Rozina Aziz Since nurse managers are in charge of their colleagues, they must exude confidence and authority. If you’ve been promoted from the inside, you must keep your professional distance from the team to make impartial (and often difficult) judgments.
If you’re interested in working your way up to the nurse manager position, we’ve laid down all the steps you need to take to get there.
What is A Nurse Manager?
A nurse manager is a person in a medical setting who can make daily decisions that affect how things run. Those individuals can advocate for better patient care by suggesting ways to enhance routine hospital or healthcare facility operations.
Nurse Managers are a specialist field that requires extensive training, licensing, and work experience before entering the field. Managers in the nursing profession usually begin their careers as registered nurses or licensed practical nurses working in a medical facility.
What are the Responsibilities of a Nurse Manager?
Nurse Managers are responsible for a wide variety of tasks. Nurse managers oversee healthcare operations while simultaneously providing direct patient care.
When nurse managers are responsible for administrative and clinical duties, they have a unique position to shape the norms and practices of healthcare facilities.
A nurse manager’s duties may include the following:
- They are making shift schedules for nurses and other department employees.
- They monitor nurses while providing care, resolving problems with other patients, talking to their loved ones, and carrying out other duties as assigned.
- Performing all the tasks associated with providing full-service nursing care to a patient at the bedside.
- It is finding and fixing problems that have arisen during regular clinic operations.
- They assist other departments in guaranteeing top-notch service from patient admission through discharge.
- Finding and educating future nurses.
- Making all operations within the healthcare system more productive.
- Putting together a system to store and retrieve facility data efficiently.
- Most of a nurse manager’s day is spent carrying out these and related duties.
One of the highest-ranking positions in the nursing profession, nurse managers strive to enhance the quality of care for all patients at their facility. They can effectively advocate for the best possible patient care because of the abovementioned duties.
What is a Nurse Manager’s Work environment?
A nurse manager typically works in a healthcare setting such as a hospital, clinic, nursing home, or other long-term care facilities. Nurse Managers in hospitals are in charge of the nurses working on a certain wing or unit.
These are some of the benefits that a nursing management position offers:
- Prolonged periods of standing or walking
- At a workstation, typing away on a computer
- Communication by telephone, computer, and pager
- Donning safety gear such gloves, masks, shoes with closed toes, and surgical caps
- Interacting with clients, nurses, and other medical staff
What abilities do Nurse Managers need?
These skills are necessary for a nurse manager:
Emotional intelligence
Nurse Managers need to be able to read nonverbal signs from patients and coworkers to respond appropriately. They can evaluate the intentions of others and react suitably because of their high level of emotional intelligence.
Leadership
Possessing this competence entails the capacity to inspire and direct subordinate nurses. Managers of nursing staff are expected to inspire their personnel to greater heights of performance. The key to being a good nurse manager is being a strong leader.
Efficiency in the use of time
Managers of nursing facilities must be adept at prioritizing their tasks to meet deadlines. Patient encounters and paperwork must be completed by a certain time each day. In a 24-hour hospital, a nurse manager’s time-management abilities are especially useful when planning shifts for other nurses.
Organization
The capacity of a nurse manager to organize patient records and other medical materials is referred to as this talent. In times of crisis, they must have quick access to relevant data. Physical and digital structures could be used for the same organizational purpose.
How to become a nurse manager?
If you want to advance to nurse manager, you’ll need time and money. Having a Master of Science in Nursing (MSN) is preferred by most employers in this field. However, a Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) may be sufficient for employment in some healthcare facilities.
If you’re interested in a rewarding nursing profession, take these first three actions.
Step 1- get your nursing license.
Obtaining one’s RN license is a prerequisite to working as a nurse manager (RN). Here are the three options available to you. Earning your ADN, BSN, or ABSN are all viable options for nursing professionals.
A BSN is a minimum requirement for many entry-level nursing positions. Since most healthcare employers prefer MSN degrees for nurse managers, it is in your best interest to pursue one as soon as feasible. You can only apply to an MSN program once you’ve finished it.
Get Ypur Master’s in Nursing
There are several positive outcomes for those who earn a BSN. Skills like critical thinking and leadership will be taught in addition to the more commonplace ones typically covered in an ADN degree. A Master of Science in Nursing degree cannot be earned without one (MSN).
An RN-to-BSN program allows you to continue working as an RN while you earn your BSN degree. Hold a Bachelor of Science in Nursing already? While working, you can complete your MSN in a shortened time frame. The BSN-MSN program is a fantastic method to further your nursing career without devoting excessive time to your education.
Pass the NCLEX-RN Exam
A nurse’s final requirement for licensure is to pass the NCLEX-RN exam. Taking the NCLEX exam is mandatory for all aspiring registered nurses because it demonstrates their level of competency in the profession. If you fail the first time around, you can retake the NCLEX-RN.
