NURSING 3 Essay: Professionalism and Teamwork in Nursing Practice

This essay provides a critical analysis of the relationship between being a professional nurse and the skill of working in a team. It discusses the importance of adhering to the standards and code of conduct for nurses, highlighting the role of teamwork in achieving professional goals, especially for newly registered nurses. The essay examines the NMBA standards, emphasizing the development of professional and therapeutic relationships through teamwork. It also explores nursing theories such as Benner's stages of clinical competence, Duchscher's stages of nursing, and the Dreyfus model of skill acquisition to explain the transition to professionalism. The essay concludes that professionalism is crucial for the nursing practice and is linked to the ability to work in a team, promoting better understanding of the job's professional demands. The author also emphasizes the need for supporting newly graduated nurses to adjust to the working environment, considering the various stages they undergo before achieving competency.

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Being a professional nurse

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Introduction
Nursing is a practice that transforms a human being into a generous being. The job of nursing
done for a longer time could led to better relations with the people around due to the
development of empathetic attributes in an individual. The title of a professionally registered
nurses renders the nurses with the responsibilities to adhere to the specifically outlined standards
and code of conduct of nurses. The accountability of the registered nurses become high as they
are obliged to follow the standards and code of conduct of nursing diligently (Berg & Ruppert,
2018). For a newly registered nurse, it becomes essential for them to work as a part of a team to
achieve the targeted results. The thesis statement is to establish the link between “being
professional” with the skill of working in a team. The following essay will be critically
discussing the relationship of being professional with the skill of working in a team of newly
graduate nurse and will be associating the nursing theories with the given case scenario.
Critical Analysis
Nurses are expected to follow standards to be professional
As a newly registered nurse, the importance of becoming professional is very high as it acts as a
learning ground for a nurse to learn different parts of nursing. The NMBA standards of nursing
have been issued by the healthcare department that instructs the nurse to follow the standards set
by the department (Dahlke & Baumbusch, 2015). These standards act as a guideline for the nurse
to achieve the appropriate level of professionalism in practice. These standards guide the
behavior of the nurse towards initiating safe and quality practice towards patient, and
development of the person-centered approach towards patients (Dean & Carter, 2018). The
standards are responsible for developing professionalism in the nursing practice of a nurse. The
professionalism of a nurse helps to deliver the best practice to the patients. For a nurse to
demonstrate the professionalism in the practice, it is important for them to work as a part of
team, as working with the team of healthcare providers improves the knowledge regarding the
healthcare practice. The second standard of NMBA instructs the nurses to develop the
professional and therapeutic relationships with the peers and patients (Grover & Morphet, 2017).
The second standard initiates the collaborative nursing practice with the peers. If the newly
graduated nurses do not act as a part of team then it will become difficult from them to adjust

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with the profession (Holmes, 2016). Working as part of a team helps in the development of
professional skills in the newly graduates that include delivering the quality and safe practice,
measuring the patient’s progress in the health, and designing the effective nursing plans for
patients. The collaborative practice among nurses helps in the relieving of the mental and
physical pressure that the newly graduate nurse might feel however in some cases nurses are
disinclined to practice with the team, as they might feel uncomfortable to be held accountable for
an act. Nevertheless, the high percentage of the nurses’ work in the healthcare team to deliver the
quality of nursing practice as nursing without a team is not possible (Lyon, 2015). For example,
A newly graduate nurse in the healthcare facility is not comfortable in working in a healthcare
team, a new nursing policy has come up in the hospital. The information regarding the policy got
dispatched to the team leader in the organization for which the newly graduate is not the part of.
Her unavailability in the team made her unaware of the policy thus affecting her performance.
Professional therapeutic relationship is achieved through working in a team
The professional therapeutic relationship is about developing the relationship of care and trust
with patient according to the demands of the healthcare organization. it is concerned with
maintaining the connection with the patient with the help of elements such as empathy, genuine
concern, and trust (Ozdemir, 2019). As a newly graduate, it is essential to work with healthcare
teams as one is able to connect with the behavior of his or her teammates and can achieve the
therapeutic relation with patients. The newly graduate nurse subconsciously picks up the
professional habits of its teammates thus resulting in the better performance of new individual.
The incompetency of newly graduate nurse to work in a team could result in the difficulty in
understanding professional code of conduct of nursing . Despite, the importance of working in a
team that helps in achieving the therapeutic relationship, there are various cases where nurses
can deliver the therapeutic relations alone than in team. The reasons might include the
incompetent team members as they themselves are not equipped with the concept of therapeutic
care (Ozdemir, 2019). Australian government had taken various steps in improving the
productivity of the nurses at workplace, the step included optimization of the roles of nursing to
improve the productivity and innovative ways of improving the training session for the newly
graduate nurses. The training session proved to be helpful in shedding of their fears and
insecurities.

