Nurse practitioners on the cutting edge of leadership

For the past 10 to 15 years nurse practitioners (NPs) have been pioneers in the development of their roles within the health care system. My journey over the past 8 years has been to develop an interdependent role as the co-founder of a chronic pain rehabilitation program. Now, I believe, it is no longer sufficient to be an effective pioneer. The pioneer stage is over. We need to stop practicing from an industrial paradigm that views leadership as great men and great women who have certain preferred traits influencing followers to do what leaders want (Rost, 1994). NPs need interdependent team-based practices with the patient as a team member. We need to experience influential relationships between leaders and collaborators intending real change for mutual purposes.