Leadership and Mentoring

An encouraging word

Has a compliment ever made your day? Perhaps it was just what you needed to hear to raise your self-confidence a notch or to encourage you in your…
ounce_prevention_coronavirus

An ounce of prevention

Engage in practical training through Project Firstline.  A lifetime of working with patients with serious burn injuries truly ingrained in me the importance of infection prevention and control.…
benefits-feedback-nurse-leaders

Benefits of feedback for nurse leaders

Viewing feedback as a gift enhances career growth. Takeaways: Without feedback, beginning nurse leaders’ careers can be derailed Constructive feedback can lead to significant performance improvements. Individuals with…
influence

Boosting your influence

Jessie was excited to be appointed as chair of the professional practice council in her hospital. She envisioned being able to quickly engage staff in the work of…

Bringing nursing orientation back to life

Our hospital systems’ journey to obtain Magnet® recognition led to an excellent opportunity: the chance to revamp and improve our nursing orientation program as part of the effort to…

Building a sense of community on nursing units

Jeff Rawson, a new nurse graduate, works on a behavioral health unit. His manager believes his transition is going well—until Jeff asks to transfer to another unit. When…

Building Your Communication Skills Part 3

Marjorie Lee North, a consultant for political candidates, physicians, and lawyers, presented these ten tips in her blog on the Harvard University Division of Continuing Education Professional Development…
_ChangeMaker_Leadership

Change maker

Dori Healey is passionate about patient safety, public service, and volunteering. President-elect for American Nurses Association (ANA)-Idaho, Dori Healey, MSN-RN, MBA-HA, CPPS, takes every opportunity to advance the…
confrontation talking conversation

Choosing the right conversation

It’s 7:10 A.M. Maggie, the night-shift charge nurse, is waiting to give report to Julie, the charge nurse on the next shift. After a long night in the…

Choosing your political battles

Mary*, a new manager in the operating room, prides herself on being a strong advocate for her staff, quickly acting on every issue with which she’s presented. So…
What is civility

Civility starts with you

Over the last decade, civility has become a hot topic. I got involved with it in 2000, when more than 700 nurses told the Maryland Commission on the…
Nursing careers and education

Collaboration: The key to healthcare transformation

Transforming health care is a complex challenge that can best be met through a coordinated response from academia and clinical practice. Working together, chief nursing officers (CNOs) and academic leaders ensure that clinicians…

Confronting conflict with higher-ups

Conflict in the workplace is a fact of life, and dealing with it is never easy. Sometimes it seems easier to ignore it and hope it will take…

Dealing with difficult people

Jackie Jacobs is a charge nurse in a busy intensive care unit. She prides herself on being able to get along well with almost everyone on her team.…
self-awareness

Enhance your self-awareness to be an authentic leader

In 2013 alone, U.S. organizations spent more than $15 billion on leadership development activities. Although much of these expenses focus on external programming, including face-to-face workshops, webinars, and…
face-fears

Face your fears and forge ahead

Cathleen Wheatley steps up to a challenge. Cathleen Wheatley, DNP, RN, CENP, is president of Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center in Winston Salem, North Carolina, a position she…
middleman nurse middle organization power leader

From our readers: Nurses leading from the middle

Nurse leaders are needed at all levels of the organization, especially in “the middle,” which is commonly used to describe mid-level management positions. Middle managers are essential to…
Fruits and Vegetables are dietary Staples of Caring for patients with metabolic syndrome

From our readers…Hunger advocacy for nurses

Since the mid-1990s, the number of hungry people worldwide has been steadily increasing. Currently about 925 million people worldwide are hungry—about 1 in 7 of the global population.…

Gaining confidence in public speaking

EVA, a professional practice coordinator, and her team of clinical educators are thrilled to learn that their abstract on an iLead in Nursing initiative (Innovation in LEadership and ADministration in Nursing and…
ANAPres_Diversity

Heavy Reading: Inside Nursing

Diversity, equity, and inclusion can’t be authentically incorporated into curricula when faculty assign textbooks that harm those whose health they seek to protect. For instance, nursing textbooks can…

How to avoid biased thinking

Jessica, a Millennial (Generation Y) nurse working on a medical-surgical unit, recently completed her first year of practice. Ralph, her manager, is pleased with her transition and believes…

How to get off the anger-go-round

One of the most complex emotions, anger is a normal response to certain situational triggers. It’s associated with physiologic changes, including increases in heart rate, blood pressure, and…
Informal leaders and cultural change

Informal leaders and cultural change

Informal leaders are crucial to the success of a change involving the nursing team, yet they are often overlooked. A literature search of nursing publications over the past…

