I am continuing a series for our newsletter to include a leadership topic along with passing along news in the #nursing community. This series we are focusing on our Be-Attitudes, those attitudes we need to cultivate to win business and life. I wanted to focus on the positive in nursing and leadership. Subscribe to receive notification when our newsletter comes out. We publish twice a month.
Proverbs 21:5 (NIV) says “The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty.” Have you taken the time to evaluate your goals? How intentional are you in your actions? If we don’t set goals, we are often tossed about aimlessly. If you want to hit a target, you first need to have one. Staying goal oriented protects you from the distractions in life and the new shiny, flashy objects. I meet a lot of people on social media. Most of my conversations have been rewarding. Others are just a sales pitch, often done ineptly. I get, “Buy my product. It will change your life,” but when I ask for the evidence, that is when I get substandard “research” studies and false promises “wink-wink” that this will cure everything that ails you. I don’t waste time listening to endless sales pitches. I am open to learning about new products that may actually work but more often than not, I am not interested in becoming a distributor of such products. That is not my goal. My goal is to help nurses take control of their destiny. I want nurses to leave the trap of toxic corporate environments and to create a career in which they can thrive. I want us to be the answer to the solution, which is why I support entrepreneurship. Don’t you know that Florence Nightingale, Mary Seacole, and other nurses were entrepreneurial? They went against the grain. They were not afraid to go into the fray. They had GOALS!
I could easily be distracted by the feuding on social media about one nurse influencer’s approach versus another influencer’s style to address the same problems. That is not my goal. My goal is to share the data and let the individual make their own decisions. I am going to stay on my mission. We have serious problems in health care. Someone needs to pull back the curtain and expose sometimes the ugly truth. If we are really going to make change in our profession, we have to be willing to accept the truth. I have always said if you want to know what is happening in healthcare, follow the money.
Let’s look at Mary Seacole for an example. She is a contemporary of Florence Nightingale and in my opinion, she does not get enough credit for her contributions to nursing. She was born in Jamaica. She was taught to care for the sick using traditional remedies. She later had the chance to go England to study nursing, where she faced discrimination. She returned to Jamaica and nursed the victims of the Kingston cholera epidemic, then later helping during the yellow fever epidemic. She later turned her mother’s boarding house into a hospital. She funded her own trip to the Crimea War front after being turned away by the British government. She established a hotel with her husband much closer to the fighting than Nightingale’s hospital. According to the Mary Seacole Trust, “Mary was able to visit the battlefield, sometimes under fire, to nurse the wounded. Indeed, she nursed sick soldiers so kindly that they called her ‘Mother Seacole’”. Talk about a nurse with goals. She went against the norms of the time, persevered through discrimination, used what she had, and remains a role model for nurses to this day. She was a business owner, best selling author, and world traveler. She was a true pioneer in nursing. We need more Mary Seacoles today. Nurses who are ready and willing to make a change. Let’s stop talking about it and be about it. Set your goals and intentions today. Here is a quote attributed to Mary Seacole, “And the grateful words and smile which reward me for binding up a wound or giving a cooling drink was a pleasure worth risking my life for at any time.” Be goal oriented. Set your intentions for your day. Plot your course.
Nursing News
In an article in Penn Today, a study from the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing’s Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research (CHOPR), found that among the reasons nurses are leaving their employer besides retirement is [wait for it!], poor working conditions with insufficient staffing, burnout, and poor work-life balance. These issues aren’t new. In 2022 The International Council of Nurses (ICN) reported that nursing has been “historically underpaid. Caring professions like nursing are often regarded as ‘women’s work’ and therefore are undervalued or even unpaid. Fair pay is critical to recruiting and retaining the nursing profession”. We have identified the problem, now what are we going to do to stop the flight of nurses from the profession? It is time for nursing leaders to stand up with real solutions. Nurses are angry and they have a right to be angry. Anger is often the precursor to change. It is when we say “enough is enough” that we find the courage to step out into the sun to let our voices be heard. Nurses are speaking and it is time that we listen and then act.
References:
My mission is for you to own your seat at the table of nurse entrepreneurship, gaining confidence, skills, and the freedom to live your life on your own terms. You will dream big and expand your consciousness as an entrepreneur.
Pick up our Nurse Entrepreneur e-book at https://www.thenursesharkacademy.biz/product-page/guide-for-nurse-entrepreneurs-pdf-version
The Nurse Shark Academy show https://thenursesharkacademy.podbean.com/
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