Shared Governance

Shared governance  is a “professional practice model, founded on the cornerstone principles of partnership, equity, accountability, and ownership that form a culturally sensitive and empowering framework, enabling sustainable and accountability-based decisions to support an interdisciplinary design for excellent patient care”. Shared governance puts some of the decision-making power into the hands of those who will feel the impact of the decision. Nurses, through shared governance, can now make decisions that affect nursing. Decisions are made through four principles: accountability, equity, partnership, and ownership.

1. Accountability: The mutual commitment to positive patient care outcomes.

2. Equity: Valuing every role in the organization.

3. Partnership: Nurses’ relationships with one another, patients, or other disciplines.

4. Ownership: Membership in the nursing profession, clinical practice, and the work that nurses as individuals.

Shared governance may have different names in different organizations. Some organizations call it “shared leadership, shared decision-making, decentralization, decisional involvement, collaborative governance, professional governance”. Unit-based shared governance may have monthly meetings to discuss unit-based problems, where the organization’s shared governance may discuss problems occurring within the organization.