The best professional advice I have received up to this point in my life was when I was 21 and fresh out of graduating college and just starting my nursing career. The unit I was working on posted a position for assistant manager and I told a mentor of mine whom I met as my first semester clinical instructor in nursing school when I was 19. He asked me, "did you apply?" I looked as him like a deer in head lights thinking he was crazy for even asking the question considering I had officially been a nurse for 3 months. My reply matched my expression, "no, I have only been a nurse for 3 months"! He told me, "so what! that doesn't mean you don't apply"!
Essentially what he was telling me was I'm limiting myself from opportunities because I was placing limits on myself. He basically told me who cares if you are not qualified! If you believe in yourself that should be enough to apply regardless if I got the position or not. That stuck with me and I have adopted that attitude since that day. Just because I don't meet all the qualifications listed for a job position doesn't mean I can't apply for the position or do that job! He was the only person that told me once I graduated that I was now to sign everything as "First Name, Last Name RN, BSN". I was not used to adding the "RN, BSN". However, he taught me that I worked hard for those initials and that they need to be a part of my signature.
Trying to find the balance between being proud of my accomplishments and remaining humble is a challenge. I was raised by parents that taught me to be humble no matter my accomplishments, power, or net worth. Society also tells me this as a woman. However, in order to achieve the things I want to achieve I have to find the delicate balance to be proud of my accomplishments and own them while remaining humble as the same time. I have a great need to accomplish great things in my life time. Many nurses do not consider climbing the ladder they are happy just being a bedside nurse and often the ones that go back for higher education become nurse practiticioners instead of going to get their MPH or MBA so that they can be on the executive side of health care. Often you will see the MALE nurses or "murses" go this route because they want to move up! As woman and nurses we SHOULD be going for the MPH and the MBA because we SHOULD be running the hospital. No one knows the hospital like a nurse does!
As nurses we are on the front line. Without nurses hospitals simply would collapse. Why is it that the people at the top making decisions for us, the nurses, have NO idea what its like to be a nurse. They simply go by what the they THINK makes sense. Think about it like this, if you were a marine in the army wouldn't you want your sergeant major to have been a marine at one point in his career? That way when he makes decisions for the marines on the front lines he knows EXACTLY what he's talking about and what its like to be the first to get shot at? Same concept for nursing and hospital administration. Nurses should be the executive operators of the hospital not doctors.
Nurses simply don't believe that they can become top administrators in healthcare. The majority of the nursing field are women. This is precisely the reason why. Many women shoot themselves in the foot and underestimate themselves eliminating opportunities without even trying like I did when I was 21. There are many studies that prove this thinking in women compared to men as well. We need to take an active role in changing this mindset. Apply to a job that you know you don't know much about! Be adaptable! Be a quick learner! Challenge yourself! That is the only way to grow professionally. Move around. Do something different! Often we see nurses working on the same floor for 20 plus years!!! That is mind blowing to me! I could NEVER work on the same floor doing the same thing for 20 years! It just does not run in my blood.
I have a constant need to challenge myself. A constant need to be better. A constant need to be the best. I am in competition with myself. I want to prove to myself that I CAN achieve anything I set my mind to. Throwing out all the stereotypes of being a woman, a minority, and young. In my book those are all pluses! Who wouldn't want to hire me? That's my mentality going into any job interview or when I am speaking with anyone that is a networking opportunity. I am fully confident that I am an asset to any hospital that hires me.
I am willing to jump on and take a job or project I know nothing about and learn a whole new area of healthcare. I will master it and be the best at it. Instead of try to convincing you that I have all the skills that you are looking for let me show you. Tell me a problem you have right now and give me the opportunity to fix it! You will not be disappointed!
To all the female nurses out there step up! Stop being okay with JUST being a bedside nurse. Take an active role to get involved and be a leader. I work at a hospital where there is ONE bathroom on the unit for all the nurses. WHO thought that was a smart idea?! The set up of the units are absolutely ridiculous. Clearly nurses were not involved in the engineering of the hospital. The structure of the units do not flow and are completely inefficient! If a team of nurses had been on the committee I guarantee the units would have been built differently. That is just ONE example of how administration that has never worked the front lines of the hospital makes big irreversible mistakes.
Do not underestimate what you are capable of achieving! There is nothing wrong with making your career first as a woman! Be educated, kind, compassionate, humble, assertive, fierce, adaptable, opinionated, confident and pretty all at the same time! Learn to speak up! Push yourself out of your comfort zone! Learn to accept compliments and appraisals! Just say thank you! Do not sell yourself short!!
Nurses…
We ARE the future of healthcare.
Do not underestimate me.
Until next time
-Norah
