Towards Excellence in Nursing

In nursing, the reflective practice allows to involve analysis of experience and actions of nurses as a whole rather than separating their analysis based on non-acceptable and acceptable feelings. This assists the nurses to develop effective engagement with their work by identifying the strengths and weakness to be resolved which in turn increases their interest at work leading to offer improved quality of support to the patients. In this reflective account, my experience regarding placement through the University is to be critically discussed to determine personal development and performance as well as the expectations to be further met in the profession.

In my first semester, the introduction regarding employability was at first given. The book by Rook (2013) mentioned that employability is the attributes present in the person which make them able to secure and manage employees. This led me to understand that certain skills are to be present in me based on which I could be a potential candidate to gain employment. The key employability skill informed is collaboration, written communication, oral communication, adaptability, resource management, organisation skills, technology use and others (Suleman, 2016). The collaboration is important skill for employability as it helps employees to work together by sharing ideas through interaction along with helps to negotiate and cooperate to manage problems at work (Mungai and Sirmah, 2019). This information led me to understand that effective collaboration skills would ensure me smooth working ability in future placement. This is because through discussion and negotiation with other employees while working collaboratively I can reach decision regarding the way to execute my work and overcome problems to ensure its smooth execution. The organisation skills are important in employability to make effective planning of resources and ideas at work to accomplish it successfully (Kendall and Bryar, 2017). I do have no concept regarding what extent I am efficient in this skill.

The written and oral communication is important employability skills as it helps employee to develop proper rapport and friendly relationship with the colleagues (Jung and Bae, 2019). I am quite confident regarding my communication skill as I have been provided feedback by the peers that I have effective proper to interact with all. This is evident as many of my friends have reported during teamwork they were able to develop effective relationship with me as I have been very communicative about all actions to be discussed to take collaborative decision. The adaptability skills are required in employability as it helps employees to continuously change as per the changing requirements at the job (Alexander et al. 2017). The university has provided feedback that I lack effective ability to adapt to circumstances and changes. This is evident as they have often found me to face complication and report against changes done suddenly during the semester indicating I was unable to cope with changes. This lack of employability skill is going to affect me in future to face hindrances during change management done in future placement making me show problematic work efficiency.

During the semester, it was mentioned that self-awareness skill is the ability to judge own behaviour and performance so that the person can respond according to improve the strength and resolve weakness identified for acting effectively in different social situations (White and Grayson, 2019). The self-awareness skill is important in employability as it boosts others to control their feelings and behaviour to act accordingly (Rasheed et al. 2019). Thus, it led me to understand that being self-aware about own behaviour and feelings would help me in employment to avoid engaging in unusual conflict as I can manage my emotions and actions based on situation to show proper professional decorum. This is going to impact me in future to be a responsible employee and avoid discrimination or involve in unnecessary conflict due to personal emotions at work ensuring to show proper professionalism. In the semester, information regarding skills for success in personal development and employability is provided. The book by Cottrell (2015) was used where it is mentioned that before placement interview students are required to rehearse the probable skills and information they wish to mention to the employers to show confidence during the interview. This is because often students are found to be confused out of fear regarding their performance in the job interview to act properly making them show inappropriate skills and deliver hindered knowledge in the process. It makes the interviewer feel disengaged to continue the interview leading the students unable to get placement (Lynes, 2019). The learning of the aspect from the book led me to understand that I have to rehearse before personal and face-to-face interview for any placement to develop confidence towards being employed. This learning helped me during the interview for placement to show my confidence skill in speaking assisting me to positively influence the interviewers in considering me to be a potential candidate.

The study by Cottrell (2015) informed that before job placement interview, the students are to develop effective knowledge regarding the activities and details of the placement. This is because it makes the students develop proper knowledge regarding their placement area and share effective information during the interview to showcase they are familiar to the probable work environment in the placement. As criticised by Joung et al. (2017), during interview in the placement if the employers understand that the students do not know regarding their organisation it makes them develop lack of interest in recruiting the candidate. This is because the employers feel that the candidate is not interested in their organisation due to which the person did not try to know their way of working and specifications. The fact led me to understand that proper effective professional development and employability I have to know details regarding my placement to ensure I can show I already knew in which work environment I have to act.

