NR 446 Week 2 Communication Style Self-Assessment Example

Course	NR 446 Collaborative Healthcare
Week	2
Paper type	Communication self-assessment
Length	About 1,130 words, 7 pages
Format	APA 7 student paper
School	Chamberlain University
Program	RN-to-BSN
Updated	October 2026

Free sample paper for NR 446 Week 2

Agreeable Under Pressure: A Communication Self-Assessment Tested Against My Own Handoffs

Student Name

College of Nursing, Chamberlain University

NR 446: Collaborative Healthcare

Instructor Name

Month Day, Year

What this page is doingThe title states the result and the test in one line: an agreeable style, examined under the pressure of real handoffs. It signals interpretation rather than a report of a score. Student APA 7 format, no running head.

Agreeable Under Pressure: A Communication Self-Assessment Tested Against My Own Handoffs

The Result

I completed the social style inventory assigned this week, which places people on two dimensions, how strongly they assert themselves and how openly they show emotion, and sorts them into four styles (Merrill & Reid, 1981). My result placed me in the amiable style: low in assertiveness and high in responsiveness. In short, the inventory describes someone who values relationships, avoids conflict, listens well and tends to go along with the group rather than push a position.

What this page is doingThe instrument and the result take a few lines and no more, because the marker is waiting for what the writer makes of them. Naming the two dimensions behind the result gives the interpretation something specific to argue with.

What I Accept and What I Do Not

I accept most of the result, but not all of it. I do listen well, and patients and families say so; I am usually the nurse assigned to the family who has complained. I also avoid conflict, and I can see that in how I speak with physicians and with nurses who are senior to me. Where I disagree is with the idea that I go along with the group. On my own patients, when I am sure of what I have seen, I will hold a position for a long time. What the result gets right is that I hold it quietly, and a position held quietly is easy for others to miss. My difficulty is not that I lack a view. It is that I soften the way I say it until the listener no longer hears that I have one.

That distinction matters for patient safety. A nurse who has no concern and says nothing is not a risk. A nurse who has a concern and states it so gently that the listener hears reassurance is a risk, and I think that describes me on my worst days. It also matters for how I am read by colleagues. A night nurse who has worked with me for a year may have learned to hear a concern under my soft phrasing; a float nurse or a covering physician who does not know me will take my words at face value, and at face value they sound calm.

What this page is doingInterpretation is the graded part, and the paper argues with its own result instead of accepting it whole. The distinction between lacking a view and softening it until it disappears is specific enough to test, which is what the remaining sections do.

Evidence From My Shifts

Three exchanges from the last month support the self-portrait above. The first was an evening report I gave to a night nurse on a patient with a new oxygen requirement. I had been uneasy about him all afternoon because his breathing had quickened from 18 to 26 breaths a minute. In report I said, he's a little more tachypneic than earlier but he's okay. The night nurse, reasonably, heard okay. He went to the intensive care unit at 0300. My concern was accurate; my report buried it under a reassurance I did not believe.

The second was a call to a hospitalist about a patient whose blood pressure had dropped after a new antihypertensive. I opened with an apology for bothering him, described the numbers and then asked whether he wanted to do anything. He said to recheck in an hour. I had wanted him to hold the next dose, but I never said so, and he answered the question I asked rather than the one I meant. The third exchange shows the strength in the same style: a daughter who had been angry with every staff member for two days calmed down within ten minutes of my sitting with her, and she later agreed to the palliative care consult the team had been trying to arrange.

What this page is doingEach exchange is given by role and setting only, and each is attached to one claim. Two show the weakness with its consequence, a transfer at 0300 and a dose that was not held, and one shows the strength, so the self-portrait is proved rather than asserted.

The Handoff Test

If my habit is to soften a concern until it disappears, a structured format such as SBAR should be the repair, because it forces the speaker to state an assessment and a recommendation out loud (Haig et al., 2006). I rewrote the first exchange in SBAR form to see what the template would have done. Situation: Mr. B. in bed 12 has a rising respiratory rate and a new oxygen need. Background: admitted two days ago with pneumonia, on 2 liters since this morning. Assessment: his respiratory rate has gone from 18 to 26 over six hours and I am worried he is getting worse. Recommendation: I would check him within the first hour and call the provider if his rate is above 28 or his saturation falls below 92 percent.

The template repairs most of the problem. It will not let me skip the assessment, and it makes me say worried in a sentence where I would otherwise say okay. What it does not repair is tone. I could still say the recommendation as a question, you might want to check him, and the receiving nurse could still hear it as optional. The template makes room for a clear concern, but I have to fill that room in a clear voice. That is the part of my habit that SBAR lets through, and it is the part I need to work on.

What this page is doingThe structured format is applied to the writer's own habit using her own exchange, showing what the template repairs and what it quietly lets pass. Identifying tone as the gap SBAR cannot close is exactly the kind of finding the rubric rewards.

My Strengths, Named Narrowly

The same style that softens my concerns makes me effective with frightened or angry families and with new graduate nurses, who tell me they ask me questions they are embarrassed to ask others. Salas et al. (2005) list mutual trust among the conditions that hold a team together, and the time I spend with new nurses is part of how that trust gets built on my unit. I will keep both. They are real strengths, but they are strengths in particular situations, not a reason to excuse the weakness. The skill that calms a family is not the skill that moves a physician to act at 2200, and I should stop assuming one covers the other.

