Employees working in health and the healthcare system have made it clear that leadership is one of the most highly valued skills for healthcare professionals. In response to this, the teaching staff for the Nursing Degree at UIC Barcelona has implemented an innovative methodology for this academic year, developed by Dr Albert Gallart, Dr Encarna Rodríguez, Dr Marisa Martín and Dr Marian Cerezuela, with the aim of helping students to develop skills that are very important for their profession.
In the words of Dr Albert Gallart, head of the leadership project, “our experience and direct contact with hospital centres, healthcare institutions and colleagues in the profession have showed us that, in addition to the knowledge that comes from studying of Nursing, future nurses also have to know how to work as a team, how to impact and influence others, how to be good communicators, how to show emotional intelligence, how to make decisions independently and how to develop strategic thought”. “We are convinced that starting to work on leadership from university not only provides a response to emerging demands in the healthcare system, but also contributes to providing a more thorough and competent perspective of nursing in relation to our professional tasks. That’s why, this academic year, we wanted students in the first year of their degree to work on this skill set from day one, in a cross-cutting way and throughout their entire degree”, explains Dr Gallart.
As a first step, the degree coordinators have created 16 groups with six students each, with the group participants distributed according to their different personality types. Each group will have a tutor to accompany them until the end of their studies, and who will work with them on fundamental aspects of leadership. In the words of Dr Marisa Martín, who coordinates the first year of the degree programme, “the experience over the first three months has been very positive and encouraging for all the tutors involved in this project. It is very uplifting to see how well this change in methodology has been accepted, and how it has translated to better student participation in class”.
As for the students themselves, the initiative to work on leadership skills in a cross-cutting way “is an excellent addition that will allow us to be more independent, while also helping us to work better as a team”. The activities carried out so far “are teaching us how we can do much more by working together than as individuals”.
