Introduction
The interaction of nurses with their colleagues, patients, and other healthcare professionals improves when they have excellent communication skills. Every nurse is a leader with significant influence on the relations and productivity of healthcare facilities’ staff. Their tasks, including delivering services to patients, negotiating, and exchanging information with other healthcare workers, involve communication. The latter is a fundamental aspect of high-quality nursing care since it facilitates achieving their goals, sharing patients’ experiences and concerns, and upholding healthcare values. Assertiveness in nurse professionals’ communication improves quality of care due to effective relationships with patients, families, and healthcare providers.
Definition and Background Information of Assertive Communication
Assertiveness in communication is an important aspect necessary to all leaders, irrespective of their industries. According to Weiss and Tappen (2014), assertive communication refers to individuals’ ability to express their ideas, both positive and negative, and feelings about something or a situation in an honest, open, and direct way. Being assertive in communication allows people to recognize their rights while still respecting those of other individuals (Mansour et al., 2020). Assertive communication skills allow people to be responsible for themselves and their actions without blaming or judging others.
The application of assertiveness has been increasing significantly over the decades. According to Omura et al. (2018), American psychologists Salter and Wolpe introduced assertiveness training in the 1950s as a form of behavioral therapy. It was then promoted as a means of protecting individuals and human rights from the 1970s by the civil rights movements. Since then, more fields, including healthcare, have adopted assertiveness training in communication. Assertive communication skills in healthcare professionals benefit them and play a significant role in patients’ well-being. Initially, training of healthcare providers in assertiveness focused on their self-esteem, job satisfaction, well-being, and workplace relations. However, healthcare institutions recognize assertive communication training as an integral strategy for addressing increasing concerns regarding a high number of errors in treatments (Omura et al., 2018). Therefore, assertiveness communication training improves nurses and doctors’ communication skills as well as patients’ safety and treatment outcomes.
Assertive communication accentuates three important aspects, including confidence, clarity, and control. The first aspect, confidence, requires healthcare professionals to believe in their ability to handle situations. The second one, clarity, emphasizes communicating a non-contradictory message, easier for everyone to understand. Finally, the last aspect requires that individuals communicate their thoughts and ideas in a calm and controlled way (Omura et al., 2018). These features of assertive communication facilitate the establishment of trust between patients and care providers and amount healthcare professionals.
Assertive Communication’s Functions in Nursing Practice
Assertive communication is instrumental in nursing roles, such as beside nurse, public health nurse, Chief Nursing Officer (CNO), or unit manager. Bedside nurses offer direct care to patients in various settings, such as hospitals, nursing homes, ambulatory centers, and clinics. They frequently interact with patients and their families, and their presence is more than comforting. Therefore, bedside nurses need to be effective communicators to facilitate comfort for their clients. In this regard, they need to be assertive in the information they convey to the patients and their families. Assertive communication skills in bedside nursing practice guarantee minimal confusion between patients and nurses since the latter avoid the use of medical jargon, demonstrate confidence and honesty, and make steady eye contact (Weiss & Tappen, 2014). For instance, if patients or their families request changes in hospital rooms or medications, they need to be assertive in explaining why that is possible or impossible.
Public health nurses play a significant role in ensuring that the population has improved health outcomes. They use delivery of care, education, and advocacy to ensure communities’ overall health and safety. Public health nurses’ main goal is disease prevention and prevention of health risks through education and evidence-based care (The University of St. Augustine for Health Sciences, 2020). Effective communication among the public health nurses as well as between them and patients, families, or other healthcare professionals is fundamental in the achievement of this goal. They need to be assertive when advocating for patients’ needs, educating the public about healthcare policies, and informing patients about their medications. Therefore, assertive communication skills are a core attribute needed for excellent public health nurses. This quality helps nurture a trusting relationship with the public, which helps the latter comply with implemented healthcare policies.
Chief Nursing Officer (CNO) in healthcare facilities coordinates all daily nursing operations. According to Ingwell-Spolan (2018), the CNOs role necessitates accountability in leading professional nurses to facilitate consistent quality patient outcomes. Additionally, excellent communication skills define a good CNO since the latter speak out about organizational issues and propose operational changes to improve nurses’ well-being and patients’ safety and quality of care. They ensure a productive relationship between nursing staff and the management, and patients. Therefore, they are assertive when communicating any operational changes to the staff, training nurses in patient care administration, and coordinating care activities. Their assertiveness when conveying information instills trust among the nurses and top management and facilitates compliance with operational procedures.
