PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
5 Signs That You’ll Be a Great Nurse Mentor
-
EveryNurse Staff
- Last Updated: 09/29/2021
There is no singular definition of what a nurse mentor should or should not be. One thing a nursing mentor is for sure is a more experienced nurse who provides support to a new nurse. When pairing nurse mentors and mentees it can be helpful for them to work in the same department at least starting off. The nurse mentor can also be a preceptor for the new nurse, but the nurse mentor tends to provide more holistic and long-term support for the new nurse than what someone who is only a preceptor provides.
The Need
New nurses need support. The learning curve from nursing student to professional registered nurse is huge – just ask any nurse who is no longer a newbie in the profession or remember back to your brand-new nursing days if you’re an experienced nurse yourself. New nurses need to feel supported not only for their physical and mental wellbeing but also so they’ll stay in the profession.
The nursing shortage is real in the United States and a study published by PubMed highlighted that 13% of new nurses surveyed had changed jobs and 37% felt ready to change jobs within the first year of work. Statistics also show about 33% of nurses leave the bedside within the first 2 years. New nurses need the help of experienced nurses to assist them through the crisis of confidence and fatigue they experience during their first year of work. So how do you know if you have the characteristics to be a successful nurse mentor?
1. You are passionate about advancing the nursing profession beyond individual patient encounters
Studies on nurse mentorship are somewhat limited. However it has been demonstrated that implementing nurse mentor and mentee partnerships can improve working environments for nurses as well as improve patient outcomes in important areas such as fall and pressure ulcer injury prevention.
The care nurses provide for their individual patients day to day is the backbone of a staff nurse’s work and hugely important. By being a nurse mentor, the staff nurse has the power to take this impact on individual patient encounters to the next level. How? A more positive workplace environment with well supported new nurses will in turn lead to a better experience for every patient cared for. This will multiply the nurse mentor’s ability to positively impact patient care even on the nurse’s day off.
2. You have your own new nurse experiences to share (positive or negative) and you’ve learned from it
Nurses who are mentoring that can remember back to their new-grad nurse days are at an advantage. Whether it was a positive or negative experience nurse mentors should try to recall what worked and what didn’t. Remembering what it is like to be new can help the nurse mentor understand the perspective of the mentee.
If the mentee is struggling with something or the nurse mentor has suggestions for how the mentee could improve, it’s usually most productive to present the suggestions to the mentee before going to management. If the mentee is not receptive or changes in practice are not occurring after the mentor makes suggestions, then it would be appropriate to enlist the help of management. Going to management right away can make the mentee feel like he or she is “in trouble” rather than feeling supported.
3. You’re not afraid to speak up
New nurses are at a high risk of being bullied, a phenomenon commonly referred to as “nurses eat their young”. There are a lot of reasons for this unfortunate culture but any instance of nurse bullying is not okay. The nurse mentor needs to be willing to stand up for the mentee in instances of horizontal or vertical violence. What may seem like harmless teasing could be damaging to a new nurse wanting to fit in while trying to learn the complicated world of nursing. The nurse mentor needs to be confident in his or her role, have earned the respect of management and coworkers, and be able to recognize and shut down bullying immediately.
4. You have a little time to give outside of work
The hospital can feel like its own world. After all, it’s a drastically different work environment than what many 9-5 working Americans are used to. Nurses are not only challenged to care for patients and families journeying through the most difficult time periods in their lives, they get few if any breaks, they experience constant noise, and now during the COVID-19 pandemic the utmost caution to prevent exposure needs to be acutely observed at all times.
This is stressful for even the most seasoned nurse. So, if the nurse mentor is able to meet with the mentee in a relaxed environment outside of work upon initial partnership and then even as infrequently as a bimonthly basis, it will be easier to develop a comfortable relationship. It is also important for the mentor, not the mentee, to be the one to suggest the initial meeting and a loose schedule for future meetings so the mentee can be assured of the mentor’s intention to be a support person.
5. You possess a whole lot of patience
New nurses are slower in their work, that’s just the way it is. In many programs classroom time is greater than clinical time, and nursing students are usually used to taking care of 1 or 2 patients instead of the 4 patients that is typical of ER or non-ICU inpatient care. New nurses may also still need to learn some basic medication administration skills, especially if they are coming from a different hospital where policies may be different.
For example, some hospitals require respiratory therapists to administer all inhalers and nebulization treatments. If the nursing student is coming from a hospital where that is the case and now training in a hospital where nurses are responsible for respiratory medications, the mentor needs to be cognizant that the mentee will need extra help in this area. The nursing mentor needs to be willing to teach the mentee from the ground up and be understanding of what the mentee does and doesn’t know at the start of his or her career. The mentor will need to potentially repeat explanations and exhibit patience to allow the nursing mentee to work through new processes.
It’s All Worth It
Being a nurse mentor is a difficult task, but so is nursing. And like nursing, the challenge of mentoring will come with many rewards. In addition to being a healthcare hero in his or her own right, the nurse mentor will nurture the rise of future nursing professionals. Our nation needs good nurses now more than ever.
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