A downloadable research brief from the LeadingAge LTSS Center @UMass Boston focuses on the key challenges, best practices, and successes of frontline nurse managers, who have immense influence on the way care is provided in aging services, and for whom robust support is imperative.

The brief, Enhancing Frontline Nurse Management in Long-Term Services and Supports, covers several key issues:

• Why frontline nurse managers have so much influence in how care is provided.
• Why developing management and supervisory skills in these nurses is so important.
• How effective nurse managers create environments that lead to better work environments for direct care professionals—as well as greater skill and job satisfaction among them.
• The characteristics of the most effective nurse managers.

The brief includes recommendations generated by participants in a LTSS Center-convened meeting with three dozen stakeholders. These included:

• Calls for more nursing education programs to develop long-term services and supports (LTSS) curricula and leadership training for nurses.
• Greater efforts to create meaningful clinical placements for nursing students while building nurse management into nurse training.
• Policy and regulatory changes to strengthen core competencies of nurse leaders and create incentive payments to strengthen the frontline nursing workforce.

Read a summary of the brief, including details about the 2021 stakeholder meeting, and read the full research brief here.

Nurse LEAD, a seven-module leadership training program for charge nurses and team leaders working in long-term care environments, is available free to members on the LeadingAge Learning Hub. Try it today.