The nursing professional practice, including the healthcare industry and its organization, is faced with a wide array of challenges that are not limited to the context of patient care delivery. The majority of the issues that impact the healthcare industry include the emergence of formidable aggressive illnesses, an increase in the patient population with chronic complex diseases, a shortage of nurses, increased demand for health resources, health reform, increasing cost of care, and other factors that critically affect the capability to meet the demands and expectations of the society. According to Cronshaw et al. (2021), a healthcare environment that nurtures a culture of excellence does not limit itself to the ability to simply meet the level of competence set in the standards of quality care delivery but to continually challenge the status quo and develop interventions to further improve and exceed expectations. The importance of a mission, vision, and values defines the identity of an organization and reflects a guiding principle that cultivates excellence and a sense of purpose for its employees and workers (Min et al., 2020). The purpose of this paper is to explore the importance of a culture of excellence in an identified healthcare organization and understand the role of vision, mission, and values, including the significance of leadership strategies that foster excellence in nursing practice.
The concept of excellence is described by Medeiros (2020) as a “constantly moving target that strives to keep moving beyond expectations and to continually improve.” Achieving excellence in an organization requires the need to recognize and focus on the development and motivation of its employees and teams with the necessary competencies and foundational elements (Medeiros, 2020). Among the most profound foundational elements described by Medeiros (2020) pertaining to organizational characteristics that reflect a culture of excellence include a learning environment, shared decision-making, and planning for lasting change. A learning environment fosters a culture of excellence by motivating and encouraging nurses and healthcare workers to develop competence in knowledge, skills, and continued education through the value of research outcomes and evidence-based practice. Evidence-based practice is a robust program that outlines and provides continued education at all levels of the organization that guarantees effective changes and best practices in patient care and treatment. The aspect of shared decision-making is a groundwork that cultivates excellence and inspires leadership among the staff by sharing power in governance to increase engagement, accountability, ownership of improvement, collaboration, and job satisfaction. The organizational characteristic of planning for a lasting change promotes the cultivation of excellence because it shows the future aim and necessary changes for improvement and application of innovation that is needed in the organization. Organizational planning is not only limited to infrastructure but also supports improvement in healthcare processes and continued education to increase the level of competence in the point of care and promotion among the staff.
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