If you are ready for a new challenge in your nursing career, the role of being a new nurse mentor might be the right fit. Having mentors who help new employees understand essential responsibilities and field all their questions is important in every field.
Becoming a nurse mentor is an especially crucial in the complex world of nursing and medicine. The healthcare landscape is constantly evolving, and having a mentor can increase the confidence and accuracy of new nurses.
Proper training for mentoring new nurses
While nursing experience is necessary for mentoring new nurses, becoming a family nurse practitioner is another way to attain the leadership role you seek. This is a rewarding way to advance your education through an online FNP program while challenging yourself as a nurse mentor.
Since you can earn this advanced practice degree in your own time, you can continue to work and interact with other nurses.
Once you have achieved a family nurse practitioner degree to enter a new career phase, connecting with a mentor can help jumpstart your skills. Progressing in your family nurse practitioner job can allow you to pursue an opportunity to mentor other new nurses.
How an advanced degree helps mentoring
As an experienced nurse, you can play a vital role in the accomplishments of new nurses as you perform your family nurse practitioner job. Earning an advanced degree allows you to cover a wide range of academic knowledge that can be combined with extensive nursing experience. This can be an effective pairing to aid new nurses who need someone with practical and professional knowledge as a resource.
Recent research shows that new nurses with a mentor during the first year of practice have a better understanding of high-level nursing practices, increased confidence, and better job satisfaction.
These focus areas help new nurses and new nurse practitioner peers, especially in the first six months to one year.
Preparation for new nurses and Family Nurse Practitioners
New nurses and family nurse practitioners prepare for mentor meetings by writing down questions and problems they need help with. Discussing issues with a more experienced nurse is a valuable resource and confidence-builder.
A frame of reference for new nurses and Family Nurse Practitioners
Feeling defensive and on guard can be a normal reaction to starting a new career or a new job in a medical setting. As a nurse mentor, you can work to understand the frame of reference of the new nurse and gently aim to reframe it into a more productive outlook.
Effective communication
Effective communication is an essential skill for mentoring. Utilizing pregnant pauses and encouraging language can help new nurses and family nurse practitioners to see you are on their side, partnering with them to improve their skills and approach to nursing.
Reinforcing a culture of safety
Reinforcing a culture where new nurses and family nurse practitioners can express their feelings and ideas can improve their work performance and outlook. Nursing can be difficult, sometimes lonely, so having someone to talk to about issues and work to a solution is essential.
The role of a mentor
A mentor shares information and strategies with a new employee trying to learn a new career. When new nurses start working in a medical setting, there are many things to learn that they did not cover in nursing school. Mentors are the ones who fill the gap.
The first responsibility of a nurse mentor is to validate the new nurses by teaching them how to succeed in their jobs. You do this by answering questions and helping them understand when they make mistakes. This is a form of teaching correction that aims to improve the process for them the next time.
The second responsibility is to help new nurses problem-solve. As you walk them through how to solve a problem, they can take those skills into the next difficult situation.
The third role of a mentor is to be an active listener. Listening is a lost art, but it can be important for you to practice as someone who encourages new nurses to reach their goals and potential. Active listening and asking questions foster respect and trustworthiness in the relationship.
The role of a new nurse mentor
You will be a resource for clinical and non-clinical questions as new nurses learn their jobs. Since there are so many adjustments for new nurses as they practice what they learned in college, you can serve as a teacher, role model, and coach.
One way you can help new nurses is to talk about a work-life balance. You can offer emotional support and encourage them to find hobbies they enjoy doing when they are not working. You might also recommend mental health assistance when they need an objective point of view to work through feelings and frustrations. It can be common for new nurses to feel overwhelmed and need some aid for better mental health.
Another way to mentor new nurses is to offer constructive criticism. This is the process in which you praise their strengths and help them improve their weaknesses. Remind them that everyone makes mistakes when they are learning and help them see where they can make better decisions in the future.
As a nurse mentor, you can help them bridge the gap between a medical and healthcare philosophy they learned in college and the actual practice of the medical care model. Many times this can be a wide gap that new nurses need assistance navigating.
Finally, the new nurse/mentor relationship promotes lifelong learning. You can always be a resource for the nurses you have mentored as they progress in their nursing careers.
Mentoring phases to build relationships
Some studies show that new nurses with mentors have a better job retention rate and feel more successful than those who don’t have this added help. Transitioning from a novice to a practicing professional is crucial to increased nursing confidence and excellent patient care.
Some medical facilities offer mentors to nurses coming from other nursing jobs since adjusting to new expectations, and work circumstances can be challenging for even experienced nurses. The combined mental and emotional support goals with professional training can be a recipe for success.
Once formal orientation ends, these guidelines for a mentorship relationship can form a beneficial structure.
Nurse mentor phase I
While some medical facilities match mentors with new nurses through a random assignment, results show that allowing new nurses to select their mentors can result in a much stronger relationship. Since new nurses likely will work a different schedule than a mentor, they can communicate via texting, email, and agreed-upon in-person meetings.
Nurse mentor phase II
Regular weekly check-ins for the nurse and mentor can be aimed at answering questions, working through problems, and clarifying professional practices. The point is to have scheduled, structured times for discussions on issues the new nurse experiences to identify solutions.
Nurse mentor phase III
The final nurse mentor phase is geared toward assuring the new nurses that they are ready to handle the role independently. It is important to note that each person is different, so the mentoring period should be flexible and tailored to the person, not the program.
Benefits of new nurse mentoring
Aside from expanding clinical skills and improving patient outcomes, being part of new nurse mentoring often means you can positively impact the next generation of nurses. Many medical and hospital settings also compensate mentors, letting you earn extra income for this crucial role.
Career direction
New nurses often need a clear idea of where they fit in nursing. An effective mentor can help them sift through the options to find where their skills fit best. Mentors can have a unique front seat to their mentees, able to guide them to the areas where they will excel.
Leadership direction
The relationship with a nurse mentor can compel nurses to stay in the healthcare field. Because nurse mentors are senior staff members, they can have a voice for change that improves nursing satisfaction and patient care.
Aid for transition to a new jo
As new nurses gain experience and confidence, a nurse mentor can be uniquely qualified to recommend them for promotions and more senior-level positions.
Impacting social norms
Because nurses help a cross-section of people, a nurse mentor can facilitate an understanding of many different cultures for a new nurse to extend compassionate care to various patients and their families.
As a new family nurse practitioner, you can glean helpful insights and information from a nurse mentor that helps you acclimate to your new role better. Becoming a family nurse practitioner can give you dynamic opportunities to aid new nurses and effect change through becoming a nurse mentor who helps and guides the next generation of nurses.