Application of Assertive Communication in Nursing Supervision
Assertive communication skills are also a fundamental requirement for the nursing supervisor. The latter manages and supervises a team of nurses, creating and maintaining high-level patient care. The leaders’ duties and responsibilities involve daily interaction with nurses, the senior management team, and patients’ family members. Therefore, they need to ensure that any information they convey to the mentioned parties is clear to minimize any possibility of misunderstanding (Weiss & Tappen, 2014). For instance, nurse supervisors assertively communicate hospital policies and procedures and nursing standards to the nurses to ensure their compliance. They also use the skill to train staff on they can quality of care and patient safety. Their assertiveness creates a trusting relationship with the nurses, leading to improved job satisfaction and staff engagement, enhancing safety and quality of patient care.
Personal Growth in Regard to Assertiveness in Communication
My assertive communication skills have improved since I started practicing as a nursing supervisor. The position’s duties and responsibilities involve interaction with nursing staff, patients, and other leaders in the healthcare facility. Initially, my communication was aggressive, which inhibited effective relations with other healthcare professionals, jeopardizing the quality of care and patient safety. Therefore, I resolved to train myself to be assertive in the information I conveyed to nurses and my seniors, which promoted trust and productive relationships.
Personal Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats to My Career Advancement
My strengths include education, work experience, good communication, and interpersonal skills, and self-managed learning skills. I have a Bachelor of Science in nursing, which has equipped me with adequate knowledge related to the field, allowing me to deliver services in different healthcare settings. In addition, my experience as a nursing supervisor is an important factor that can accelerate my career growth. Excellent communication and interpersonal skills allow me to convey information and express my thoughts effectively and ensure that I am an active team player in the provision of healthcare services. Further, I actively strive to learn essential skills and apply them in my practice without any supervision.
Difficulties in adapting to changes and inflexibility are weaknesses that inhibit my career advancement. Although changes are inevitable in every organization, I experience challenges when adjusting to restructuring operations or a new working environment. Equally, I prefer fixed working schedules which clearly define working hours. These factors prevent me from moving to an institution offering a more competitive position or apply for a job that demands high career flexibility. Opportunities in my career advancement include expanding the market job market in the healthcare industry, nursing shortage, and increasing at-risk population. These factors ensure the possibility of getting a promotion and job security. However, changes in government regulations regarding the healthcare industry are significant threats. Government agencies regularly revise requirements to remain healthcare practitioners, such as licenses, years of experience, and skills and competencies.
Traits That Make a Good Nurse Leader
Integrity, emotional intelligence, and effective communication skills are the most important attributes that define a good nurse leader. West (2019) indicates that integrity is an internal system of principles that guides the behavior of leaders, and it involves choices rather than obligations. Personal integrity allows nurse leaders to do what is right to ensure the well-being of healthcare staff and patients. Integrity is one of the important factors that determine a leader’s trustworthiness. Various core principles, such as honesty, kindness, compassion, respect, loyalty, and dependability guide and empower nurse leaders with integrity (West, 2019). This trait ensures that nurse leaders are accountable for their actions and promotes a healthy relationship with their peers, staff, and superiors.
Emotional intelligence is a necessary attribute for all healthcare providers due to stressful situations in their workplaces. Emotional intelligence involves understanding one’s emotions and those of others. According to Prezerakos (2018), emotionally intelligent leaders utilize, understand, and manage their feelings in a way beneficial to them and others. Nurse leaders utilize this attribute as a tool for achieving effective management in healthcare. They are responsible for the well-being of nurses and patients. Therefore, they train nurses and help them develop emotional intelligence to cope with stressors that occur during their daily activities effectively. Such nurse leaders assist staff in managing various challenges and other adverse influences that can lead to emotional exhaustion and ineffective team collaboration.
Nurse leaders interact with staff, patients and their families, peers, and superiors when executing their daily activities. They need to be effective communicators to guarantee productive relations with various healthcare stakeholders. Effective communication skills are a vital element in every level of nursing because they influence the quality of care. Nurse leaders with these skills establish an environment that promotes communication and assists their staff in developing the competencies to guarantee the quality of care (Jankelová & Joniaková, 2021). These skills may include written, verbal, and non-verbal communication, active listening, personal connections, and compassion. Effective communication skills promote collaboration among teams of healthcare providers.
Conclusion
Assertive communication skills are fundamental for good nurse leaders since they promote effective relationships with patients, families, and healthcare providers. Assertive communicators express their ideas, both positive and negative, and feelings about something or situation in an honest, open, and direct way. The important aspects of assertive communication are confidence, clear, and controlled expression of thoughts and ideas. These skills are applicable in every nursing role, ensuring improved quality of care and patient safety. Therefore, healthcare institutions should train their staff on how to adopt assertiveness in their communication.
References
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