Collaboration and Leadership Reflection

Hello, my name is [Your Name], and in this reflection, I will analyze an interprofessional collaboration experience I had during my work as a nurse. Interprofessional collaboration is critical in modern healthcare. Diversity allows healthcare teams to solve multifaceted problems that exist when addressing the needs of their patients: Collaboration and Leadership Reflection.

This reflection will provide positive and negative aspects of collaboration encountered as well as the possible effects of poor collaboration concerning resource allocation and the proposed techniques from literature for enhancing collaboration and leadership. To provide working and realistic decisions, my discussion is backed by a literature review to elicit scholarly sources.

Reflection on Interdisciplinary Collaboration Experience

One of the most impactful interprofessional collaborations I participated in involved a project to reduce hospital-acquired infections (HAIs) in a surgical unit. Our team is comprised of nurses, physicians, infection control department staff, and administrative staff. The change plan sought to establish and practice standard practices to reduce new infection rates after operation.

 Aspects of the Collaboration Leading to Success
The project outcomes showed a 30% reduction in HAIs rate after six months of implementing a detailed project plan. The main factors that contributed to this achievement were communication and the resultant respect for co-workers. The nurses brought in their practical experience and the measures to be taken at the bedside, the infection control team provided best practice recommendations, and the physicians checked that the measures, where applicable, fit into the patients’ care maps.

It is true that with partnership, everyone feels that they have a role to play, and this helps drive the entire project. According to Braun et al. (2020), teamwork across the profession is vital for healthcare organizations to respond to emerging healthcare problems.

Aspects of the Collaboration that Could have been Improved

One challenge that was faced was an imbalanced contribution. While some members of the team claimed to be involved, others—particularly the administrative ones—were not as involved. Because of their limited involvement in the process, they were also observed to have caused a lot of delays in decision-making and meeting process bottlenecks. Accordingly, the need for structured leadership to make all individuals function at the same level of intensity becomes apparent.

Impact of Poor Collaboration on Resource Management

Poor collaboration can have significant repercussions for both human and financial resource management. During this project, insufficient communication and role clarity led to duplicated efforts. For instance, nurses and infection control specialists conducted separate hand hygiene compliance audits, unaware that their work overlapped. This duplication not only wasted valuable staff time but also created confusion when compiling the final data.

It had a significant financial impact as well. The project’s duration was impacted by noncompliance with the standards, which resulted in expensive staff and material training. Haque (2023) noted a lack of collaboration may lead to increased operational costs due to inefficiencies and duplicated work. In this case, these costs would have been avoided if there had been proper planning and coordination in the project.

Additionally, the lack of engagement from some team members placed an undue burden on others, leading to staff burnout. First, burnout not only impacts personal satisfaction but also represents a valuable indicator of the adverse effects on team performance, which already suffers from additional resource waste. According to De Hert (2020), resource utilization for an organization’s healthcare delivery is vital for sustainability, and collaboration is part of the utilization process.

Best-Practice

Leadership Strategies

Leadership plays a pivotal role in fostering effective interprofessional collaboration. Transformational leadership is one strategy that could have significantly improved our team’s performance. Optimistic bureaucratic leaders aim to transform by providing the cause, direction, and tenacity in order to encourage creativity. As De Hert (2020), states, the transformational leadership technique is useful where there is a diverse team and where the work environment requires embracing intricate issues.

For instance, our project leader could have organized regular team meetings to address concerns, celebrate milestones, and reinforce the importance of our shared goals. These meetings would have afforded a chance to define roles and facilitate conflict resolution and required morale boosts among teams. Confirmation of individual effort, for instance, would have also helped to increase engagement and accountability among the participants.

Another best-practice leadership strategy is situational leadership. This approach involves adapting one’s leadership style to meet the team’s needs. Perhaps when we were initiating our project, the use of an autocratic leadership style was most appropriate as the team needed to be guided as to their responsibilities.

So, when the team integrates itself, the leader should shift to a more guidance-oriented style of work where the members take responsibility for their assignments. Khan et al. (2024) remind us that the possibility of schedule adjustments is critical to organizing work in constantly evolving teams and ensuring their sustainable effectiveness.

Collaboration Strategies

Effective collaboration requires structured communication and inclusive decision-making. One strategy that could have enhanced our team’s performance is the SBAR framework (Situation, Background, Assessment, Recommendation). SBAR is a standardized communication tool that ensures clear and concise information exchange, reducing the risk of misunderstandings. Khan et al. (2024) highlight that SBAR improves efficiency and aligns team members toward shared goals.

