Nurse Innovator, Nicole Weathers

[00:00] Michelle: In my conversation with Nicole Weathers, I had a moment that made me wonder, "Why didn't I think of this?" Nicole is a pioneering nurse who cofounded STAT PD, a medical marketplace that empowers nurses and allied health professionals to purchase and sell resources for their professional development. She started her career in a rural hospital where she had to take on multiple roles, but she prioritized her professional development and gained invaluable experience. An educator for both patients and nurses, she invested in her own education and is currently a doctoral student. As if that weren't enough, she manages an online nurse residency program that helps new nurses across the nation transition from student to practitioner. Nicole firmly believes in lifelong learning and feels that professionals should not have to start from scratch when seeking development resources. And I wholeheartedly endorse that perspective. After hearing her speak, you'll know it's evident that Nicole is a true champion of professional growth and development. In the five-minute snippet: I knew it, she's a card keeper. Here is Nicole Weathers. Well, good morning, Nicole. Welcome to the podcast.
[01:46] Nicole: Thank you so much for having me, Michelle. It's great to meet you.
[01:50] Michelle: It is so wonderful to talk to you in person. We meet so many of our guests and just colleagues on Instagram. And I think it's great how Instagram brings like-minded people together. And that's how I saw you. And I saw you well, I guess your page, which is amazing, and I definitely will put that in the show notes. That's STAT PD, and I want you to talk all about that in a little bit because it's novel and I really love it. But, yes, it's great to talk to you on the line, in person. So thank you so much for being here.
[02:40] Nicole: I'm excited.
[02:41] Michelle: Me too. Today we're going to talk about a lot of things because you wear a lot of different hats and you have several different roles, and they're all very interesting and they're all very pertinent. So I just want you to start off by telling us kind of what's your background and experience in nursing.
[03:04] Nicole: Sure. So I have been a registered nurse now for, I think, 17 years, which doesn't really seem possible. I still sometimes feel like I'm new, but I went to the University of Iowa College of Nursing and graduated there with my bachelor's degree in about 2006, I believe it was. Started my first role far away from home, moved 16 hours across the country, started a new role, worked in sort of it was a same-day surgery outpatient type, short stay floor. And then there was an infusion clinic where we did chemotherapy and different kinds of outpatient infusions. And I did that for not quite a full year. So I was one of those new graduate nurses that leave their first job within the first year, and being so far from home and coping with some of the realities of working as a nurse in healthcare, I kind of decided maybe being closer to home would be better. I was really focused on the time of never having a vacation, right? Because all of my vacation time was going to be spent going home to visit my family and working the night before or the night of a holiday. It was kind of like I wasn't even able to make it home for the holidays a lot of times, and so made the big decision to pack up everything and do the one thing I said I would never do, move back across country. And I landed in a small rural community not far from where I grew up. So when I got there and I started looking for a job, I realized that the large hospitals that I was used to weren't really within even an hour's drive of where I was now living. And there were all these tiny hospitals that I came to learn were called critical access hospitals. They had about 25 beds in them compared to where I first started my job. And so I started working in rural healthcare, and to be honest, when I did, I kind of felt like, oh, my gosh, all of my friends are working in large ICU. They're in places like Chicago and Madison, Wisconsin, and Iowa City, and these big large teaching hospitals, and here I am working in a 25-bed hospital. But it didn't take me long to realize that I was totally off my rocker when it came to what I thought rural health care really was like. And it was really interesting, because right away in my orientation, I think they were running through mock codes, and they said, okay, you walk into a patient's room, you find out they're not breathing, you realize they're not breathing, what do you do? And I was like, well, you call the code team. And they looked at me and they kind of started laughing, and they're like, you are the code team, right? You are the person who's going to be responsible for all of this. And so that was kind of a rude awakening that I had to become sort of a mini expert in all the things. I didn't necessarily have those specialty resources at my beck and call when I needed them. So that is how I sort of ended up in rural healthcare. And then I worked there for about seven years. And it's funny when you say, like, you wear a lot of different hats because I think that has been me all along. When you work in rural healthcare, you wear a lot of different hats, right? You are the nurse. You are the code team. You are pharmacy after hours and administration when there's things maybe going not quite right in the evening or overnight hours. And so I had the opportunity to do so many things though there. I was a floor nurse, of course, worked in the acute care setting, got to cross-train into labor and delivery, got to even cover here or there, help out in the ED or even the critical care areas. And then I eventually became their nurse educator. And so I was responsible for all the orientation and onboarding of our new hires. I got to go into diabetes Ed for a while. I ran a program there for our outpatient diabetic population and then even did a little bit with nursing informatics and our transition to a new EHR and learned a whole lot of that world as well. And that was all before I took my current role, which is with the Iowa Online Nurse Residency program that's offered through the University of Iowa College of Nursing. And we work with rural hospitals, but we also work with large organizations as well to offer an online curriculum for nurse residency. So for those new graduate nurses who are just getting started, just transitioning into practice, we provide a year-long program to sort of help support that transition. Which is just really interesting when you look back at where I started and the fact that I was one of the new nurses that started and left my first job within the first year, right?
