Developing Nurse Leaders in Tennessee

Senior nurse leaders must actively support leader development of emerging nurse leaders in their organizations and their communities. Collaborative learning is one way to gather momentum in leadership development and to create energy and engagement of young nurses who want to lead, yet may not have the skills or be empowered to lead change. The Tennessee Action Coalition (TAC) developed a model to plan and implement collaborative emerging nurse leader seminars across the state. This narrative presents the methods and outcomes of the first seminar as an exemplar to be copied by other states and organizations who similarly want to develop leadership knowledge, skills and abilities in emerging nurse leaders.

“This seminar encouraged me to improve health care in my organization. It also allowed me to network with leaders in other facilities and gain new ideas and the tools for improvement in our community.” This comment from an emerging nurse leader in Memphis represents the many positive comments from the attendees at the inaugural Emerging Nurse Leader seminar held on April 1, 2016 at the University of Memphis Loewenberg College of Nursing in Memphis, TN. Hosted by the senior nurse leaders from the University of Memphis Loewenberg College of Nursing, University of Tennessee Health Science Center College of Nursing, and Baptist Healthcare nursing, in collaboration with The Tennessee Action Coalition (TAC), the Emerging Nurse Leader seminar invited 43 young nurse leaders from the Memphis area to gather for networking and leadership development. Attendees participated from a variety of organizations to include Baptist Memorial Hospital, Church Health Center, Le Bonheur Children’s Hospital, Union University, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, UTHSC College of Nursing, Methodist University Hospital, Methodist North Hospital, and Baptist College of Health Sciences, and University of Memphis Loewenberg College of Nursing. 

The purpose of the seminar was to inspire grassroots action to influence change in Tennessee and create nurse ambassadors for the Tennessee Action Coalition and transformative change. This seminar was the first of a series of regional leadership seminars planned for nurses in 2016 and supports the TAC emphasis on developing nurse leaders throughout the state. The theme for the seminar was "Nurses Leading Change Towards a Culture of Health in Tennessee." This theme captures the intent to focus on leadership and empowering nurses to lead and influence change in healthcare to advocate for actions that support health in Tennessee. The seminar included an inspirational keynote presentation on Envisioning the Future of Nursing and Creating a Culture of Change. The keynote emphasized the impact that nurse leaders can and should have at the local, state, regional and national levels. The keynote presented the message that nurses lead from wherever they are and that leadership is not just by people who hold a leadership title. The keynote challenged the audience to bring the excitement of leading change back to their individual organizations, and to respect nursing values, and she said “can you image healthcare without nurses?”

Attendees also heard from a panel of emerging leaders representing various leadership roles in local health systems and academic centers. The panelists fielded questions related to the challenges in leadership, the barriers that they viewed as the most challenging in their leadership roles, their individual path to their current leadership role, their role models and mentor relationships, their views on developing the culture of health in their settings, the characteristics of effective leaders, their personal leadership development plan, and their advice to someone going into a nursing leadership position for the first time.

The attendees also participated in small group discussions to further discuss strategies for developing a culture of trust, barriers that may impact the development of a culture of trust, strategies for identifying and fostering leadership skills in emerging leaders, and ways to further engage as nurse leaders in their organizations and in their communities. Each group presented key outcomes of the small group sessions to all the attendees. The seminar concluded with an engaging and humorous presentation by a leader from Church Health Center. Church Health Center is one of the largest faith-based healthcare organizations of its type in the country caring for more than 58,000 patients of record without relying on government funding.¹The leader's message focused on responding to the call to create a culture of change. The leader's primary message was to follow your heart and mind to create the best possible environment of care for patients and families.

Another attendee commented “I feel encouraged and reassured to attain and secure a leadership role within my organization.” The Tennessee Action Coalition (https://tac.tennessee.edu/Pages/default.aspx) is encouraging efforts in Tennessee to develop nurse leadership by collaborating with nurse leaders across the state.² The Institute of Medicine (IOM), now known as the Health and Medicine Division (HMD), released a report that communicated the results of the committee’s two-year collaboration with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) that called for the transformation of the nursing profession.  This report delivered key messages to support their recommendations.  One of those messages states the need to “Prepare and enable nurses to lead change to advance health.”³ The successful implementation of the Emerging Nurse Leader seminars is one way to work toward realizing that goal for nurses in Tennessee.

The outcome of this effort was the successful implementation of the collaborative seminar with the associated planning tools including financial aspects so that it can be replicated across the state and shared around the country with other organizations that wish to inspire emerging nurse leaders to become more active change agents.