Management and leadership are vital to the delivery of good health services. Both are similar in some aspecst but they may involve different types of outlook, skills, and behaviors. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), good managers should strive to be good leaders and good leaders, need management skills to be effective (World Health Organization, 2019). Leaders have a vision of what can be achieved and then communicate this to others. Leaders evolve strategies for actualizing the vision through motivating others and seeking out resources. Managers ensure that the available resources are well organized and applied to produce the best results (WHO, 2019).
Leadership is often viewed as an art, not science and management on the other hand, is often thought of as a science as it involves a series of logical steps that can be followed to implement whatever the role demands. In my experience in the health care field, leaders differ from managers in a variety of ways. Leaders are active in formulating goals and objectives for the employees who work for them and strive to seek out efficiency. Managers work to accomplish the tasks and usually will continue to do whatever is necessary to get the job done.
An Advanced Practice Registered Nurse (APRN) can both lead and provide management as they have an expert level of knowledge and complex decision-making skills and clinical competencies for expanded practice specific to the context in which they are credentialed to work (Lamb, Martin-Misener, Bryant-Lukosius, and Latimer, 2018). For example, APRNs can lead well to formulate goals related to patient care to help to reduce surgical site infections. An APRN can provide management to the staff on tasks the nurse can carry out to reduce infections such as proper skin prepping techniques and dressing application. APRNs are well versed on evidenced-based practice and can incorporate their knowledge into improving efficiency. An APRN in the role of a leader will strive to seek out efficiency through policy changes at the organization they are employed with. The APRN leader might identify equipment or staff training needs to accommodate high risk patient populations. The APRN manager would then continue this movement to ensure staff training is completed, that staff was familiar with policy updates, and that ultimately the process was rolled out completely. APRNs are an asset to organizations as they advanced education allots for an individual capable of both leading and managing the team.
References
Lamb, A., Martin-Misener, R., Bryant-Lukosius, D., Latimer, M. (July 2018). Describing the leadership capabilities of advanced practice nurses using a qualitative descriptive study. Nursing Open, 5(3): 400-413.
World Health Organization (2019). Chapter 10: Leadership and Management. https://www.who.int/hiv/pub/imai/om_10_leadership_management.pdf
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