An Exercise in Transformational Leadership Through the Development of a Community of Practice

Paper

Thursday, 20 July 2006

This presentation is part of : Nursing Leadership and Management Initiatives

Iain Graham, RN, RMN, PhD, MEd, MSc, BSc, Institute of Health and Community Studies, Bournemouth University, Bournemouth, Dorset, England

Learning Objective #1: Describe the theory of transformational leadership as realized through the creating of a community of practice.
Learning Objective #2: Explore the rubric of a community of practice and how it helps achieve organizational goals and development.

This paper reports on a narrative study, conducted between September 2003 and December 2004, on the impact of transformational leadership theory of senior executive level nurses during the creating of a Nursing strategy. The purpose of the study was to reflect and evaluate how these nurses created such a strategy for their hospital through the evolution of their group as a community of practice. The group consisted of six senior nurse leaders and the Nurse Executive and her deputy. The method used to collect findings was questionnaire and focus-group interview. The findings reveal how group dynamics and leadership characteristics converged in order to create the strategy. They also denote the key actions individuals within a community of practice of this nature should take in order to implement strategy. A strong leadership – fellowship dynamic is exposed and this process of guiding change and development, whilst implementing a strategy, seems crucial if success is to be realized.

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