Time Management Practices for a Registered Nurse

Time Management Practices for a Registered Nurse

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Time Management Practices for a Registered Nurse

Nursing is a demanding, intense, and focused career requiring effective time management to manage tasks properly, reduce personal stress, enhance quality care, and achieve desired patient and organizational outcomes (Zhang et al., 2021). Despite the importance of effective time management among nurses, managing time can be challenging for nurses due to their busy schedules throughout the workday. As such, nursing staff may adopt various strategies to help with effective time management.

One of the time management practices that a candidate can initiate to become a successful Registered Nurse (RN) is prioritization. Nurses play many roles; hence, they must prioritize what should be done first. Since there are certain duties, such as drug administration, that must be performed, an individual preparing to become a RN should prepare a priority list of the things that must be done first to ensure that all critical duties are performed.

A candidate seeking to become a RN can also implement routinization to help with time management. Routinization entails repeating what a nurse does in their routine in a systematic process so that consistency assists with time management. Research reveals that developing a consistent routine improves time management among nurses by turning essential tasks into habits and eliminating unnecessary planning (Goldsby et al., 2020). The candidate can make a list of routine tasks and arrange each task based on the time required and prioritization of each item. Implementation of a step-by-step procedure for habitual duties will help save time.

Also, starting cognitive stacking may help a candidate who wishes to become a RN with time management. Cognitive stacking involves a nurse planning the day before shift starts (Jennings, 2021). Usually, cognitive stacking assists nurses in priority setting and time management.

Reference

Goldsby, E., Goldsby, M., Neck, C. B., & Neck, C. P. (2020). Under pressure: Time management, self-leadership, and the nurse manager. Administrative Sciences, 10(3), 38.

Jennings, B. M. (2021). Workflow, turbulence, and cognitive complexity. In Nurses contributions to quality health outcomes (pp. 85-107). Springer, Cham.

Zhang, F., Liu, J., An, M., & Gu, H. (2021). The effect of time management training on time management and anxiety among nursing undergraduates. Psychology, health & medicine, 26(9), 1073–1078. https://doi.org/10.1080/13548506.2020.1778751