Growing Nurse Leaders: Their Perspectives on Nursing Leadership and Today’s Practice Environment

Abstract

With the growing complexity of healthcare practice environments and pending nurse leader retirements, the development of future nurse leaders is increasingly important. This article reports on focus group research conducted with Generation Y nurses prior to their initiating coursework in a Master’s Degree program designed to support development of future nurse leaders. Forty-four emerging nurse leaders across three program cohorts participated in this qualitative study conducted to capture perspectives about nursing leaders and leadership. Conventional content analysis was used to analyze and code the data into categories. We discuss the three major categories identified, including: idealistic expectations of leaders, leading in a challenging practice environment, and cautious but optimistic outlook about their own leadership and future, and study limitations. The conclusion offers implications for future nurse leader development. The findings provide important insight into the viewpoints of nurses today about leaders and leadership.

Theoretical-practical articulation of the continuous learning of leadership in Nursing in light of Peter Senge

“…Another research highlighted the importance of using methodological resources and active methodologies for the development of this competence in Nursing, as it encourages student commitment and autonomy, in addition to favoring decision making and building healthy interpersonal relationships (5) . Such results converge to others, who envisioned possibilities for transformation and improvement of health care through the development of leadership in Nursing, through the construction and improvement of personal capacities to understand and influence other people in the learning environments (21)(22) , as well as making the assistance provided more qualified and efficient (23)(24) . Therefore, the promotion of metanoia becomes essential, a term that, according to Senge, means a change in mentality/behavior and that requires the commitment of all individuals involved in this construction (4) .…”

Authentic leadership and nurses' motivation to engage in leadership roles: The mediating effects of nurse work environment and leadership self‐efficacy

“…Organizational variables associated with reduced interest to lead among nurses include the following: inadequate organizational support (Sherman et al, 2015), lack of leadership readiness and preparation (Al Sabei et al, 2019;MacPhail et al, 2015), heavy workload (Dyess et al, 2016), low salary or pay and work-related burnout (Al Sabei et al, 2019).…”

“…Nurses' individual variables include the nurses' age, gender, years of work experience, educational background and nationality (Al Sabei et al, 2019; Wang & Jacobson, 2015; Wong et al, 2013). Organizational variables associated with reduced interest to lead among nurses include the following: inadequate organizational support (Sherman et al, 2015), lack of leadership readiness and preparation (Al Sabei et al, 2019; MacPhail et al, 2015), heavy workload (Dyess et al, 2016), low salary or pay and work‐related burnout (Al Sabei et al, 2019).…”

Connection between nurse managers’ stress from workload and overall job stress, job satisfaction and practice environment in central hospitals: A cross-sectional study

“…9 Recruiting and retaining trained and experienced nurse managers is also a major challenge, as it appears that the next generation of nurses is reluctant to lead. 10 The training of a nurse manager takes years, since experience is the primary mechanism to build competency in nursing management. 11 Thus, nurse managers' stress from workload needs to be addressed in order to retain not only the managers themselves but also our trained and experienced nursing workforce.…”