Free Essay Example on Empowering for Nurses

Introduction

In the literature, laissez-faire leadership is defined as the type of leadership that recognizes full freedom and is expressed as “let them do It.” laissez-faire leadership is a more distant form of leadership. Contrary to what is described by (Bass & Riggio, 2006, p. 17) that laissez-faire is the absence of leadership, this leadership style allows nurses to work under minimal supervision while also empowering them to make decisions. This does not necessarily imply that the nurses may take any action they choose, but rather that they stay within some boundaries and guidelines. There exist few studies on laissez-faire leadership style in nursing. Still, many studies suggest that laissez-faire leadership has proved to be much good while involving motivated and highly skilled personnel (Khan et al., 2016, p. 4 & Zareen et al., 2015, p.538). This assignment explores how laissez-faire leadership in a health care facility aids or bars the facility from achieving its outcomes and targets and also the impact it has on teamwork and staff engagement.

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Laissez-Faire Leadership Style on Achieving Specific Nursing Targets

The primary targets in nursing are to ensure that patients are safe and are given exceptional care, while the nurses are developing their expertise and experience. Nursing leaders have an extra duty of improving and maintaining efficiency while adhering to required process protocol (Aboshaiqah et al., 2014, p. 58). Also, they must keep the staff engaged and motivated. Laissez-faire leadership style by nursing supervisors has both positive and negative impacts on achieving specific targets because leadership style has a direct effect on the quality of patient care and medical facility's outcomes.

Advantages of Laissez-Faire Leadership Style on Achieving Specific Nursing Targets

The first positive impact of this leadership skill on achieving specific nursing targets is that it encourages creativity and innovation among employees (Merrill, 2015, p. 321). When nurses have been allowed to work on different delegations with minimal supervision, the staff can work on coming up with new ideas of attaining the set target by the supervisor. Allowing some nurses to figure out problems can lead to innovations which streamline processes and improves the work environment for every nurse leading to efficient patient care and exceptional outcome.

Another positive impact is that the leader will have more free time to handle other issues. Since the leaders are not always standing over their staff and continuously providing guidance, they can be involved in other pertinent or pressing issues (Merrill, 2015, p. 321). This helps the nursing leaders to achieve the set organizational goals since they can handle more issues. Also, the leaders can utilize this opportunity to pay close supervision to the inexperienced nurses who may require guidance on their duties and hence helping them grow their expertise.

Also, Laissez-faire leadership style helps in fast decision making. Nurse duties on caring for patients may require urgent decision making, yet the supervisor is held up with other pressing matters (Merrill, 2015, p. 321). Therefore, this leadership style allows workers to make some decisions without waiting around for feedback from the supervisor. This will help nurses to serve more patients effectively while deciding their jurisdiction.

Additionally, the leadership style gives nurses a chance to succeed and have personal growth. The Hands-off leadership approach gives the nurses hand-on chance to show their abilities (Merrill, 2015, p. 321). Also, the nurses have the opportunity to try new ideas or collaborate in working towards a particular target set by the supervisor or the organization. Achieving new ideas serves as nurse's experience growth and their talents can be acknowledged quickly.

Disadvantages of Laissez-Faire Leadership Style on Achieving Specific Nursing Targets

There may be insufficient role clarity. When there is a new project in the hospital, the Laissez-faire leader may fail to provide enough clarity for the staff to get started leaving them without explicit knowledge of what they are expected to do (Merrill, 2015, p. 322). This may lead to slowed operations inpatient care, and medical errors may increase.

Another negative impact is that not all nurses will have the capabilities to handle the duties allocated to them. When a nurse is assigned a task where he or she has limited knowledge of it, they may not be able to hit deadlines and targets. Also, they may require more guidance and closer supervision hence slowing their efficiency (Merrill, 2015, p. 322). Therefore, this leadership style will fit only to those comfortable with the delegated duties.

