The Nurse Manager operates within Decatur Memorial Hospital and Nursing Division mission, vision, strategic priorities and goals.  Utilizing a shared leadership philosophy, the Nurse Manager assumes 24-hour accountability for unit management and the quality of patient care on a designated unit(s).  The Nurse Manager creates and maintains a work environment conducive to effective communication, collaboration, teambuilding and nursing professionalism. They assure that care provided on the unit is appropriate to the age of the patients served and that staff are competent to provide safe, quality, evidence-based nursing care.  They maintain positive physician and interdepartmental relationships as well as positive employee morale.

Education:

BSN required; Master’s degree preferred.

Licensure/Certification/Registry:

Current Illinois RN licensure required.

Holds national specialty nursing certification in clinical area of nursing administration, or completes within 24 months of assuming role.

Experience:

At least three years experience in acute care nursing as a registered nurse with demonstrated progressive leadership/management skills.

Leadership:

1.  Personal and Professional Growth:

• Demonstrates responsibility for own personal and professional growth as reflected in ongoing education, projects, and annual professional development plan.
• Provides and receives formal peer-to-peer feedback among nurse leader colleagues
• Empowers self and staff to enhance patient-focused nursing care and quality patient outcomes as reflected in patient satisfaction and quality improvement efforts.
• Fosters an environment which focuses on values, professionalism and accountability, where staff and management see each other as partners in the decision making process.
• Serves as a professional nurse role model and works to encourage and develop future nursing leaders as a function of succession planning.

2.  Clinical Knowledge:

• Maintains an understanding of the unit’s primary patient populations and their care needs/requirements.
• Keeps up-to-date on new clinical treatments/services being developed/implemented for primary patient populations.
• Maintains a sound knowledge base of current trends and developments in nursing practice in order to lead unit-based changes to improve patient care delivery.

3. Collaborative Practice:

• Demonstrates ability and willingness to collaborate with peers and staff.
• Shows commitment to the development of inter-departmental/intraprofessional collaboration for improvement of patient care, unit efficiency and effectiveness.
• Develops working relationships with the medical staff that encourage problem solving on all levels.

 4.  Community Involvement:

• Involves self with professional organizations and community health-related services and agencies.

Human Resource:

• Is accountable for recruitment, interviewing, selection and retention of unit-based staff.
• Is accountable for scheduling of personnel to assure quality patient care within budget requirements.
• Is accountable for staff performance monitoring/feedback/appraisal and initiating corrective/disciplinary action as necessary, in accordance with hospital policies.
• Holds regular staff meetings in order to facilitate communication of organizational imperatives/changes as well as unit issues.
• Encourages staff to identify personal and professional growth needs and facilitates appropriate opportunities for that growth.
• Maintains a climate which provides ongoing appreciation and recognition of achievements.
• Supports appropriate risk-taking efforts by staff and peers.
• Assists in the development of and supports divisional programs/initiatives that promote recruitment/retention and satisfaction of staff members.

Planning:

• Engages staff in developing annual unit goals and individual goals consistent with DMH Strategic Priorities, the MH Nursing Strategic Plan.
• Develops mechanisms with staff to fulfill unit goals and objectives.
• Reviews goals and plans of action with staff on a regular basis.

Performance and Outcomes Improvement:

• Identifies quality improvement opportunities and uses appropriate QI tools/techniques to evaluate potential solutions.
• Leads intra-and inter-departmental problem solving to ensure resolution of clinical issues and adoption of “best practices.”
• Collaborates with staff in evaluating standards of care in relation to a particular patient population. Measures and validates that identified outcomes are met.
• Assures unit performance measurement data is gathered, monitored and reported and facilitates its use in improving quality and/or efficiency.

Research:

• Creates an environment that promotes analytical thinking in the resolution of identified clinical problems and the adoption of evidence-based nursing practices.
• Provides opportunities and resources to encourage staff to participate in nursing research/scholarship activities.  
• Fosters collaborative research relationships with other healthcare institutions and healthcare providers.

Performs other related work as required or requested.

•  The intent of this job description is to provide a representative summary of the major duties and responsibilities performed by incumbents of this job.  Incumbents may be requested to perform tasks other than those specifically presented in this description.