Becker's Hospital Review

33 CMO / CARE DELIVERY Advocate redesigns the nurse manager role By Paige Twenter A dvocate Health recently reimagined the role of nurse managers, said Jane Dus, DNP, RN, senior vice president and chief nursing officer of the system's Midwest region. Nurse managers are oen balancing large spans of control, she said, and as nurse managers lead staff, they simultaneously manage patients, throughput, quality, budgets and everyday issues. Advocate employs about 44,000 nurses and Dr. Dus leads 22,000 of them. Over the last 18 months, Advocate asked its nurse managers, What do you do that you shouldn't be doing? What do you like to do? What's taking up your time? "We know that they are our future leaders, so we stepped back and took time" to examine their roles, Dr. Dus told Becker's. e questions revealed six untapped areas to help frontline leaders. ese included defining scope and span of control, such as how many people report to them; managing pace of change; and minimizing the burden of onboarding. e fourth focus was elevating nurses to practice at the top of their licenses, which involved removing tasks they shouldn't be doing, such as filling out repair skips or tracking down equipment, Dr. Dus said. e final two areas of improvement were reviewing auditing processes and strengthening the partnership between nurses and the support department. "e things that I'm most proud of is that we've aligned on standard scopes now that all our managers — assistant managers, managers, directors — have the same job descriptions, the same scopes, we're all doing the same job," Dr. Dus said. From these discoveries, the system created a manager relief program, which is a float pool for nurses to "stretch" into a manager role for a few weeks or months to stabilize a unit. Before, when a nurse manager le, another nurse manager of one unit would typically be assigned a second unit. Now, nurse managers can continue to focus on their own unit while a float nurse manager helps out until a permanent nurse manager is hired. "at has been very successful," Dr. Dus said. "ey do such a good job, but it's a really unique role, having these managers float around and fill in these open positions. It really just helps support our frontline managers." Since discovering these opportunities and acting on them, Advocate has seen a decline in nurse manager turnover and a stabilization in staffing levels. To continue to support its workforce, Advocate is piloting several AI models, including an ambient nurse listening pilot. n Workplace gender parity still 50 years away, report says By Kelly Gooch W hile women have made workplace gains over the last 10 years, they still face significant challenges in their roles and careers. This is the primary finding from the "Women in the Workplace" report, published Sept. 17 by LeanIn.Org and McKinsey & Co. For the report, analysts collected information from 281 companies across the U.S. and Canada, surveyed more than 15,000 employees from 27 companies, and interviewed 27 women and non-binary individuals, including women of color, LGBTQ+ women and women with disabilities. Companies from the private, public and social sectors submitted data for the report, including 26 companies grouped under "healthcare systems and services." Women's representation has increased across the pipeline over the past 10 years, according to the report. Women today make up 29% of C-suite positions, 29% of senior vice president positions and 34% of vice president positions, compared to 17%, 23% and 27% in 2015, respectively. The authors attributed progress for women in senior leadership primarily to a reduction in line roles (positions with profit- and-loss responsibility and/or a focus on core operations). But women continue to experience more competence- based microaggressions than their male counterparts, according to the report. Thirty-eight percent of working women reported having their judgment questioned in their area of expertise. Twenty-six percent of men said the same. Additionally, 39% of women reported being interrupted or spoken over more than others. Twenty percent of men said the same. And 18% of women said they had been mistaken for someone at a much lower level than they are, compared to 10% of men. "Men and women are less likely to be interrupted or spoken over than they were five years ago — a sign that increased awareness around an issue can lead to cultural change," the report authors wrote. "However, women remain twice as likely as men to experience this." The report also found that women today are just as likely to experience "othering" microaggressions as they were five years ago, particularly women of color, LGBTQ+ women and women with disabilities. Overall, the report authors estimate that at the current rate of progress, it will take nearly 50 years to reach parity for all women in corporate America. n

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