Make Mentoring One of Your Professional Career Goals

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The process of mentoring can be a mutually satisfying experience. Through mentoring, nurses acquire knowledge and practical skills as well as the assimilation of values, norms, and accepted modes of behavior. Mentor and mentee relationships help to reduce anxiety for beginning nurses during their transition into professional practice.

A healthy and professional workplace environment is necessary in the health care arena with its regulations, rapid changes in health care, fiscal restraints, and public reporting of patient care outcomes. Health care management has approached these expectations by changing the leadership environment, with a strong emphasis on the quality of care and the use of evidence-based practice. The recent American Nurses Credentialing Center's (ANCC) Magnet recognition has been responsible for an increased stability of nursing employment through visible accessible leadership, horizontal organizational structure, and decision making at the staff level (Latham, Ringl, & Hogan, 2011).

A new organization credential is the Pathway to Excellence offered by ANCC. This new credential is designed to recognize health care facilities that have created a therapeutic environment where nurses can flourish (ANCC website). There are 12 standards that a facility must meet. Most require some aspects of mentoring: Nurses should control the practice of nursing; orientation (that is solid) prepares new nurses; professional development is provided and used; and nurses are recognized for their achievements.

A less well researched form of mentoring is executive coaching. Robinson-Walker (2011) recommended some similar activities in which to engage to develop outstanding nurses. First on her list is the need to be the mentor and role model we would want to have. Leadership should recognize talent and tell nurses what is seen in them, provide growth-producing resources as available, and engage with these leaders as they grow. The mentee will recognize the organization's commitment and will strive to meet expectations.

Moos discusses similar mentoring of the novice author (2011). Group support and mentoring are necessary to assist novice authors. Some barriers to writing for publication include lack of motivation, time, and self-confidence and finding a suitable topic. I have mentored several novice authors and find the work to be very rewarding. It benefits our journal as well.

I have also mentored high school students who are considering nursing as a profession. I have taken high school students to Villanova University to observe students during simulation learning experiences. One student from that program has been accepted into the university that was on the top of her list.

Another area of mentoring is within the American Society for Pain Management Nursing (ASPMN). That is one reason why nurses who are attending their first ASPMN conference are identified as such. Committee chairs and elected officers are encouraged to interact with first-time attendees. All first-time attendees are also invited to a reception where they learn about the different committees and chapters. Here they are encouraged to actively participate in the organization.There are many different-colored ribbons that are placed on name badges at the conference to identify those in a particular leadership position. The organization uses mentoring very well. The bylaws specifically state that to hold office the nurse needs to have served ASPMN in some leadership role and by being a member for a specified number of years. This assures the organization that the nurse has some experience within the organization as well as some leadership experience. No doubt, the leadership experience came about through professional mentoring.

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References 

1. ANCC. Retrieved December 19, 2011, from http://www.nursecredentaling.org/Pathway/AboutPathway.aspx.
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2. Latham CL, Ringl K, Hogan M. Professionalization and retention outcomes of a university-service mentoring program partnership. Journal of Professional Nursing. 2011;27(6):344–353
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3. Moos DD. Novice authors… What you need to know to make writing for publication smooth. Journal of PeriAnesthesia Nursing. 2011;26(5):352–356
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