Leadership Lessons Show Notes
About The Nurse Shark Academy
Welcome to the Leadership Conversations segment of The Nurse Shark Academy Show, where Tina Baxter, your host, shares leadership topics of the day.
My mission is for you to own your seat at the table of nurse entrepreneurship, gaining confidence, skills, and freedom to live your life on your own terms. You will dream big and expand your consciousness as an entrepreneur. The Nurse Shark Academy Show is looking for nurse entrepreneurs, innovators, and business leaders to guest on the show. If you have always been curious about how to be an effective podcast guest, sign up for our webinar at www.thenursesharkacademy.biz.
About your host
Tina M. Baxter is an advanced practice registered nurse and a board certified gerontological nurse practitioner through the American Nurse Credentialing Center (ANCC), who resides in Anderson, Indiana. Mrs. Baxter has been a registered nurse for over twenty years and a nurse practitioner for 17 years in the areas of mental health, gerontology, and health education. She is the owner of Baxter Professional Services, LLC, a consulting firm which provides legal nurse consulting services for attorneys and insurance professionals; wellness and chronic disease management coaching; and customized educational and operational resources to healthcare organizations. Mrs. Baxter teaches stress management strategies to clients of all ages and offers virtual as well as online classes. She is listed as an Alignable Local Businessperson of the Year in 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025. She is the founder of The Nurse Shark Academy® where she coaches nurses to launch and scale their businesses. She is the host of The Nurse Shark Academy Show© which interviews and spotlights nurse business owners and leaders in healthcare. She is a public speaker and has spoken on numerous topics on a national level. She is a contributor to articles on electronic and print media such as Entrepreneur.com, The Minority Nurse, LinkedIn, as well as a guest on numerous podcasts.
To reach your host, https://hihello.me/p/30801bee-4180-448d-a6b2-0bf6754ece87.
Podcast Title: Leadership Lessons
Episode: Top 5 skills every nursing leader must develop
Host: Tina Baxter
Powered by: The Nurse Shark Academy
Welcome back to The Nurse Shark Academy Show, where we empower nurses to lead boldly, build profitably, and impact their communities with confidence. I’m your host, Tina Baxter, and today we’re diving into a topic that every future—and current—nurse leader needs to hear.
Whether you’re supervising your first team, running a department, or stepping into entrepreneurship, the skills we’re about to explore are the backbone of effective leadership in nursing. These aren’t just nice-to-have abilities; they’re the difference between burnout and balance, chaos and clarity, surviving and scaling.
So let’s get into the top five skills every nursing leader must develop—and how you can start strengthening them today.
Emotional intelligence, or EI, is the art of understanding emotions—your own and those of the people you lead. In nursing, this is especially important because clinical stress, trauma exposure, and fast-paced environments can amplify emotions on any given day.
Scenario:
Imagine a nurse who’s consistently running late. You could reprimand them immediately, but a leader with high emotional intelligence pauses and asks, “What’s really happening here?” After a quick conversation, you learn they’re caring for a sick child at home and experiencing caregiver fatigue. The solution shifts from discipline to support, scheduling flexibility, or resource referral.
EI doesn’t make you soft. It makes you strategic.
How to practice:
Notice emotional cues. Pause before reacting. Lead conversations with curiosity rather than conclusions.
Nurse leaders communicate constantly—with staff, patients, administrators, and sometimes entire communities. The best leaders are translators: they take complex information and deliver it clearly, calmly, and with purpose.
Example:
Let’s say your facility changes the wound care documentation protocol… again. Your team is rolling their eyes before you even open your mouth. Strong communication sounds like:
“Here’s what’s changing, here’s why, and here’s how this helps us prevent errors and protect our patients.”
People don’t resist change; they resist confusion.
We talk a lot about critical thinking in clinical care, but nursing leadership requires a different flavor of it. Leaders think long-term. Leaders anticipate problems. Leaders respond rather than react.
Scenario:
You notice supply costs rising each month. Instead of blaming staff for “wasting supplies,” critical thinking invites deeper review. Is the inventory system outdated? Are vendors overcharging? Is there a workflow issue causing repeated dressing changes?
Critical thinking turns knee-jerk reactions into sustainable solutions.
Delegation is not dumping tasks. Delegation is developing people.
A common trap for new nurse leaders is trying to “do it all.” The truth? When you hoard tasks, you also hoard opportunities for team growth—and fast-track yourself to burnout.
Example:
If you’re the only person who ever handles staff scheduling, your team remains dependent. But when you delegate parts of the process to charge nurses or administrative leads, you build competence and create more time to focus on leadership priorities—like staff retention, patient experience, or strategic planning.
Delegation is a gift, not a burden.
This may be the missing skill most nurses don’t even realize they need.
Leadership is not only clinical. It’s financial. It’s operational. It’s strategic.
Scenario:
Imagine you want to advocate for hiring two additional CNAs. A leader without business acumen says, “We’re short-staffed.” A leader with business acumen says:
“When patient-to-staff ratios increase, incidents rise. That leads to higher overtime costs, increased turnover, and lower patient satisfaction scores. Adding two CNAs reduces those risks and improves long-term financial stability.”
That’s how you get a “yes.”
When nurses understand the business side of healthcare, we stop being unheard and start being unstoppable.
Bringing It All Together
These five skills—emotional intelligence, communication, critical thinking, delegation, and business acumen—aren’t traits you’re born with. They’re muscles. You build them with intention and practice.
And you don’t have to figure it out alone.
Join The Nurse Shark Academy
If you’re ready to grow as a leader, elevate your income, and build a career that actually aligns with your purpose, then The Nurse Shark Academy is where your next chapter begins.
Inside, you’ll find:
You’ve spent your career taking care of others. It’s time to invest in your own growth, your own leadership, and your own legacy.
Visit TheNurseSharkAcademy.biz and take the next step toward becoming the leader you were meant to be.
Thanks for spending this time with me. Share this episode with a nurse leader who needs a reminder of their potential, and don’t forget to subscribe for more episodes that help you lead, grow, and thrive.
Until next time, keep leading with purpose and power.
As always, thank you for listening to The Nurse Shark Academy Show, where we are experts in nursing and experts in business. Subscribe to our channel and download our podcast wherever you get your podcast such as Podbean, Apple, Samsung, Spotify, iHeart Radio, YouTube, and more. If you are nurse entrepreneur or business leader who would be interested in coming on the show, contact us at thenursesharkacademyshow@baxterprofessionalservices.com or visit our website at https://www.thenursesharkacademy.biz/.
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