For example, using SBAR during our team meetings could have streamlined discussions and ensured that everyone was on the same page. Each team member could have presented updates using the SBAR format, making it easier to identify challenges and develop solutions collaboratively. Another effective strategy is shared governance. Decision-making structures that allow different members of a team to be involved in one or the other of the decision-making process entail shared governance, which enhances organizational obligation and dedication.

McKnight & Moore (2022) point out that a sense of ownership is a key reason why shared governance is critical in sustaining teams’ engagement. In our project, having nurses and/or the administrative staff participate in the protocol development could have helped establish usable protocols and, at the same time, be efficient.

Team-building exercises are also valuable tools for improving collaboration. Teamwork involves trust and should be nurtured through the organization’s incorporation of occasional team-building activities that include meetings and workshops. Such exercises may be a good beginning in which, via team building, a team may develop better interpersonal relations, thus reducing conflict and improving collaboration. McKnight & Moore, (2022) pointed out that trust will result in enabling proper interaction and decent treatment with co-workers.

Conclusion and Recommendations

Reflecting on this experience has provided valuable insights into the importance of interprofessional collaboration and leadership in healthcare. While our project successfully reduced infection rates, there were significant opportunities for improvement in both collaboration and resource management. To enhance future projects, I recommend the following:

Implement Transformational Leadership

Cohesion involves the need for the leader to urge people to work towards a common goal and appreciate individual inputs in the team. A great deal of emphasis should be placed on communication and motivation on the team, and this can be achieved through brief checks that the team leaders make on their subordinates as well as rewarding the teams for a job well done.

Adopt Structured Communication Tools

Tools such as SBAR can also guarantee that transferred information is understood and well-passed, allowing the eradication of misunderstandings and enhancing efficiency.

Promote Shared Governance

Implicit decision-making powers workers to be involved in decision-making practices to increase accountability since the solutions reached are adaptable.

Invest in Team-Building Activities

Strengthening relationships through workshops and social events can improve trust and collaboration, creating a more cohesive team environment. Notably, through these strategies, healthcare teams can improve the processes of working more effectively towards realizing team goals and using resources in order to produce more positive patient outcomes. All the lessons that have been covered in this course have helped me develop my view on inter-professional collaboration, and I am going to continue practicing in accordance with those lessons in the future.

Thank you for taking the time to watch my reflection. I hope these insights inspire meaningful changes in your collaborative practices.

References

Braun, B. I., Chitavi, S. O., Suzuki, H., Soyemi, C. A., & Puig-Asensio, M. (2020). Culture of Safety: Impact on Improvement in Infection Prevention Process and Outcomes. Current Infectious Disease Reports, 22(12). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11908-020-00741-y

De Hert, S. (2020). Burnout in Healthcare workers: Prevalence, Impact and Preventative Strategies. Local and Regional Anesthesia, 13(13), 171–183. https://doi.org/10.2147/lra.s240564

Haque, S. (2023, August 30). THE IMPACT OF REMOTE WORK ON HR PRACTICES: NAVIGATING CHALLENGES, EMBRACING OPPORTUNITIES. ResearchGate; Open Access Publishing Group. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/373542790_THE_IMPACT_OF_REMOTE_WORK_ON_HR_PRACTICES_NAVIGATING_CHALLENGES_EMBRACING_OPPORTUNITIES

Khan, D., Waqar, F., Azim, N., Khan, O., & Sohail, A. (2024). Reduction of Hospital-Acquired Infections Through a Nursing Education Program: A Quality Improvement Project on the Sensitization of Nursing Staff Toward Infection Control in Neonates. Cureus, 89(57). https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.62656

McKnight, H., & Moore, S. M. (2022). Nursing shared governance. PubMed; StatPearls Publishing. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK549862/

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For this assessment, you will create a 5-10 minute video reflection that addresses either an interprofessional collaboration you experienced or a collaboration case study scenario that you imagine you experienced.

Introduction
Interprofessional collaboration is a critical aspect of a nurse’s work. Through interprofessional collaboration, practitioners and patients share information and consider each other’s perspectives to better understand and address the many factors that contribute to health and well-being (Sullivan et al., 2015). Essentially, by collaborating, health care practitioners and patients can have better health outcomes. Nurses, who are often at the frontlines of interacting with various groups and records, are full partners in this approach to health care.

Reflection is a key part of building interprofessional competence, as it allows you to look critically at experiences and actions through specific lenses. From the standpoint of interprofessional collaboration, reflection can help you consider potential reasons for and causes of people’s actions and behaviors (Saunders et al., 2016). It also can provide opportunities to examine the roles team members adopted in a given situation as well as how the team could have worked more effectively.

