The project aim is to decrease compassion fatigue using evidence-based interventions. The objectives are to increase staff awareness, each staff how to incorporate the AACN Healthy Work Environment (HW) official meaningful recognition, true collaboration, and authentic leadership, and implement interventions that will assist in reducing compassion fatigue.
Recognition of meaningfulness and value of one’s contribution to an organizations’ work is a fundamental human need and an essential requirement to professional and personal development (American Association of Critical-Care Nurses, 2016). People who are not acknowledged feel invisible, undervalued, disrespected, and unmotivated. Meaningful recognition is a process, not an event. It must be ongoing and developed over time, becoming a norm with the work culture (American Association of Critical-Care Nurses, 2016).
Lack of meaningful recognition leads to poor morale, discontent, decreased productivity, and adverse patient outcomes. Therefore, developing a plan to improve significant recognition for your team is critical. Addressing, barriers to meaningful recognition should be a key component of staff retention and productivity improvement programs.
True collaboration is challenging in any environment. However, achieving this standard in the high-pressure world of healthcare is especially challenging and requires continuous focused attention. Providing education and professional development skills underlying collaboration - especially communication and effective decision making is critical to achieving this standard. Developing a training and education program will assist a team to learn new skills and advance existing abilities.
Authentic leadership is an essential part of job satisfaction for nurses. Improving the skills and competence of informal and formal organizational leaders should be an ongoing and significant component of professional development.
Nurse leaders must be skilled communicators, agents for positive change, team builders, resulted oriented, committed to service, and role models for collaborative practice. However, nurse leaders often lack the resources and support required to develop the skills necessary to be included in the critical facility decision making organizational forums.
Nurses must be willing to focus their attention on themselves, considering what they individually can and must do to effect HWEs. Nurses need to take responsibility to create an HWE, one in which they feel emotionally safe, begins with them.