[08:32] Michelle: But who better than somebody that's actually lived it and that sees the need for something like that? And I was on that website, all over it and I just thought this is really so necessary, so important for our new nurses that they just don't always get. And it was so comprehensive. One of the things I really loved was My Nursing Mastery, like a whole course to pass the NCLEX and then the preceptor training. And I think that's something that's really lacking today. I think preceptors are chosen. The nurses that are precepting are chosen because they show a lot of leadership skills, a lot of clinical skills and so they're kind of just chosen or they volunteer, but they don't have any really formal training on how to be a preceptor, what the new nurses need. So I think that's really amazing too.
[09:44] Nicole: That is so true. We find that all the time that the most expert nurse on the unit, or the one that's been there the longest is often just asked to precept. And they aren't necessarily the best fit. Not because they don't have the knowledge, but mostly because they don't even think anymore about what they do or why they do what they do. They just know to do it. And so we've actually found that a lot of our newer nurses and for many organizations it is the new sort of training, the new just because of some of the turnover issues that we've seen. But they still remember they are still thinking through a lot of the process. They remember what it's like to be new. They remember what it's like to want to sort of know the why. And it's all very fresh for them to be able to kind of explain and provide that training and support for them.
[10:38] Michelle: Yeah, absolutely. And so much of that resonates with just my personal story as a nurse for 36 years in the NICU and really loving teaching and the first time that I was a preceptor, exactly what you said. So much of what we do after so long and so much experience, it's so automatic, and we don't really think about the why we do it anymore. And then we have a new nurse that's saying, but why? Why do you do this? And it's like I found myself going, oh, yeah, wait, why do I do this? And having to think backwards to when I was first learning it. And it really helps you if you're motivated to teach, it just really helps you come up to speed very quickly and realize, okay, this person doesn't know the why. So it's my role to explain the why, to go over everything, and that's a lot of responsibility. And I've known a lot of preceptors that have gotten into it, and I'm not sure what they thought it was going to be, but then they go, oh, man, I don't want this role. It's forcing me to think too much. Or sometimes as nurses, we feel really uncomfortable if we don't know the answer to the question that's being asked of us. Maybe we're just kind of rusty in that part of our knowledge base, and so we just feel really uncomfortable about it. So I just think any kind of training for preceptors is crucial because we're training the new nurses in their profession, and we want them to love it, and we don't want them to leave. We don't want them to burn out. So that's just such important training. It is.
[12:54] Nicole: And I think that nursing is kind of notorious for just assuming if you know how to do something, you know how to teach something. Yeah, and that's just it's not the case. And I also think that precepting is a lot of extra work. It's hard, and with the turnover and the retention issues that we've seen in the last few years, these preceptors are getting burned out. So making sure that we have enough people trained to be able to fulfill this role and do a good job is going to be so important for keeping those preceptors fresh and hopefully in the long run, improving retention.
[13:35] Michelle: Yeah, that's the goal, definitely. And obviously putting nurses in the workforce that are knowledgeable and confident and all those things that we want as professionals. So take me through just I'm a new grad, and I'm going to take your course. What are kind of the steps? What would we go through?
[14:01] Nicole: Sure. So we mostly work right now with organizations that are hiring new grads. But we have said that we are definitely willing to work with individuals. So if you find yourself working in an organization that doesn't have any sort of transition to practice or residency program, definitely connect with us and we'd be happy to sort of work through that. But typically what happens is once a new grad has been enrolled through either their organization or if they decided to kind of do it independently, they get enrolled into an online cohort. And so this online cohort are new graduate nurses from all over the country. So I'm here in Iowa, so could probably most likely have new grads that are working here in Iowa, but then also could be Colorado, could be Montana, could be Oregon, could be Wisconsin, could be New York. So whoever really is just starting in the program at that time becomes this online cohort and then they work through the program together. And so there's a combination of sort of online content that they will do that's self-paced. So this is really kind of trying to make it sort of fun content. So it is short microlearning videos. So these are all videos that are five minutes or less. We've got podcasts so much like we're doing today. We did a series of interviews with expert nurses and we've integrated that into our curriculum each month. We do have a focus on well-being as well. So we're talking about things like resiliency and self-regulation and optimism, but then also things like self-compassion and self-appreciation and why meaning and engagement are such an important part of our professional roles as well. And so that is sort of the focus of the content. So each month there is sort of a professional skill that we focus on. So things like communication or managing patient care, how do we develop solid habits and routines or safety? We do get into things like safety and quality and EBP. But each month there's a professional skill. Each month there's a well-being topic. It's about an hour to 2 hours of sort of online content, completely self-paced. You can do it wherever you want, whenever you want, you can do it right from your smartphone. And then one time each month we actually get that