nurse is as well dependent on the “moral and ethical foundations,” which are critical elements of the professional behavior (Porter-O’Grady, Weberg, Mangold, & Malloch, 2018, p. 58). Nurses must strictly adhere to the code of ethics, which ensures personal trust towards healthcare providers.
Application of Leadership
Any preceptor is a team leader who must aim at strong credibility within team members and involve them in the decision-making processes. Being a credible leader provides the groundwork for well-deserved trust to the leader and coherent teamwork. Together with other concepts, such as “context and dose of reality,” credibility is brought by clinical expertise to establish the position of a leader (Broome and Marshal, 2020, p. 185). Considering the challenges caused by the world pandemic, nurses function in the environment that requires a “balance between time-limited crisis standards of care and longstanding professional standards of care” (ANA, 2020, p. 1). Although my preceptor also faced with these challenges, she continues to provide me with new information and experience.
The continuing education includes mainly reading, videos, interviewing a Social Worker, and a Dietitian as leaders in their respective roles in an Acute Inpatient Rehabilitation unit. My preceptor is reviewing with me “The Functional Role of Nursing administrator” Magnet Recognition program to discuss the challenges faced by leaders’ nurse mangers related to the COVID 19 pandemic. In addition, she emphasizes the issues regarding the nursing staff, specifically those who had difficulty getting to work related to transportation and were offered hotel accommodations. By highlighting these issues, she serves as a credible leader who fosters a community of trust. The preceptor demonstrated her credibility in the workplace by discussing important concerns in the nursing practice, such as ethics, communication, listening, compassion, and shared decisions. Moreover, the practicum includes extended invitation via phone for everyone, especially nurses, to join in prayer at 8:30 am each morning, and 8:00 pm each evening. This unites all the nurses and practitioners for the common prayer to bring healing to our country and bring peace in our lives.
Practicum Project Preparation
The effects of the practicum project training are mainly measured by comprehensive evaluation and my personal experience report before and after the practicum. In my opinion, the determining factor of the successful outcomes of this project is the extent to which a preceptor can motivate and encourage a student to become a servant-leader in terms of personal development in the nursing practice. The analyzed training and contribution of my mentor proved her capacity to demonstrate credibility and leadership qualities throughout the practicum and continuing online education. These are sustainable measures since they provide a secure framework for a nurse practitioner to achieve the patient-related and team-related trust that can be measured and ensured by professional competence.
The target outcomes of this practicum project include not only gaining knowledge and expertise in the nursing practice within a real work environment. The core idea implies learning how to obtain servant leadership qualities to guide coherent teamwork and patients towards mutual trust and patient-oriented care. After the project implementation, several measuring tools will be applied to evaluate the success of the results attained. This involves patients’ questionnaires, relationships with the patients and with the co-workers, knowledge of nursing standards during the world pandemic crisis, as well as decision-making skills. It is of the utmost importance to be prepared for all the challenges that nurses face and know how to create the culture of caring that is focused on support, communication with the patients, and opportunity of shared decision-making.
Leadership Video Reflection
In this video, Darryl DelHousaye, the president and professor of practical theology at Phoenix Seminary, examines the issue of power and the concept of servant leadership. He defines servant leadership as the one “patterned by the very model of Jesus Christ” (GCU Academics – Nursing, 2016). Considering the variety of leadership terminology, DelHousaye identifies the general concept of leadership as influence. It can be a good or a bad influence, which, therefore, defines a good or a bad leader. The leadership style of a single individual is closely intertwined with his or her personality. The professor discusses seven distinctive characteristics of servant leadership that are essential for shaping a personal leadership style. Two things that I have learned from this video is the essence of power and the way it can be defined by interconnection with other people.
The first distinctive is the issue of power that refers to the capacity to implement something that might influence another person. DelHousaye states that it is the power of possessing the power of influence. More importantly, the critical element of such influence is something that other individuals would want about a leader, something they would want to imitate, or something one has to offer. The issue of power is particularly relevant in the field of nursing since a leading nurse has a set of valuable knowledge and experience to offer for the personnel and provides care for the patients. The professor suggests asking people who know me and are intimately acquainted with my personality to analyze the essence of personal power. It is interesting that DelHousaye considers the leadership issue in terms of Christianity. He recommends asking related people about how they believe God uses me in their life. I suppose that this implies that the leadership power is not mainly about a leader himself, but also about his life, family and friends, and work environment. The coherent teamwork in the nursing field ensures a leader’s ability to identify the power and lead.
References
ANA (American Nurses Association). (2020). Crisis standard of care: COVID-19 pandemic. Nursing World, 1–3.
Broome, M., & Marshall, E. (2020). Shaping your own leadership journey. In M. E. Broome & E. S. Marshall (Eds.), Transformational leadership in nursing: From expert clinician to influential leader (3rd ed., pp. 183–213). Springer Publishing Company.
GCU Academics – Nursing. (2016). Servant leadership – issue of servant. Web.
Li, H., Liu, L., Lin, L., & Meng, H. (2016). Reflection on the pre-practicum nursing students’ integrated competence training under the guidance of caring experience. Health Education and Care, 1(1), 1-5.
Porter-O’Grady, T., Weberg, D., Mangold, K., & Malloch, K. (2018). Leadership in nursing practice (3rd ed.). Jones & Bartlett Learning.