Stage 2: Gain Work Experience
After obtaining your RN license, you should seek employment in a healthcare setting where you may develop your managerial acumen and broaden your clinical expertise. Working as an emergency room or trauma center nurse can be a great way to hone your critical thinking and communication skills in a busy environment.
Competencies And Experiences That Are Useful
Nurse managers need to be able to multitask. This nursing position involves dealing with financial management, shift allocation for nurses and addressing patient concerns.
Additional useful abilities include:
- Expertise in business management that aids in implementing management techniques for enhanced operation
- Interpersonal skills for interacting with patients, nurses, and other members of the healthcare team
- Capacity for creative problem-solving in the context of general operations and individual patient care
A Nurse Manager Is Your New Speciality
If you have the proper training and experience, transitioning from an RN in another nursing specialty to a nurse manager is possible.
Say you’re an emergency room nurse ready to leave direct patient care behind. It’s a logical next step to become a nurse manager in an emergency room after working in another medical setting. You should get a master’s in nursing (MSN) first if you don’t already have one.
Step 3: Become Certified
As a nurse manager, you may pursue several different specialist qualifications. Exams for the following certifications are available through the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC):
Executive Nurse
You must be a registered nurse in good standing, hold a bachelor’s degree in nursing or higher, and have worked in a managerial or academic capacity for at least two years to qualify for this post. If you don’t have an MSN, you also need 30 CEUs in nursing administration.
Executive Nurse (Advanced)
In addition to having at least two years of experience in a managerial capacity as a nurse, you’ll need a bachelor’s degree in nursing. An Associate’s Degree in Nursing and 5 years of experience in the field, or a Bachelor’s Degree in a field other than nursing and 3 years of work as a nurse manager can both qualify you for this role.
What are closely related fields to Nurse managers?
Nurse Managers have knowledge and abilities that are transferable to other professions. Here are a few more careers to think about:
- General administration and control of physical assets
- Directors of Human Resources
- Insurers and their underwriters
- Experts in patient medical histories and health data
- Managers of social and community services
How much does a nurse manager make?
While regional variations exist, the BLS reports that the median annual pay for medical and health services managers in the United States is $101,340 as of May 2021. In terms of income, the bottom 10% made less than $60,780, while the top 10% made more than $205,620. One must keep in mind that this is context-dependent.
The average wage for medical and surgical hospitals is $119,450, while the average annual salary in home healthcare services is slightly lower at $83,550.
While some healthcare organizations pay Nurse Managers hourly, others offer them a set annual wage. Hourly workers are eligible for overtime pay, whereas salaried workers would have to explore the possibility with the hiring committee. Since most nurse managers put in more than 40 hours a week, this is often a matter of life and death.
What are the Job Prospects for a Nurse Manager?
There is a present need for more qualified Nurse Managers. With the aging of the baby boomer population comes a greater need for additional long-term nursing care facilities, which means this figure will continue to rise. Due to the extensive clinical training and experience needed for the position, Nurse Managers tend to be older.
Since the demand for nurses is predicted to increase, the demand for nurse managers will also rise. The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that health care administration jobs will grow by 28% over the next decade.
About 136,200 new managerial positions will open up. The demand for nurse managers is expected to rise more quickly in outpatient care settings than in inpatient hospital units, which is good news for anyone considering entering the field.
FAQ’s
What are your duties as a nurse manager?
Managers of nursing units are accountable for a wide range of duties, including but not limited to the following:
- Managing human and financial resources.
- Ensuring patient and staff satisfaction.
- Keeping the unit safe for nurses, patients, and visitors.
- Keeping care standards and quality high.
- Ensuring that the unit’s goals are aligned with the hospital’s overarching strategic objectives.
Is nurse manager a good career?
There is an equal amount of upside and downside to nursing managers having additional responsibility than regular shift nurses. You don’t need a new job or even a different department at the hospital to satisfy your need for variety in your professional life. Taking on the role of nurse manager will introduce you to interesting new aspects of nursing.
Which nurse manager are you referring to?
The Director of Nursing oversees Nurse Managers (or possibly the Chief Nursing Officer, depending on the organization’s size). While bedside nurses might be accountable for themselves and one or two CNAs, a nurse manager might be responsible for ten or more registered nurses.
Is there a difference between a nurse and a doctor?
Because of their superior training, credentials, and experience, doctors are paid more than nurses. As much as it may seem to indulge inequality, that is how the world has always functioned and always will.
Are nurse managers in demand?
The BLS classifies nurse managers as part of the medical and health services sector, which is expected to increase by 28% from 2021 to 2031, much faster than the 8% anticipated growth for all occupations.
What hours do nurse managers work?
Shift lengths for nurse managers often fall between 8 and 10 hours. As the leader of a group of nurses, a nurse manager may need to be available 24/7 in an emergency. Most nurse managers put in hours that exceed 40 per week.