cohort of residents together via a live Zoom call. And we have facilitators here at the University of Iowa that facilitate sort of a debrief discussion with the participants, where they get to sort of share with one another what they're experiencing and how they're applying some of these concepts in practice and where are they maybe struggling and get advice and strategies and things like that. So each month for the first twelve months they will focus on these different things. They'll have those discussion pieces ideally with the organization. They have an on-site person who's sort of mentoring them as well and checking in with them each month. That is where they can go over maybe more of, like, the clinical skills or some of the facility-specific things that they need more information on. And then as part of this whole online program, they will actually engage in what we call a professional experience. And so with this professional experience, they get to do a few different things. They can identify a change, like something in their organization they think could be improved upon, and then they sort of take the steps to try to bring change to the organization. They can do a case study, which is really kind of a neat thing, where they identify a patient, and we all have that patient, right, especially from that first year of nursing, where we still think about them to this day, like, what happened? What went wrong? Where could I have done better? But they take a little bit of a deep dive into a patient case like that, and then instead of actually taking the steps to make a change, they do research and they come up with a proposed change. So they would take this idea to maybe a unit-based council or a group of nurse leaders at their organization and propose that based off of this case, this is what I think the organization could do to make sure this doesn't happen again in the future. And then the third option for that is that they could choose to engage in committee work. So an existing committee that's already working on a change, they get to join that committee, sort of temporarily learn all about what that committee does, and then figure out how they can use some of the strengths that they have to help that committee sort of carry out the work that they're doing. So three different ways to kind of see really what a professional nurse does as a part of their practice beyond caring for patients at the bedside during sort of their typical shift work.
[19:17] Michelle: Yeah, it sounds like a very comprehensive program. And I just want to say, where were you in my life 40 years ago?
[19:27] Nicole: It's so funny because I think that all the time because we definitely have those nurses who are like, this is great. This has been so beneficial, but we always have the few that are like, this isn't for me. And I'm like, you don't know what you don't know, right? You don't know how helpful this really is.
[19:46] Michelle: Oh, my gosh, just the segment alone on the mental health aspect of it, that's huge. And teaching nurses about shared governance and unit-based councils, and we had no idea how any of that worked. And I think you do probably hear from a lot of nurses that are like, hey, I made it through without any of that. And I did just fine. And I want to say to them, really? Are you really okay? Are you really fine? Because such a valuable program, I think.
[20:30] Nicole: We also need to acknowledge the fact that healthcare is different than it was 30 years ago. So maybe they did make it through just fine 30 years ago. But patients are sicker, hospitals are just more complex. There's a lot more technology, there's a lot more just focus on things like quality outcomes and all of those things. So it would be interesting to see if they would be just fine in today's healthcare as a new graduate.
[20:54] Michelle: That's true. That's very true. Yeah. And I heard you talking about evidence-based practice and all of that and I think that's great. My brother, I interviewed him on this program, he's the director of research at our local hospital. And that's his thing. He helps nurses and other health professionals, residents, and physicians, do research. And I just think there's such value in that. And any program that can start new nurses thinking in that direction, it's just so valuable. I mean, I just keep saying that over and over, but when I learned about the program, I just thought, oh my God, every school of nursing needs this. Do you reach out or do you have other schools of nursing reach out to you about your program? And do you do any train-the-trainer training for other hospitals or programs?
[22:01] Nicole: Sure. So we actually provide this program nationwide, so less working with colleges of nursing and more working with individual healthcare organizations. So any healthcare organization that hires new nurses can partner with us to bring this program to their organization. They pay a fee per participant to enroll them, depending on the sort of option they choose. So the one I described for you is what we call our online option. This is typically for sort of those smaller organizations that maybe don't have the resources or the volume of new grads to do a big comprehensive face-to-face program. But we also provide that same curriculum to large organizations. So if it is a large organization that's looking to just standardize their program to sort of make it a little bit more efficient with not having to bring in speakers or things like that, or maybe they don't have one in place yet, they can also partner with us to just use the curriculum but then run the program themselves in person.
[23:06] Michelle: Wow, that's great. Such a great benefit. And I'll add all those links into the show notes so that anybody can check that out. So you are a DNP student right now, is that correct?
[23:24] Nicole: I am a DNP student.
[23:29] Michelle: Wow, I've interviewed quite a few DNPs and I just interviewed a DNP student, Carla Stanley, because I wanted to get her perspective on what it's like in the actual program. And just from her description alone, it sounds very challenging. And one of the questions I asked her was what she was going to do her capstone project on. And so I will ask you the same thing if, you know, what do you think you're going to do your capstone on?
