Nursing / Midwifery Unit Manager
What the work is
Manages a health service unit or sub-unit of a hospital or community health care facility to enable the provision of safe, cost-effective nursing or midwifery care.
Would you enjoy the work?
These are the main tasks in the official description. Mark how each one sounds to you.
- Determines objectives, strategies, policies and programs for the unit or health care facility, ensuring compliance with relevant regulations
- Provides management, education and training to staff, implementing advancements in nursing/midwifery practices
- Manages financial resources for the unit or facility and the provision of cost-effective nursing/midwifery care
- Monitors and evaluates the quality and clinical standards of nursing/midwifery care
- Collaborates with other Health Professionals to ensure coordinated patient care
- Recruits and rosters staff to meet the needs of the unit or health care facility
Try it
A simulation and a case study from this kind of work, set in a surgical ward at a fictional city hospital, run by a nurse who manages the team and the beds. They are fictional.
The kind of days you could have
Good days
- The roster works, the ward is calm and your team leaves on time
- A nurse you backed to try a new role does brilliantly
- A family writes to say the whole ward looked after their father
Hard days
- Three people ring in sick by 6am and the beds are full
- A complaint lands on your desk about something you could not have seen coming
- You are caught between what the hospital wants and what your team can safely do
Written by Career Calling as a general guide. Real roles vary by employer and place.
Work a mission
Step into a simulated workplace in this field, with a brief from your manager.
Description and tasks: Australian Bureau of Statistics, Occupation Standard Classification for Australia, 2024, Version 1.0 (opens another site), occupation 265331, used under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence. The skill guide above is our plain English summary.