Nurses' ratings of compassionate nursing leadership during the Covid-19 pandemic—A descriptive cross-sectional study

Aim: The aim of this study is to investigate how intensive and emergency nurses rated the adequacy of compassionate leadership during the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic. Background: The pandemic has resulted in nurses' increased stress and need for compassion from leaders. Compassionate leadership is here defined as a number of leadership practices based on altruistic values and emotional intelligence. Method: This is a quantitative descriptive cross-sectional study based on a questionnaire for 50 intensive and emergency care nurses in a central hospital in Finland. Results: The pandemic had increased nurses' need for compassion, but their needs for support had not been met and their strengths and competence appreciated sufficiently. They agreed that compassionate leadership could be developed through experience and personal development rather than through education. Conclusion: Compassionate leadership is a process that involves a number of leadership practices based on altruistic values and emotional intelligence and benefits from recognition and use of employee strengths. Leaders and employees could benefit from simulation-based learning, work supervision and discussion led by external facilitators. Implications for Nursing Management: Compassionate leadership involves approachability, genuine presence and listening, which could be developed through work-based learning combined with reflection.