The Need for a Contemporary Leadership Framework in Clinical Scenarios

Running head: NURSING LEADERSHIP ESSAY
Nursing leadership essay
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NURSING LEADERSHIP ESSAY
It can be argued that when clinical leadership is concerned, adhering to only one
leadership style will not be sufficient in clinical scenarios.
Nursing is one of the most compassionate and impactful professions that gives the
professional the opportunity to provide care and support to the sick and ailing. However, in order
to shine in the field of nursing or health care, there is a need for a few professional attributes
such as critical thinking and clinical leadership (Bathurst, Jackson & Statler, 2010). Clinical
leadership is associated with clinical reasoning and decision making. There are many challenging
situations involved with the clinical scenario where the nurse is required to make critical
decisions that are fundamentally associated with the safety and well-being of the patient. Hence,
there is a need for more contemporary and multidimensional leadership approaches (Beydler,
2017). This essay will explore the different leadership styles to find the most suitable approach
that can be aligned with the complex leadership needs of clinical scenario.
First and foremost, it is very important to align the different ideas and understanding of
the concept of clinical leadership and how it relates to the key clinical scenarios. Clinical
leadership can be considered as one of the key concepts that facilitate positive and optimal client
or patient outcomes across different clinical settings (Cameron et al., 2012). It has to be
understood that in any organizational scenario, the only way to maintain optimal functionality
while meeting the quality benchmarks of the performance is having a sound leadership
framework, and the healthcare scenario is not an exception to that either. This is where the
congruent concept of clinical leadership comes from, and it not only guides the nurses to their
utmost performance outcomes but it also helps them understand their role and responsibility with
clarity. According to Mannix, Wilkes and Daly (2015), it has to be mentioned that in the clinical
scenario, the concept of multidisciplinary care is very popular. In multidisciplinary care, there

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NURSING LEADERSHIP ESSAY
are different care professionals involved belonging to different care backgrounds to address the
different needs of the patient, however, the efficiency and effectiveness of the care depend on the
co-operative harmony of the varied range of different care professionals (Carlos Do Rego
Furtado, Da Graça Câmara Batista & José Ferreira Silva, 2011). The concept of clinical
leadership comes to aid in this scenario as well providing a framework of guidance and
management that will address any conflict that arises and will provide the best care outcome to
the patients. On a more elaborative note, the clinical leadership in the healthcare scenario
provides system performance, achievement of health reform objectives, timely care delivery,
system integrity, and efficiency. Hence, clinical leadership is one of the greatest operational
needs of the contemporary health care scenarios to ensure optimal productivity and performance
(Swanwick & McKimm, 2011).
Now there are various different leadership styles and approaches, and each one of them
has a significant use and impact on the functionality of the organizational construct.
Transformational leadership is the leadership style of the millennium; it provides the most
benefit to the organization. The transformation leadership is the leadership of change; here the
leader attempts to portray as a role model in order to have the followers be motivated by the
vision and mission of change brought forward by the leader. According to Doody and Doody
(2012), in transformational leadership, the leader attempts to motivate and inspire the followers
to see and feel the need for the change in the scenario and work towards facilitating the change
along with the leader. In clinical leadership scenario as well, the most notable leadership
approach that has been discovered is the transformational leadership. It has to be mentioned in
this context that the professional development is the sector that requires the most of the
leadership attributes in the healthcare scenario. And hence, the transformational leadership style