[24:03] Nicole: So that's been something I've been thinking a lot about because I have to have my decision made by August about what I am going to be focusing on. But right now I'm really leaning towards sort of that next step beyond just that transition to practice. So, so much of my career so far has been focused on helping new grads. And as far as being in the DNP program, that's really formal education, on being sort of a formal leader. But what's happening for the people in between? How are we supporting those people who are not new grads, but maybe they're not in a formal leadership position either, and they're trying to sort of find their way? So my focus, or my thought of my focus right now is going to be more on that sort of mid-career sort of mentorship to just make sure that we have the right nurses in the right seats, being able to bring their best to healthcare every day.
[25:05] Michelle: I think that is a very worthy project and I just can't wait to see the end result of that. I think, thankfully, there's a lot of attention recently on new grads, new nurses, and some of the ones that are not so new are kind of forgotten like you said, and they need a seat at the table as well. So I think that's such a worthy project. Where are you in your process of when are you going to be done? And all that stuff.
[25:39] Nicole: So, since I'm working full time and I do have a couple of kids at home, I am doing this program part-time, so I will actually graduate in May of 2025. So I have two years left, which is essentially because I do have a master's degree already.
[25:59] Michelle: Right.
[26:00] Nicole: It's essentially my capstone. And then I've got some leadership Practicums where I'm doing executive leadership type Practicums, which will be kind of exciting to see and work alongside other leaders.
[26:16] Michelle: Yeah, very cool. Sounds like you have a very bright future with all of that. So that's awesome.
[26:24] Nicole: Well, thank you. I'm excited for it. I really enjoyed it. I was really unsure if a DNP was my next step or if it was, quote-unquote, necessary, but I will say that so far it's been extremely valuable. My focus is on systems and leadership and innovation. And so the innovation classes, though, I've just been loving. I think it's finally giving me I'm kind of naturally a creative thinker, a future thinker in this innovation class that I was able to take the very first semester. Really just help give me sort of the tangible processes that can help me better, maybe bring some of this innovation together without just trial and error, because I'm a big trial and error person, but kind of just giving me more of a formal process to follow to make sure that I'm thinking about all the things.
[27:26] Michelle: Well, let's talk about innovation, and let's talk about STAT PD. Do you think STAT PD came out of that kind of innovation mindset? Or how did you come up with the idea of that?
[27:42] Nicole: Absolutely. I mean, like I said, I'm very much like if you do like the Clifton strength, my top strength is like being a future-focused thinker, which I think is really interesting. I didn't necessarily know that until recently. And so when I'm like, oh, this is why I think the way that I think sometimes. Being that, I just naturally tend to think of like, oh, wouldn't this be cool if this existed? Or how can we do this new or different so that we're really meeting the needs of our users of our program? And so we were visiting one day about a tool that I had made for my nine-to-five job with the online residency program. And this was essentially like eight years' worth of my learning put together in one tool to help people who use our program have a nice organized process and have a nice organized plan for how we're going to implement this in real life. And as I was looking at this tool, I kind of said to a friend of mine, wouldn't it be cool if you could just sell this? Even if people aren't using our online residency program, this tool would be valuable to anyone who wants to implement the transition to practice in their organization. And we kind of looked at each other and we're like, well, why couldn't you? And so while this tool is not listed on STAT PD because that's a conflict of interest, of course, we got to thinking, like, why couldn't I mean, nurses are creating things every day. We're natural innovators. We are creating tools, we're creating resources to make our jobs easier all the time, and yet they just sit there for us to use. And how could we help nurses share these things with others so that not only do they help others do their jobs better, but then we're not reinventing the wheel every time we turn around? Because yes, especially with my work in rural healthcare, where we don't have a lot of resources, I was spending time all the time creating things, whether they were mock code scenarios or case studies to use with my nurses or orientation tools like competency. Checklists all the things that you use to do your job of educating nurses. And so much of my time was creating those things, even though I knew they probably existed somewhere in the world. Like, someone out there has already created this thing. And so that is really where sort of this idea for what if we gave nurses a platform to share their everyday knowledge, their everyday expertise, the tools that they use every day for their job with others? How could that maybe impact healthcare? How could that impact our individual nurses?
[30:53] Michelle: Yeah, when I first was looking at the site and everything, the things that kept running through my mind were like, this is so novel, and yet it's so necessary, in your words, to not have to reinvent the wheel. Somebody out there has done this at some point. And I ran into the same thing as the developmental specialist for the NICU. I was doing a lot of education and always creating all these forms. And sometimes I would think the same thing that you like, there has to be a form out here. There has to be a document somewhere. And I would reach out to other hospitals or other professionals, and I found that they were really kind of hesitant to share their forms. It's like everyone wants to keep it to themselves.
[31:59] Nicole: Oh, my gosh, I'm glad you say that because that is so true. I know we work so much in silos of this is what I'm doing here. And sometimes you're lucky. Sometimes you can email out and say, anybody willing to share this and they will send it right over to you. But the other side of that is that it's fabulous that those people are just willing to share it, but they likely put a lot of time and effort into creating that, to begin with. Yes, and it would be amazing if we could kind of assign a value to that expertise that they've put into creating that thing and allow them to have some sort of compensation for their time and energy, and effort that went into that, to begin with.
