Core then care: the nurse leader's role in "caring"

When discussing caring practices of health care professionals, often the nurse leader's role is not articulated, because the leader is not a direct caregiver. The leader, however, has the ability to potentiate or impede the level of practice that results in expert caring. In this article an argument is presented for the use of empowerment to promote the clinician-leader partnership model. Two theories--novice-to-expert and symphonology--are presented to assist leaders to create environments that foster expert level care.