One Behavior I Will Change

My goal is one behavior in one situation. Whenever I give report or call a provider about a patient I am worried about, I will say the word worried and state one specific recommendation as a sentence, not a question: I recommend we hold the 2100 dose, rather than do you want to do anything. I will know whether it happened because I will write the recommendation I made on my report sheet at the time I make it, and at the end of each shift for the next four weeks I will count how many of my concern calls include a stated recommendation. I have also asked the charge nurse I work with most often to tell me when she hears me finish a concern with the word okay. If after four weeks fewer than three of every four concern calls include a stated recommendation, the goal has not been met, and I will need to practice the script with a colleague before calls rather than only reviewing them afterward.

What this page is doingThe goal is a single behavior with a trigger, a script and two ways to check it, including a colleague who can observe it. It also says what failure would look like, which makes the closing section checkable rather than aspirational.

References

Haig, K. M., Sutton, S., & Whittington, J. (2006). SBAR: A shared mental model for improving communication between clinicians. Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety, 32(3), 167-175. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1553-7250(06)32022-3

Merrill, D. W., & Reid, R. H. (1981). Personal styles and effective performance. Chilton Book Company.

Salas, E., Sims, D. E., & Burke, C. S. (2005). Is there a "big five" in teamwork? Small Group Research, 36(5), 555-599. https://doi.org/10.1177/1046496405277134

Reading the NR 446 Week 2 instructions

The Week 2 self-assessment has you complete a communication tool and reflect on your style as a member of an interprofessional team. Required parts tend to be the tool and your result, an interpretation, examples from practice, how a structured communication method applies, strengths, a goal for improvement and APA. Keep the score itself to a few sentences; the reading of it earns the points. Agree and disagree with it where your practice warrants. Use specific exchanges, each tied to one claim, with consequences where there were any. Apply a structured format such as SBAR to your own habit and say what it fixes and what it misses. Name strengths narrowly. Set one behavior goal with a trigger and a way to check it.

How this NR 446 Week 2 example is built

The result section names the inventory's two dimensions and the writer's amiable placement. The next section accepts listening and conflict avoidance, then explains why softening a concern is a safety problem. The evidence section describes an evening report on a patient with a new oxygen need that ended with "she's okay" and a 0300 transfer, a call about a blood pressure drop that opened with an apology and did not get a dose held, and a third exchange that supports the reading from another angle. The handoff test applies SBAR, citing Haig and colleagues, and finds that tone can still undo a recommendation. Strengths with frightened families and new graduates follow. The goal is to say "worried" and a recommendation in every concern call, counted for four weeks.

NR 446 Week 2 rubric: what full points look like

Communication self-assessment rubrics in NR 446 typically score accurate reporting of the tool, depth of interpretation, examples from practice, application of structured communication, recognition of strengths, a measurable goal and APA. Interpretation is where the grade sits, and the paper earns it by disputing part of the result and drawing a safety distinction. Examples are credited because each supports one claim and two show consequences. Structured communication scores through SBAR applied to the writer's own exchange, with its gap named. Strengths earn points for being specific to families and new nurses. The goal is credited for a trigger, a script and two checks, including the charge nurse. Salas and colleagues add the team view. Three references complete APA.

NR 446 Week 2 help: mistakes that cost points

The most expensive version of this paper only reports, giving the result, a definition of the style and a paragraph of agreement. Another loss is examples that do not connect to any claim about the result. Students also describe SBAR without applying it, list strengths in general terms or set goals such as "communicate more assertively." A goal with no way to check it earns little. You do not have to share your actual inventory result with us to plan the paper; the structure works for any style. Examples from your own unit work best with details changed. If you know your result but not what to make of it, tell us the style and an NR 446 self-assessment can be argued from it.

Get a NR 446 Week 2 example written to your instructions

Send the Week 2 prompt, the inventory your classroom assigns, and the rubric if one is posted. We write a custom example to those instructions and return it inside 24 to 48 hours, with the first one free. Give us your actual result and the interpretation is built around it rather than around a guess.

More NR 446 papers and RN-to-BSN samples

NR 446 Week 2 questions, answered

Do I have to give you my actual inventory result?

No, but the example is better if you do. Sent a result, we write the interpretation around it, including the parts a nurse would reasonably dispute. Without one we pick a plausible outcome and flag it in a note, and you swap in yours. Either way the argument structure is what you are getting, and it survives the swap without rewriting.

Can the example use situations from my own unit?

We write composite exchanges that fit the prompt and identify any setting by specialty rather than by employer. Real events are better told by you, and anything your employer holds, such as a manager evaluation or an internal audit result, is yours to supply. Send a two line description of an exchange and the example is built on that.

Does the paper have to use a structured handoff tool?

In many sections the prompt asks for one and the classroom names it. Where it does not, a finished example still tests the writer's habit against some structured format, because that test is what makes the self assessment about practice rather than about temperament. Tell us which tool your unit uses and the example works with that one.

Where can I find a free NR 446 Week 2 sample paper?

The complete Week 2 self-assessment of an agreeable communication style, with the result, the argument with it, three exchanges, the SBAR test, strengths, the goal and three references, can be read here.

What goal does the writer set in the NR 446 Week 2 self-assessment?

To say the word worried and state one specific recommendation as a sentence in every concern call or report, record each on the report sheet, count them for four weeks and ask the charge nurse to flag any call ending in "okay."