As you begin to prepare this assessment you are encouraged to complete the What is Reflective Practice? activity. The activity consists of five questions that will allow you the opportunity to practice self-reflection. The information gained from completing this formative will help with your success on the Collaboration and Leadership Reflection Video assessment. Completing formatives is also a way to demonstrate course engagement

Note: The Example Kaltura Reflection demonstrates how to cite sources appropriately in an oral presentation/video. Your assessment will reflect on either a professional collaboration you experienced or a collaboration case study scenario that you imagine you experienced

References

• Saunders, R., Singer, R., Dugmore, H., Seaman, K., & Lake, F. (2016). Nursing students’ reflections on an interprofessional placement in ambulatory care. Reflective Practice, 17(4), 393–402.
• Sullivan, M., Kiovsky, R., Mason, D., Hill, C., Duke, C. (2015). Interprofessional collaboration and education. American Journal of Nursing, 115(3), 47–54.

Demonstration of Proficiency

• Competency 1: Explain strategies for managing human and financial resources to promote organizational health.
  • Identify how poor collaboration can result in inefficient management of human and financial resources supported by evidence from the literature.
• Competency 2: Explain how interdisciplinary collaboration can be used to achieve desired patient and systems outcomes.
  • Reflect on an interdisciplinary collaboration experience noting ways in which it was successful and unsuccessful in achieving desired outcomes.
  • Identify best-practice interdisciplinary collaboration strategies to help a team to achieve its goals and work more effectively together.
• Competency 4: Explain how change management theories and leadership strategies can enable interdisciplinary teams to achieve specific organizational goals.
  • Identify best-practice leadership strategies from the literature, which would improve an interdisciplinary team’s ability to achieve its goals.
• Competency 5: Apply professional, scholarly, evidence-based communication strategies to impact patient, interdisciplinary team, and systems outcomes.
  • Communicate via video with clear sound and light.
  • The full reference list is from relevant and evidence-based (published within 5 years) sources, exhibiting nearly flawless adherence to APA format.

Professional Context
This assessment will help you to become a reflective practitioner. By considering your own successes and shortcomings in interprofessional collaboration, you will increase awareness of your problem-solving abilities. You will create a Kaltura video of your reflections, including a discussion of best practices for interprofessional collaboration and leadership strategies, supported by references to the literature.

You may choose to reflect on a collaborative interprofessional project you worked on in your current or former place of practice.

Scenario
As part of an initiative to build effective collaboration at a site where you work as a nurse, you have been asked to:

• Reflect on an interprofessional collaborative project.
• Examine what happened during the collaboration.
• Identify positive aspects and areas for improvement.
• Research best practice for interprofessional collaboration.
• Use lessons learned from your research and experience to create a video reflection (5-10 minutes) that share suggestions for improving interprofessional collaboration that can be shared with leadership and colleagues.
  

  Collaboration and Leadership Reflection

Be sure that your assessment addresses the following criteria. Please study the scoring guide carefully so you will know what is needed for a distinguished score:

• Reflect on an interdisciplinary collaboration experience, noting ways in which it was successful and unsuccessful in achieving desired outcomes.
  • Explain aspects of the collaboration that helped the team make progress toward relevant goals or outcomes.
  • Explain aspects of the collaboration that could have been improved.
• Identify how poor collaboration can result in inefficient management of human and financial resources, citing supporting evidence from the literature.
  • Discuss the ways in which the interdisciplinary team did not collaborate effectively.
  • Discuss the negative implications for the human and financial resources of the interdisciplinary team and the organization as a whole.
  • Cite the literature for support.
• Identify best-practice leadership strategies from the literature that would improve an interdisciplinary team’s ability to achieve its goals, citing at least one author from the literature.
  • Identify at least one leadership best practice or strategy that you believe would improve the team’s ability to achieve their goals.
  • Identify the strategy and its source or author and provide a brief rationale for your choice of strategy.
  • Cite the literature for support.
  • Identify best-practice interdisciplinary collaboration strategies to help a team achieve its goals and work together, citing the work of at least one author.
  • Identify at least one best practice or strategy for interdisciplinary collaboration to help the team achieve its goals and work more effectively together.
  • Identify the strategy, its source, and reasons why you think it will be effective.
• Communicate in a professional manner, is easily audible, and uses proper grammar. Format reference list in current APA style.
  • Submit an APA-formatted reference list for any sources that you cited specifically in your video or used to inform your presentation.
  • The Example Kaltura Reflection will show you how to cite scholarly sources in the context of an oral presentation.