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Discussion
Professionalism in the nursing practice comes with many benefits, as it acts as direction for the
right conduct as a nurse in the organization. Moreover, the professionalism can be achieved by
working in the teams in the organization. (Mariet, 2016) As working in the teams promotes
coordination, patience, listening skills, and the right manner of interaction. According to the
Benner’s stages of clinical competence, the stages include Novice, Advanced Beginner,
competent, proficient, and expert. The theory states that it takes time for a newly graduate who is
beginner or according to the theory is in the novice stage to evolve into the stage 5 that is expert.
Although working in teams could act as a facilitator to become an expert but still, there is a time
gap for a person to become an expert. Within few months of practice and working with the team,
one can achieve the advanced beginner stage but moving to competency stage takes around two
to three year (Lyon, 2015)s. It is only with time, practice and working with the team the highly
professional stage could be achieved.
According to Duchscher’s stages of nursing, the stages to transition include doing. Being and
knowing (Feather, 2016). The elements included in the stages are anticipation, learning
performing, concealing, adjusting, questioning, reveling, separating, rediscovering, exploring,
and engaging. The transition to professionalism does not happen in a month or a year time. It
takes a good amount of time to achieve that stable stage in nursing. It starts with the stage of
doing where an individual does the job based on the theoretical concepts learned by him in the
graduation days (Körner, 2016). Then, after acting on the knowledge gathered by him. The first
stage includes the elements such as learning, performing. Concealing, adjusting, and
accommodating. The nurse in the first stage faces the difficulty in adjusting in the new
professional environment and the working teams (Feather, 2016). The second stage is about
being a professional nurse where the nurses do the introspection of their practices done by them.
They try examining whether their practices meet the professional standards of the nursing.
(Slatyer, 2016) They examine every act and questions their abilities and things around them. The
elements consist of doubting, examining, questioning, searching, and revealing. The last stage is
about knowing the process where the nurse knows about the real workings or concepts of
performing a job (Lyon, 2015). The stage is marked with stability where the nurse has learned
about the practices of doing a task at a job.

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The other model that include is the Dreyfus model of skill acquisition. The model identifies
various stages to acquire the skills. The four stages are Unconscious incompetency, conscious
incompetence, conscious competence, and unconscious competence. To develop the professional
skill of working effectively in a team to achieve a good level of professionalism, a newly
graduate nurse goes through four stages. The first stage is where a nurse is not able to grasp the
exact the crux of the skill and grasp it wrongly. For example, a newly graduate nurse joins the
healthcare system where the nurse simply sees nurses working in the team and considers the skill
very easy (Williams & Williams, 2015). In the next stage that is Conscious incompetence, the
nurse tries to imitate skill wrongly. The nurse consciously takes this step. In the third step which
is conscious competence, where the nurse consciously practices the skills in right manner. For
example, a nurse practices coordination of tasks properly by consciously taking in account the
elements of skills. In fourth stage, the nurse does not have to put the efforts to achieve the
competency, as it becomes the part of the individual habit (Feather, 2016).
Conclusion
Professionalism in nursing is the most important aspect as it brings the authenticity to the nursing
practice as according to the thesis statement it establishes the link between “being professional”
with the skill of working in a team. With the absence of professionalism in nursing, there is lack
of discipline and effectiveness in the workings in the healthcare organization. There is a well-
established relation between being professional and the skill of working as part of the nursing
team. As working in team will promote better understanding of the professional demands of the
job. It is important that the interest of newly graduate nurses should be taken in account and they
should be given some time to adjust themselves in the working environment of the organization,
as according to the nursing theories there are various stages, which the nurses go through before
they finally, achieve the competency.

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References
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