Also, there are higher chances of lack of accountability in organizations. Nursing leaders may use this leadership style to evade responsibility for poor performance and bad outcomes. This makes the nurses to be blamed, and hence it makes them fear to try new ideas or make some decisions (Merrill, 2015, p. 322). This contributes to an overall reduction in the efficiency of hospital activities and patients care.

Lastly, there is a tendency of increasing conflict in the organization. Nurses may engage in interdepartmental disputes while trying to outshine others (Merrill, 2015, p. 322). Also, the nurses may be driven by self-interest, which leads to conflicts over available resources.

Effect

As suggested by the literature, laissez-faire leadership is a unique leadership style in the aspect that its results are dependent on the level of skills of the members involved. Several research studies such as (Khan et al., 2016, p. 4 & Zareen et al., 2015, p.538) have found that the laissez-fare leadership style is much useful when dealing with highly motivated and skilled personnel. Additionally, the researchers also found that the leadership style has achieved low in firms where the personnel involved is unskilled or inexperienced.

In a health care facility, different nurses have different duties. There are nurses in the admission sector for admitting the patients, some for holding medicines, others for administering pills, and providing compassionate care to the patients. Besides the different roles, the healthcare facility has its overall objectives, which the nurses should work towards. This calls for the need of intensive teamwork. Laissez-faire leadership does not promote cooperation in a working environment as it involves delegating duties to different nurses leading different departments within a healthcare facility (Zareen et al., 2015, p.541). This is because laissez-faire leadership gives the leaders in other departments in the healthcare the power to work under no supervision, which results in some departments failing and hence reducing the overall outcomes of the healthcare. For instance, if the nurses at the admission department are slow in admitting patients into the health facility, this might result in the healthcare facility not meeting its daily target of patient's admission and thus lowering the overall healthcare productivity. The fact that this leadership style keeps the managers detached from the group implies the lack of cohesiveness, and different departments in the healthcare might not achieve the set objectives.

On the other hand, laissez-faire leadership is much effective in enhancing staff engagement in a healthcare facility. As explained earlier, laissez-faire leadership involves the delegation of duties to different departments in healthcare in an attempt to achieve the overall mission and vision of the health facility. By delegating the tasks, the nurses get the opportunity to participate in the healthcare decision-making process as they are granted the power to make decisions in their respective departments. Hence, enhancing the staff engagement in the healthcare facility while also giving them the sense of belonging and ownership and thus increased overall production of the health care facility (Khan et al., 2016, p. 14 ).

Conclusion

In conclusion, Laissez-faire leadership style is useful for an organization where nurses and the leader are experienced or when a new nurse leader is in charge of nurses with extensive experience (Aboshaiqah et al., 2014, p. 58). Experienced leaders will have sufficient knowledge to make tough decisions and delegation while the inexperienced leaders may grow their leadership expertise by learning from experienced professionals.

References

Aboshaiqah, A. E., Hamdan-Mansour, A. M., Sherrod, D. R., Alkhaibary, A., & Alkhaibary, S. (2014). Nurses' perception of managers' leadership styles and their associated outcomes. American Journal of Nursing Research, 2(4), 57-62.

Bass, B. M., & Riggio, R. E. (2006). Transformational leadership. Psychology Press.

Merrill, K. C. (2015). Leadership style and patient safety: implications for nurse managers. JONA: The Journal of Nursing Administration, 45(6), 319-324.

Yasir, M., Imran, R., Irshad, M. K., Mohamad, N. A., & Khan, M. M. (2016). Leadership styles about employees' trust and organizational change capacity: Evidence from non-profit organizations. Sage Open, 6(4), 2158244016675396.

Zareen, M., Razzaq, K., & Mujtaba, B. G. (2015). Impact of transactional, transformational, and laissez-faire leadership styles on motivation: A quantitative study of banking employees in Pakistan. Public Organization Review, 15(4), 531-549.