[32:50] Michelle: I love that. And I remember several times in my career finding a hospital or unit that had exactly what I needed, and they were very hesitant to share it. And I remember saying to myself, like, oh my God, maybe I should offer to pay for this. I would buy this. It's so valuable and it's exactly what I need. And then 20 years later, I find your site and I'm like, oh my God. Again, I'm like, where was this 20 years ago?
[33:23] Nicole: Right? And don't you wonder if we were more willing to share, even if there was compensation sort of assigned to it, where could we be right now?
[33:33] Michelle: Yes, exactly. Well, before you launched STAT PD, did you do any research to see if there was anything similar out there? Like, did you run a test? Did you do anything, I think, of the PDSA cycle. Did you do anything like that before you guys launched?
[33:53] Nicole: So we definitely did research like, does this exist and we just don't know about it. And what we sort of discovered is, of course Etsy exists. Etsy is more, I think, geared towards the creative, crafty type. However, we did see that there were some nurses that were listing things just like this on Etsy already. So we thought that was sort of interesting because I would have never, ever thought to probably go to Etsy to look for something like that.
[34:24] Michelle: Right?
[34:26] Nicole: The other sort of marketplace that's out there that we became aware of was Teachers Pay Teachers. And so this is what STAT PD is all about. But it's focused on K through twelve education. And so we're like, but where do healthcare professionals, what sort of platforms are there for healthcare professionals? And to our knowledge from our research at the time of development, nothing like that existed for healthcare professionals. So not just nurses really, but we look at STAT PD as being something that respiratory therapists, or physical therapists, or speech and language pathologists. I mean, there's a lot of healthcare professionals that could utilize the platform of staff PD.
[35:19] Michelle: Absolutely. And just talking about Teachers Pay Teachers. So my late husband was a teacher for 30 years and I remember him one day, I didn't know where he got a lot of his stuff, and one day we were talking and he said, oh yeah, I get this on this website Teachers Pay Teachers. And so I started looking around on there and there were actually things that I got from that site that I ended up editing to make them applicable to my job. And I thought this is wonderful. But then STAT PD, I mean, it's all things for documents, protocols for our community. We don't have to get something from another profession and tailor it to ours. These are already there and they're already tailored to our profession.
[36:21] Nicole: And I think you bring up a good point too. As nurses, we are educators too, right? And so I belong to a couple of Facebook groups that are more faculty focused and people are always like, does anybody have a lesson plan on teaching labs? And so again, people are very willing to just share what they're doing and I think that is great. But I think STAT PD could even be leveraged for faculty to their resources out there that they are using teaching higher ed and teaching nursing students, or even CNA students, or LPM students, or whatever healthcare professional we're talking about. They could share their things on there and instead of just giving them away for free, get a little bit back in return.
[37:19] Michelle: Yeah, absolutely, I agree. How do you market the business right now? What's your marketing strategy?
[37:27] Nicole: Well, we are very fresh still, right? So I still say we're still sort of getting started. We're doing this on top of being a full-time employee and DNP student and all the other things. Right now we're really just using social media as our main platform for helping others learn about the website or the marketplace. We have been active on LinkedIn, we've been active on Instagram, and Facebook, of course, hopefully getting out and talking to people like you to help us get this word out that this is available. And then I am hoping in the next twelve months or so to get a little bit more firm marketing plan, sort of put together so that we are a little bit more consistent in getting our messaging out there to the world so that they know that we're here. But we are very new in getting this marketplace established.
[38:32] Michelle: Yeah. And I think many successful businesses have started out doing exactly what you're doing, using social media to spread the word and just word of mouth. It's wonderful when a nurse or another medical professional would find your site and go, oh my God, you guys, I found this. We have to get this or we have to list our stuff on there. And just word of mouth I think is awesome.
[39:07] Nicole: Yeah. And I think that that's where right now we're really kind of focusing on finding sellers so people who have resources or want to create resources to put on there. And then I think really, once we've got a few more resources on there than we do today, then we'll really step into marketing to buyers a little bit more than we are right now. Of course, just so that they know what resources are out there and available. So we are very much start small. We're going to start with what we have, sort of grassroots initiative to get this marketplace out there.
[39:43] Michelle: No, I love it. And I was on the website and initially I was looking at everything and I was thinking to myself, I don't really have anything that I could list on here. But then I really started giving it a lot more thought and I go, oh wait, yeah, I could list that. And that.
[40:08] Nicole: I think so cool is most people have something already. Oftentimes I think as nurses again, we have to create something from scratch, we've got to reinvent something to put on there and it's like, no, actually your first listing probably already exists and all you need to do is take the steps to set up that seller account and connect your payment system and list it. Right. And you're ready to go.
