Change can be challenging, be it in your personal life, at work, or within your community. The difficulty arises from the need to deviate from familiar routines, leading to a sense of discomfort. Successful change demands thorough preparation and planning, consuming valuable time. Moreover, change seldom unfolds exactly as anticipated, necessitating resilience on the part of the implementer. This resilience involves learning from failures, adapting strategies, and persisting in the pursuit of success.
Let's take something relatively simple, such as recycling, as an example. If you have never recycled before and one day decided to start, how successful would you be? Some of us could flip the switch and change, but for the majority, we couldn't do it without a little effort, planning, and trial and error. Now consider what would happen if instead of just thinking we can go from not recycling to recycling, we decide to spend a little time reflecting on why we want to start recycling in the first place, then knowing what we know about what recycling looks like we assess our environment to see what we can do differently to make our efforts easier and more successful. We might recognize that we need a designated place for recycling or that we need to drive 10 miles to take our recycling to the recycling center. We would then plan and take action to create a space in our house for the recycling to go and start paying a few extra dollars to have it picked up on our curb every Wednesday, and voilà! We are now set up for success by creating a supportive environment for our efforts.
Implementing a nurse residency program is the same. If you have never had a nurse residency program in place before and now you want to implement one, maybe you can show up one day and start one, and maybe that will work, and perhaps you will find success, but for many, that is a big jump. Instead, spending some time identifying why you want to do it in the first place, assessing the environment to determine what might make the change easier or more successful, and then taking action on those things will help us to achieve our goals more efficiently and with even more success.
In this month's podcast, Dr Heidi Gilroy talks about preparing your environment for your new graduate nurses. She describes preparation as creating a safe and supportive space for learning, coping with first-time experiences, and navigating the world of healthcare. Preparing the environment is a big piece of what we are doing with our NEW IONRP Academy. Through this program, organizational nurse leaders and educators will work 1:1 with a residency program expert to ensure their organization is residency-ready. Our customized SOAR tool allows participants to take a 5000-foot view of the new graduate nurse experience from onboarding through orientation and nurse residency – including all the required certifications, continuing education, and mentoring opportunities. Our goal is to help leaders assess areas such as what your new graduate nurses need to know, how preceptors, mentors, and leaders are being leveraged to provide that much-needed social support, and the timeline for all the learning required within that first year of practice. Whether you are participating in our Academy or not, here are two questions to ask yourself.
1. Why do we have a nurse residency program in the first place? What do we expect the nurse residency program to do?
2. What does the entire experience look like, from the job offer to the completion of the first year? What do we expect new graduates to do and participate in throughout those 12 months?
While these are broad questions, they are a great place to start thinking about the environment in which your new graduate nurses work. Successful implementation of a nurse residency program hinges on thoughtful preparation. By addressing key questions about the program's purpose, expected outcomes, and the new graduate nurse's journey, we can take the initial steps to create an environment conducive to success. Join us next month as we explore additional elements of environmental preparation.
Nicole Weathers, MSN, RN, NPD-BC
Iowa Online Nurse Residency Program Director
Wanting a Program Overview? Need to schedule a meeting? Book time with Nicole
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