How can we create collective, collaborative success in nursing?

Feeling a loss of connection with your teammates at work lately? Dealing with bullying or a tough nurse? It can be pretty daunting to continue along a path that isn’t exactly feeling rewarding as of late. Luckily, you have the advice of those who have gone before you to help guide you through your journey. One great resource? Our Scrubs Blog Carnival!

The Rejuvenation Collaboration recently featured a fantastic roundup of wisdom especially for nurses needing a pep talk about coworkers. Check it out below:

I was a highly competitive athlete growing up. Whether on the soccer field, basketball court, or in a heated tennis match–during high school you could find me running, sweating, screaming, and doing my best to “kick butt.”

Competition seems to be looked upon with utmost respect in our Western culture. Parents push their children to make straight As; promotions and career advancements are awarded based on productivity; professional athletes make more money than school teachers. We thrive on competition.

Unfortunately for us, our nursing profession doesn’t escape these challenges either.

Open any nursing journal and you can find articles on nurse-on-nurse bullying. Get onto any social media site and you’ll see posts about nurses struggling with the bureaucracies and politics of professional organizations. Walk onto any nursing unit and sooner or later you’re sure to hear the phrase: “Nurses eat their young.”

Well, I’ve had it. And thankfully, so have many of my colleagues!

Nursing thrives when we all work together. It shouldn’t be about competing against each other for jobs; it should be working collectively as functional, healthy, and happy teams- for the good of the patients. It should be about taking care of each other so that we can excel as the most productive and professional nurses we can be.

The Scrubs Magazine Blog Carnival is a resource which features nurse bloggers from around the country that provide a broad overview of collaborative and collective success. I’m thrilled to be hosting this round because this Blog Carnival has really been a myriad of collaboration at its best. Here are just a few of the awesome nurse bloggers and what they have to say about collective nursing success.

Scrubs Magazine starts us off with a post by Mia Lofgren and Georgietta Bento (how cool is that–two nurse writers, collaborating on one great article!). In their article they share with us the Top 5 Reasons to Love Your Nurse Team. Instead of breaking each other down, this team lifts each other up by strategizing through problems, reaching collective goals, and working on outcomes that best serve their patients.

Joyce Fiodembo, over on International Nurse Support, highlights the Golden Rule and applies this simple, yet beautiful statement to nursing in her post: One Thing that Will Make You Win. Joyce’s post reminds us the way to succeed in this profession is through compassion, love, and peace.

In Are You a Participator or a Spectator, Joyce Harrell invites us to get involved. She reminds us that when we’re involved with the team, we’re more likely to take ownership and feel empowered to support the group as a whole. Nursing projects that thrive, says Joyce, are those that the whole team takes on.

A really neat and unique way to collaborate as a nurse professional is through creative work. Brittney Wilson’s blog over on The Nerdy Nurse illustrates this through nurse writing. 5 Excellent Books Written For Nurses and By Nurses highlights that collaborative success can come in any size, shape, and form. We can lift each other up, but also support each other through lessons learned, inspirational stories, and collective creativity.

Nurse Keith on the Digital Doorway is a great example of creative writing, collaborative action, and novel ingenuity. His posts always seem to amaze me and Nurses and Collective Success is no different. In Keith’s post, he shares with us not only the “Triple Code C: Collaboration, Cooperation and Cross-Pollination,” but his passion, leadership, and example of collective success in action.

This next example is a true role-model of collective success. You’ve got the Gypsy Nurse blog (owned and operated by Candy T, RN), with a guest blogger Lisa Rhodes, RN, writing about the National Nurses in Business Association Conference (describing a presentation that was all about collaboration and cross-pollination!). Boy, now that’s collective success for ya! In Building Collaborative Success within Nursing, Lisa shares with us how community really is our greatest asset.

Finally, for those of us who are not only nurses but also nurse entrepreneurs, you may enjoy Erica MacDonald’s post over on the Self Employed Nurse blog called: Social Media Strategies for Collective Nurse Entrepreneur Success. While Erica’s post shares tips for interaction on social media, I’d also add that her suggestions could easily be applied to any nursing field. Instead of playing a game of Solitare, Erica reminds us that when we get out there and get social we can find help, offer help, and support each other. A win-win for all nurses involved!

I’d love to hear from you. What success stories do you hold from collaboration and collective teamwork? How have your patients, your colleagues, or even your own health and happiness succeeded through working as a collective unit? Share a comment below. And if you’d like to participate, this post was written for the Scrubs Blog Carnival. Nurse bloggers click the image to join us!

This post is a collective effort of nurse bloggers as part of the Scrubs Mag Blog Carnival. If you are interested in participating, find out more details and sign up here.