[40:38] Michelle: Yeah, it's so easy and I love that you offer that. The free idea generator. I was like, I'm all about those generators because sometimes my brain is so clouded with so many things at one time it gets on overload and I just need like an idea generator where I probably have that in my brain somewhere, but I need something to spark it so that I can remember what it is. Oh my gosh, absolutely.
[41:11] Nicole: And I think that just gets you thinking about what some of the different possibilities are. Like you said at first, we're very sort of tunnel vision, sort of focused on it has to be something big and grand and brand new and it really doesn't have to be. I mean, there are so many things, like I said, that we use every day that we could list. Now granted, you can create new things. You've got some people on there right now who are selling sort of like leadership planner tools or things to help you find your remote job. One that I personally bought was a get-to-know-your-employees form. So that was something that's been on my list for 100 years. Right. I want to learn more about I work with a remote team, and so I want to learn more about what are their hobbies and what are some of their favorite places to get coffee so that I can send them a little gift card or whatever. And I kept thinking, like, I got to come up with a form to do this, so I have all the questions. Well, all of a sudden, one day, one of our sellers listed that exact form, and I bought it for, like, $4.99 or something, and I started using it the next day. So, I mean, that's really the idea of STAT PD is that it's instantly available to you that you can begin using it to do your job.
[42:30] Michelle: Yeah, I think that's so cool. And one of the things I saw in there was, like, a code blue documentation form. And I thought, oh, that's so cool. Because I remember when we were making those for the NICU, and they had them, of course, in our hospital, but we wanted one specifically for our population. And I just thought, oh, this is so cool. I love this talk about the importance of networking in business.
[43:02] Nicole: Sure. I think networking has been one of the biggest things for me, and my just career, in general, is getting to know people and learning what their connections are. And suddenly things just sort of I don't know if you've noticed this, but things just sort of start to begin to fall into place, right? Like, we had reached out to The Nursing Beat, which is a great daily newsletter. I love it. Isn't that so great? So it talks about all the things nursing related and how can we connect, how can we network. They allowed us to share STAT PD in that nursing newsletter, which went out, and then I think maybe that's where actually you saw this about, oh, my gosh, and then we connected on Instagram, and now we're doing this interview. Wow, who knows where it goes from here? But I just think of networking as this chain reaction that kind of allows you to just share what it is that you're sort of doing, and then it's almost a snowball effect right? That we can continue to build on.
[44:17] Michelle: Yes, that's exactly how, that you were talking about The Nursing Beat, they highlight different organizations and different businesses, and that's exactly I clicked on the STAT PD, and it took me to your Instagram, and wow, that's so cool.
[44:34] Nicole: STAT PD initially started off as this idea of saving time from reinventing things, helping our everyday experts get their resources out into the world, but I think it's becoming so much more than that, and I think as I have networked with other people, it just begins to evolve a little bit. Right. Because I think part of providing this platform to nurses specifically is helping them realize the value that they bring to healthcare. And I've been following some of the work of Rebecca Love with the Commission for Nursing Reimbursement, and she talks a lot about the value of nurses. And I'm like, this is really another example of how nurses are experts in what they do. They don't always realize the value of that expertise. I think STAT PD is a way that we can really help nurses know their value and know that they bring a lot to the table that as a system, we don't always recognize. I think networking and business just really helps you evolve your ideas.
[45:49] Michelle: Yes, networking on LinkedIn has been amazing. And I actually started following Rebecca Love because I was on your LinkedIn and I saw like, you had reposted some things from her and yeah, I was like, oh man, she's amazing.
[46:08] Nicole: She is amazing. You cannot listen to that lady talk and not be fired up to want to change the world.
[46:14] Michelle: Exactly.
[46:14] Nicole: And this work that she is leading with the Commission for Nurse Reimbursement is amazing. And I think it has really the potential to completely transform the nursing profession.
[46:26] Michelle: I totally agree with that. Let's talk about the PD, and what that means in STAT PD. And so that's professional development. And I saw that there's an ANCC certification for professional development and you have it. So talk about that for a second.
[46:46] Nicole: Sure. So I am board certified in nursing professional development, which I think a lot of people don't necessarily maybe think of as a nursing specialty, but it really is. And so my focus has always been on the professional not always. Well, yes, kind of always. I guess from very early on, it's always been on either precepting new nurses or then when I took that role as being an educator at the hospital, helping train them, orient them, all of the things that go into bringing on a new employee. And now with my role in nurse residency programs, my focus has always been on the professional development of others. And so when we were trying to come up with a name of, like, what would we call this platform, in my mind, everything comes back to professional development. If we want the best possible patient outcomes for our patients, that starts with the professional development of the individuals. And so whether it is formal education, whether it is a resource to help them do their job better, whether it is tools to help them engage in change, it's all the professional development of that individual who's providing the care. And so that is where sort of the PD of STA PD came from. And then, of course, STAT being a medical term, and we always want things right away. We're an instant sort of gratification society. And so making sure that we have those tools, those resources, those job AIDS to do the best job that we can do STAT, right?