After the placement in the Age UK under my University, I was entrusted to provide care to the adult service users in the organisation. This process was asked to be accomplished by working as a team with the nursing and health professionals as well as patients and their family. During the initial stage of teamwork in the organisation, I tried to develop cooperation with the team members by familiarising with the role each has to play through interaction and communicating actions which are already executed in caring for specific services users allocated to me to be cared. According to Ghaferi and Dimick (2016), effective communication and interaction are required between team members to inform each other's role and share expert ideas regarding the way to resolve any complications faced in delivering care. This is because it would avoid creating confusion between team members about each other's responsibilities as well as neglect developing error at work or duplication of services. During the semester, I already identified that I have effective communication skills and it has impacted me to feel confidence regarding development of rapport and effective work relationship with others.

I received feedback from one of my mentor in the placement that I have proper decision-making and planning skill for team working but lacked efficiency to resolve conflict raised during teamwork which is hindering collaborative working. This is evident as many of my team members have reported that I fail to reach peaceful resolution regarding dispute in ideas raised at work making them feel disengaged to work with me and develop conflict regarding my way of working. As commented by Real et al. (2017), in teamwork various ideas regarding the way to execute a single activity is provided and team members are required to reach a peaceful resolution to determine which of the key idea is to be accepted at work. This is because it would lead to conflict resolution which is essentially required for proper teamwork. As criticised by Barton et al. (2018), lack of conflict resolution in teamwork makes team members face hindrance to reach a specific decision for working collaboratively. This, in turn, affects the team members fail to deliver quality services to patients while working collaboratively. This information led me to understand that in future while working as a team member I have to develop effective knowledge regarding conflict resolution skills to act collaboratively with success.

In the placement, while caring for the adults in AgeUK, I have to engage in inter-professional working. This is because many of the elderly individuals are seen to suffering from varied health disorder. In order to execute it, I developed intention to maintain autonomy and coordination of care with each professional. This is because in inter-professional working autonomy provides the freedom to each of the professionals to use their expertise in caring for the patient and coordination in care ensures each of the professionals acts collaboratively to ensure better health of the patients (Wang et al. 2016). As argued by Rodríguez et al. (2019), lack of coordination in inter-professional working leads the professionals to develop duplication and error in care. This is because without collaboration professionals are unaware regarding the way their care may interfere with other care suggested for the patient by the health professional. This information and current acting is going to impact me in future to avoid duplication of care and interference in work between health professionals ensuring successful inter-professional working to be established.

The inter-professional working requires different professionals to be accountable for their roles and develop mutual trust among one another. This is because it would avoid raising conflict and unnecessary error in care for the patients (Carpenter and Dickinson, 2016). This aspect is already understood by me and ensured each of the professional show proper accountability along with me regarding their roles. The feedback received from the placement is that I have effective ability to develop proper rapport and trust with one another in the inter-professional working as I have shown mutual respect towards them. As argued by Reeves et al. (2017), lack of proper respect to the professionals in inter-professional working leads to create conflict and lack of collaboration. This is because the professional feel lack of value while working with one another making them show mutual engagement to deliver care.

The reflection led me to understand that to achieve my long-term career goal of working as a successful nurse I require further developing my adaptability skills so that I can use it to show effective adaptation to any changes occurring in the medical field. The education regarding employability in first semester led to understand that communication, collaboration, resource management and organisation are key skills for attaining proper employability. I also understood for my personal account that I already have effective decision-making skills and communication skills but lack conflict resolution skills which are required to be upgraded for smoothing working. Moreover, the reflection led me to understand that to accomplish my long-term career goal of acting as a nurse I need to improve my skills of showing mutual respect and trust to one other while working in inter-professional team.

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References

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