Introverts can be nurse leaders, too

Natalie Sanchez recently was promoted to a nurse manager position. So far, she thinks, things are going well. She is starting to feel comfortable with her new role…

Leading at the bedside and beyond

A typical definition for a leader is one who has the ability to influence. Florence Nightingale, Abraham Lincoln, and Martin Luther King readily come to mind for their…

Leading through failure

I have served as a nurse corps officer in the United States Air Force for 27 years. One of my most useful leadership lessons came from understanding the…

Learning from mistakes

Today’s healthcare organizations need to improve patient safety, which includes effectively communicating information to nurses about safety incidents and how to address them. After all, frontline nurses are…
what is mindfulness awareness

Mindful Awareness

Tip 3 of 6 Mindfulness Exercises You Can Try Today This exercise is designed to cultivate a heightened awareness and appreciation of simple daily tasks and the results…
nurses mindful listening nursing

Mindful Listening

Tip 4 of 6 Mindfulness Exercises You Can Try Today This exercise is designed to open your ears to sound in a non-judgmental way, and indeed to train…

Nurses’ essential role in supporting professionalism

What does it mean to be a professional? Providing care of the highest technical quality, of course. But professionalism also includes communicating clearly, being selfreflective, and consistently modeling responsibility, respect,…

Recovery lessons from the Sandy Hook trauma

Children are people with small hearts and big emotions that often come from the people around them, particularly family members. As a pediatric nurse and mother of two…
Attachments

Releasing our attachments to the past

Jake, a critical care nursing director, works for a large healthcare system that has invested heavily in testing the use of robots to support operational tasks and provide…

Scrapbooks capture nurses career milestones

For nurse graduates, starting their first staff position is an exciting time, but it can also be a time of apprehension. Many have heard stories about how some…
communication disconnect triangle norms drama conflict avoid unclear clear

Squashing the communication triangle

In the infamous and deadly Bermuda Triangle, things seem to disappear, never to be seen again. In the communication triangle, the opposite is true: Emotions and unintended messages…

Taking the first steps to serving on a board

Nurses have a singular perspective on patient care and community health. With our training and experience, we can inform and improve healthcare decisions in ways that complement those…
nurse story remembering teach

The little things we do

In December 2001, the graduating class of New York University’s College of Nursing asked me to give a speech during their pinning ceremony. As part of nursing education,…
Multi,Ethnic,Group,Of,Nurses.

The pandemic and early career nurses

Find support, shape the profession via input, action. During the peaks and valleys of the now 15-month COVID-19 pandemic, nurses remain the bedrock of competent care, enlightened public…

The Power of Introverts

Are you an introvert? If so, you may think you don’t have the right personality to be a nurse leader. Susan Cain, the author of Quiet: The Power…

The power of Lean Six Sigma

Lean and Six Sigma are well-established quality improvement tools. Combining the two creates a synergistic effect, boosting effectiveness. In the hospital where I work, we used Lean Six…
Positive

The power of the positive

Being positive in a negative situation is not naïve. It’s leadership. — Ralph S. Marston, Jr., author and publisher of The Daily Motivator website Nurses may encounter many challenges and stressors…

Too young to be a nurse leader?

Marla Johnson began her career on an oncology unit after graduating from a BSN program 4 years ago. She achieved certification and regularly takes charge on the night…

Uplifting nurses

Associations respond to member needs in a pandemic. In 2020, what kept me up at night was nurses’ well-being and how they’ve been dealing with the impact of…

What followers want in their nurse leaders

Why would anyone want you to lead them? That’s a question nurses rarely ask themselves before they take on leadership positions. But it’s an important one, because if…

What you can learn from failure

Editor’s note: At American Nurse Today, we believe every nurse can be a leader. Rose Sherman, founder of the Emerging RN Leader blog (www.emergingrnleader.com), contributes articles on a…

Why disruption can be a good thing

Seventy-two seconds into liftoff, a defective mechanical part set off a string of events that caused the Challenger space shuttle to tear apart as millions watched it vanish…

Why timing is crucial in leadership

For the last 2 years, Karen, the manager of a critical care unit, has been laying the groundwork for her unit to apply for the Beacon Award for…

Reader Survey

Please share your feedback! We’re interested to learn more about your experience with American Nurse Journal.

Survey

Test Your Knowledge

Which of the following best describes Wegovy’s FDA-approved use?

cheryl meeGet your free access to the exclusive newsletter of American Nurse Journal and gain insights for your nursing practice.

NurseLine Newsletter

  • This field is hidden when viewing the form

*By submitting your e-mail, you are opting in to receiving information from Healthcom Media and Affiliates. The details, including your email address/mobile number, may be used to keep you informed about future products and services.