[48:27] Michelle: Yeah. I love it. It's so clever. I wanted to touch on a couple of the publications that I read, and these will be linked in the show notes as well. But the first one is Growing the Next Generation of Rural Nurse Leaders. That was excellent. And then your article was published in the Nurse Education Perspectives, Innovation in Nurse Residency: Blazing a Trail with Online Technology. Again, I will link those in the show notes. But what advice for nurses do you have on venturing into business?
[49:02] Nicole: One of the big things is just don't be afraid to start small. I know I am a very future-focused person. I want to have all of the details ironed out before I take my first step. That is like my natural instinct to want to have things. You mentioned earlier, I think, before we were recording that you're a perfectionist. So am I right? So we want to have everything perfect before we jump in. And I think one of the biggest things that I've learned over the years is that we don't have to see the whole staircase before we take our first step. And that's really exactly what we're doing with STAT PD. I think we're asking me all these questions about your marketing plan and all the things that we're doing. This is where I'm just trusting that this thing, this Stat PD, is going to evolve based on the people who are using it. And so I think our users will help us to continue to build that staircase and what this resource looks like.
[50:10] Michelle: I love that analogy, and I think it's so brave and perfectionists don't like just jumping in and seeing where it goes. Right? Like you said, we want to have all the pieces in place. We want to know how it's going to turn out. We kind of want to predict the future. And so I think the brave part comes in just doing it. I don't know how this is going to come out. Just do it. Just start. It's not going to be perfect. It's okay. And I felt that a lot in podcasting, something I had never done. And I was really for a while going, but I need to know how this is going to go. And it took another podcaster and nurse saying, just jump in. Just do it, just do it. You're going to work things out along the way. And I think that's such great advice.
[51:12] Nicole: Yes, absolutely. Have you read the book The Gifts of Imperfection by Brene Brown?
[51:17] Michelle: No, I haven't read that one.
[51:19] Nicole: As a fellow perfectionist, that would be a great book for you to read. So it's going to be about sort of letting go of perfectionism and leaning into things like self-compassion and gratitude for what we have and things like that. So it's a really great book.
[51:38] Michelle: Well, I need that in my life, so I will definitely check that out. And all those things that we mentioned will be in the show notes. But before we close today, Nicole, is there anything else that you wanted to talk about? Anything else that you wanted to say?
[51:54] Nicole: I would love to just encourage people to think about STAT PD as it can be used in a lot of different ways. So I can see it being used as sort of like this idea of a side gig, right? So I'm a nurse, I'm working maybe in acute care or some other clinical setting, and I have these things that maybe I want to start selling on the side. So I think STAT PD would be perfect for somebody like that. I also want people to think about STAT PD as a potential vehicle for aspiring nurse innovators, and entrepreneurs. So maybe you have this idea for something, but you're not quite sure where to start, you're not quite sure how to set up a website or connect payment systems or all the things that go into starting a business, but you are ready to just get something out there. I think STAT PD is perfect for that type of healthcare professional as well because it allows you to begin to test the waters of nurse entrepreneurship without having to know how to do all the things, because we do all of that for you, essentially. The other person I think STAT PD is really perfect for is the nurse who's maybe looking at retirement and maybe they're ready to be done with the sort of clinical setting, but they still feel like they have so much to offer their profession, and they're looking for maybe alternative avenues to be able to capture that expertise and knowledge that they have and leave it as almost a legacy for the next generations. And I think STAT PD is a perfect way to do that as well. It allows you to continue to contribute and help the nurses that are sort of coming up through the ranks, while maybe you're able to step away from maybe the traditional role that you've had in the past.
[53:47] Michelle: Well, I felt like you were speaking directly to me, Nicole. I was like, how does she know so much about me? As a newly retired nurse, I went through all of those feelings of loss of my tribe and my value. I'm not a nurse anymore, even though I'm still a registered nurse, have my license, and all of that stuff, and I think that's normal. But when I was on your site, I was like, I think this is perfect for someone like me because we have so much experience and we have so much knowledge and we want to share, and what we have is valuable for other nurses and healthcare professionals. So I think that's awesome, so valuable.
[54:37] Nicole: And I think that's one of the things that I've been almost worried about in the last few years is we have all of these nurses that are retiring, right? I don't have the stats off the top of my head, but baby boomers are retiring, and they're stepping away from the bedside. And yes, we have nurses that can replace them in the physical sense of body. But you said you've been a nurse for 36 years. You know so much that that brand new grad coming in is going to take 36 years for them to develop, and we can't necessarily wait for that for them to have that information. So how do we transfer that information from you and your brain to these new ones that are coming in so that it doesn't take them 36 years to get there?
