In the months since the COVID-19 pandemic began impacting hospitals and health systems around the country, many organizations have gotten tougher, wiser and more resilient. Healthcare professionals have learned some hard lessons: how to lead in a crisis, how to take care of not only their patients but themselves, and how to persevere under extremely difficult circumstances. Now it’s time to build on those lessons and plan for what lies ahead.
To help guide the way, Tipton Health Communications recently hosted a webinar, “Five Steps to Lead Your Nursing Team into the Future.” The webinar was led by Mary Del Guidice, Senior Fellow for the Center of Health Outcomes and Policy Research at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing. Mary offers nursing leaders five guiding principles to better prepare their teams for the post-pandemic world.
Click to request the Tipton Health Whitepaper: Five Steps to Lead Your Nursing Team into the Future.
- Stabilize
The first goal is to establish your new normal. This is best done with an air of calm, which will show your team that they can feel calm as well, and that everything is going to be OK. - Strengthen
After stabilizing your team and their functions, you’ll want to focus on workforce healing, engagement and resilience to minimize burnout and turnover. Taking time to think about your team’s well-being will help ensure success as you continue your journey to nursing excellence. - Strategize
Now is the time to look forward. There are a few ways you can begin to reenvision the future state of your organization and move forward toward success:
- Shape
You’ve made your plans—now take action. Develop and distribute leadership structures, learning opportunities, and workforce and economic planning. Plans are only as good as the subsequent action that follows. Take an active role in ensuring the plans are successfully acted upon.
- Sustain
In this final step, you’ll work on how to sustain your new implementations long-term. This is centered on your team’s ability to take in information, analyze it and build on it.
Develop communication plans so everyone is up to speed on where you are, what you’re doing, how you’re doing it and where you see it going. You can even establish an outcomes dashboard that provides a consistent form of assessing your team. The key to sustaining your new methods is consistent, team-wide communication.
Learn More from Our Speakers
Visit Tiptonhealth.com/webinars/ to view Mary’s on-demand webinar video on how you can lead your nursing team into the future.
Tipton’s next webinar, How to Recognize Your Nurses During the Pandemic, will be held July 21, 2020, 12:30–1:00 p.m. EDT.