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As healthcare shifted out of pandemic-influenced crisis mode and into a “new normal” across 2023 and now into 2024, many experienced healthcare professionals (HCPs) are taking stock of their careers and wondering what comes next. Even HCPs who may have felt relatively new and inexperienced just before the pandemic have emerged from the last few years with beefed-up skills, settled into staff roles and decided they’re ready to take on new challenges. Becoming a nurse mentor or mentoring an allied health professional may represent the next growth opportunity for such healthcare veterans.
To mentor is to be an adviser providing guidance, motivation, emotional support and role modeling to less-experienced colleagues. Experienced nurses and allied healthcare professionals (AHPs) often measure themselves by the quality of their patient care and patient outcomes. However, knowledgeable nurses or AHPs can magnify their positive impact by successfully mentoring less-experienced colleagues, who go on to deliver excellent patient care of their own.
Healthcare Needs Mentors Right Now
According to previous healthcare workforce surveys conducted by Vivian Health, many healthcare veterans have left their fields in recent years, and many more are planning to leave in the coming years. This exodus has created somewhat of a “brain drain” where there are fewer talented, experienced nurses and AHPs to go around.
Meanwhile, the staff shortages at some healthcare facilities and high turnover rates have created added workplace stress, particularly for professionals early in their careers. Many of these younger professionals were thrown into practice with less clinical training than older cohorts and are still getting their footing. The plethora of younger HCPs in need of support and the reduced numbers of experienced staff help create a unique opportunity where veteran HCPs can make a significant difference in the careers of rising talent.
RELATED: Rx for Success: Venessa Thompson, RN, Renews Her Passion for Trauma ICU Nursing through Mentorship
The Benefits of Mentorship
Mentoring comes with many benefits, ranging from the personal satisfaction of guiding and sharing with another professional to an effective way of keeping “in touch” with current issues and concerns in healthcare. Benefits of mentorship include the potential to:
- Re-invigorate your passion for your field and stay inspired by working with a newer, less-experienced HCP.
- Absorb new ideas and perspectives from professionals who completed their training and education more recently.
- Become a better supervisor or manager by getting more intimate feedback on your leadership skills from your mentee.
- Understand younger patients better by working with potentially younger professionals.
- Feel the personal reward of helping another provider reach their career milestones and achieve their aspirations.
- Contribute to a positive work culture within your unit, facility or health system.
On a more overarching level, mentorship provides a way to feel the reward of experiencing someone else’s personal growth journey when we’ve already achieved much of what we desired for our own career growth. It’s the profound experience of having already met our own needs and being able to channel some of our knowledge and energy into someone earlier in the journey.
You can also be a mentor even if you have yet to achieve all your own career aspirations, as long as you have valuable experience worth sharing. In fact, successfully mentoring a less-experienced HCP can demonstrate you’re a good candidate to move up the career ladder, from a position such as registered nurse to charge nurse or nurse educator or to a position in management or administration. Successful mentorship can be a somewhat informal stepping stone to more formal recognition and advancement.
5 Tips for Being a Good Nurse Mentor in Healthcare
If you feel ready and willing to take on a mentorship role in healthcare, consider these five tips that can help lead you to a more successful experience.
1. Lead for All by Example
Mentorship is, above all, modeling. A good mentor is someone who models professionalism, a strong work ethic, and a talented application of patient care skills at all times, including outside formal mentor-mentee relationships. A mentee learns as much by observing and imitating your skills and habits and your interactions with colleagues as they learn from your explicit instruction and feedback. Once you become a good model for everyone around you, you’re ready to work more closely with one or more individual mentees.
2. Build Trust and Foster Open Communication
Successful mentorship relies on a solid foundation of trust and open communication. When your mentee feels safe and comfortable sharing their thoughts, challenges and successes, you can more effectively advise them on all areas of patient care and career management.
Establishing this trust and open communication requires actively listening to your mentee and showing genuine interest in their development. In some ways, you’re using the same skills from patient care that foster open dialogue with patients to help them be open about their concerns and needs. Meanwhile, your feedback should be clear, honest and constructive. Avoid taking a harsh and critical tone or being a disciplinarian with your mentee.
3. Encourage Independence and Goal Identification
Mentorship should differ somewhat from parenting in the sense that parents often try to dictate what their child’s goals should be. At its best, mentorship helps the mentee identify and pursue their own goals. Ask open-ended questions to find out more about your mentee’s aspirations. Support their goals by providing resources, making connections and offering opportunities that align with their desired career path rather than dictating what you think their goals should be.
When possible, offer your mentee(s) opportunities that allow them to challenge themselves and build skills under your supervision. They can then practice these independently later or even become a mentor down the road for someone else.
4. Join a Mentorship Program for Support
Some health systems and healthcare professional organizations have established mentorship programs to pair potential HCP mentees and mentors. Check with your facility’s human resources department to see if it offers an official internal program or partners with any externally. Formalized programs may provide guidance on leadership and mentorship, ranging from tips, brochures and mentorship packets to formalized continuing education on mentorship.
If your health system doesn’t offer a mentorship program, Vivian Health created a mentor-mentee match program during its inaugural Healthcare Professional Wellness Week to help willing mentors and aspiring mentees find one another. We ask mentees to share their discipline, specialty, and other qualities important to them in a mentor-mentee relationship so we can match them with a mentor who aligns with their preferences. That mentor could be you! Once Vivian puts you and your mentor in touch, cultivating that relationship is up to you.
5. Cultivate a Workplace Bond
Mentorship can start small as a very informal interaction in the workplace by offering friendly advice to less experienced colleagues. Those most open to mentorship show their interest with follow-up questions and appreciation. Once you discover who has this open mindset, consider who among them you might want to work with. If you observe a colleague who demonstrates a work ethic you would be proud to build on through your mentorship, start a conversation with them.
A Mentorship Evolves Over Time
Once you establish a mentor-mentee relationship, you’ll see that it evolves as your mentee builds skills and gains confidence. Your relationship may shift from one where you primarily focus on patient care skills to one where you advise your mentee in such areas as pursuing continuing education, trying a period of travel work, navigating workplace bureaucracy or pursuing higher-paying opportunities and leadership roles.
Ultimately, your successful relationship may culminate a few years down the road, with you advising your mentee on how to become a good mentor themselves and continue the chain of support with the next generation of caregivers.
Explore Vivian’s new program to get matched with a mentee and make a difference today!