[55:26] Michelle: Exactly, yes. I love it, and I just love everything that you're doing. It's so valuable and so necessary, and I really appreciate you coming on today to talk about it.
[55:40] Nicole: Well, thank you so much for having me. This has been so fun, super fun.
[55:44] Michelle: And it's about to get a little more fun because, you know, at the end, we do the five-minute snippet.
[55:51] Nicole: Yes. You warned me about this. I am a perfectionist, so I'm really kind of worried about I know, right?
[55:58] Michelle: Yes, exactly. These are easy. I think you know all the answers to these. It's just so fun for our listeners to kind of see your off-duty side when you're not wearing all these other hats. So I'm going to start my timer, and we'll just go.
[56:14] Nicole: Okay.
[56:18] Michelle: What's the most important piece of furniture in the house?
[56:23] Nicole: Oh, my goodness. I'm going to say my bed. I like to sleep. I like to make sure I'm getting good rest. So we better make sure that that bed is comfortable.
[56:33] Michelle: Yes. I love it. Would you rather find a four-leaf clover or a really old penny?
[56:42] Nicole: I think a really old penny. Because that'll live on forever, right? The four-leaf clover is going to dwindle after a while.
[56:48] Michelle: Yeah, the old penny. I love coins, so that would be my gig. What's the first impression you want to give people?
[56:58] Nicole: I think that I am who you see, so authenticity is really important to me that I show up in the world as I am and not as I think you want me to be. So that is big. I think I want you to know that I'm very authentic.
[57:15] Michelle: I love it. What's the most annoying bill you have to pay?
[57:22] Nicole: Oh, right now, my cell phone bill. I've got a tween. So at that age of wanting a cell phone, of course. And when I look at how much I pay for my cell phone bill and now adding another line, it's super annoying that we pay that much.
[57:42] Michelle: So true. I remember, gosh, years ago when I had two teens, and this was before the plans were like what are they called? Like universal or unlimited? Right?
[57:55] Nicole: Yeah.
[57:55] Michelle: And so we would have to pay for text. Well, let me tell you how much teens text. It's a hell of a lot. And bills were very high, so I totally get you. Would you rather write greeting cards or obituaries for a living?
[58:19] Nicole: Initially when you said, like, oh, greeting cards would be fun, and then when I heard the second part, I was like, oh, there is something so cool about, again, capturing our older generation's life and the legacies that they leave behind and the things that they have done in their lives. And I just love speaking with older people and learning about all of the things that they've done. I just think it's so fascinating. So I'm going to actually go with obituaries. Even though my first instinct was to say greeting cards.
[58:48] Michelle: I think we're twins. I'm pretty sure we were separated at birth. I was exactly like you. I was like greeting cards because I make cards. That's one of my hobbies. And I love it. I love sending it in the mail, knowing people are going to open it and appreciate it and all that. But then I was like, no, it has to be obituaries because the worth there is just to memorialize someone's life like you said, and all the accomplishments and that's just so worthy. Yeah, we're twins. If you could try out a different job for one day just to see if you like it, which one would it be?
[59:36] Nicole: One job just for a day? Gosh, I don't know. Like I said, I'm very creative. Creativity is a big piece of everything that I do. So I would think of something creative. I think marketing would be kind of cool to learn more about. So I would definitely say some sort of profession where I can use my creativity.
[01:00:01] Michelle: Okay, here's a would you rather, would you rather send more cyberbullies or more cyberstalkers to jail?
[01:00:13] Nicole: Maybe the bullies. They never go away. I guess stalkers don't really go away either, but I know.
[01:00:22] Michelle: Okay. I was so torn on this one.
[01:00:25] Nicole: Yeah.
[01:00:25] Michelle: All right, we have 30 seconds. What is the nicest thing a stranger has ever done for you?
[01:00:32] Nicole: What's the nicest thing a stranger has ever done for me? Oh, gosh, it's hard. That is hard. I'd have to think. I mean, not really a stranger, but I remember working with patients in our diabetic Ed program and having just patients send me a card to thank you for working with me or thank you for teaching me how to do the things I need to do as a diabetic patient. And so I still have some of those cards dashed away in my little filing cabinet over there that every time I happen to open that folder, they just make me feel good.
[01:01:10] Michelle: Those are priceless. Priceless. Well, you did really well.
[01:01:16] Nicole: I don't know. There were some of them I was not quite sure.
[01:01:19] Michelle: I have to commend you. You did really well for the five-minute snippet. That was a lot of fun. I thank you for playing along with me, and I thank you for all the value that you brought to our listeners today. So I will put all those wonderful links in the show notes. And again, I just want to thank you and I want to wish you a great rest of your day.
[01:01:44] Nicole: Awesome. Thank you so much again, Michelle, for inviting me. And I appreciate all you do to help sort of elevate the nursing profession and give nurses a voice.
[01:01:56] Michelle: Thank you, Nicole.