1.1 Leadership Styles
Followership
Followership is described as the upward influence of individuals on their leaders and their teams. The actions of followers have an important influence on staff performance and patient outcomes. Being an effective follower requires individuals to contribute to the team not only by doing as they are told, but also by being aware and raising relevant concerns. Effective followers realize that they can initiate change and disagree or challenge their leaders if they feel their organization or unit is failing to promote wellness and deliver safe, value-driven, and compassionate care. Leaders who gain the trust and dedication of followers are more effective in their leadership role. Everybody has a voice and a responsibility to take ownership of the workplace culture, and good followership contributes to the establishment of high-functioning and safety-conscious teams (Dreier et al., 2019)
Team members impact patient safety by following teamwork guidelines for good followership. For example, strategies such as closed-loop communication are important tools to promote patient safety.
Leadership and Management Characteristics
Leadership and management are terms often used interchangeably, but they are two different concepts with many overlapping characteristics. Leadership is the art of establishing direction and influencing and motivating others to achieve their maximum potential to accomplish tasks, objectives, or projects (Northhouse, 2004; Specchia et al., 2021). There is no universally accepted definition or theory of nursing leadership, but there is increasing clarity about how it differs from management (Scully, 2015). Management refers to roles that focus on tasks such as planning, organizing, prioritizing, budgeting, staffing, coordinating, and reporting (Hannaway, 1989). The overriding function of management has been described as providing order and consistency to organizations, whereas the primary function of leadership is to produce change and movement (Cherry & Jacob, 2017). View a comparison of the characteristics of management and leadership in Table 1.1a.
Table 1.1a Management and Leadership Characteristics (Northhouse, 2004)
| MANAGEMENT | LEADERSHIP |
|---|---|
Planning, Organizing, and Prioritizing
|
Establishing Direction
|
Budgeting and Staffing
|
Influencing Others
|
Coordinating and Problem-Solving
|
Motivating
|
Not all nurses are managers, but all nurses are leaders because they encourage individuals to achieve their goals. The American Nurses Association (ANA) established Leadership as a Standard of Professional Performance for all registered nurses. Standards of Professional Performance are “authoritative statements of action and behaviors that all registered nurses, regardless of role, population, specialty, and setting, are expected to perform competently” (ANA, 2021). See the competencies of the ANA Leadership standard in the following box and additional content in other chapters of this boo