Santa Fe Coaching Retreats With Nurse Keith!

I don't often write explicitly about my coaching practice for nurses, health professionals and nurse entrepreneurs here on this blog, but my latest launch is so exciting, I couldn't contain myself and had to tell my Digital Doorway community all about it!

Nurses and Collective Success

Collectivism and collaboration are hot topics in the entrepreneurial spaces where I currently hang out. Just last weekend, my business partner and RN.FM Radio co-host Kevin Ross and I were at the National Nurses in Business Association annual conference in Orlando, and our presentation was entitled "Cross-Pollination: Collaboration on Steroids". This notion was well-received by the audience, and our assertion that competition belongs in the dustbin of history seemed to hit home with most everyone who was present.

Entrepreneurial Compost

This past weekend, I spent four days in Orlando at the National Nurses in Business Association (NNBA) conference with dozens of nurses. It was a great event, and the networking and connecting between nurse entrepreneurs and businesspeople was “epic”, to borrow a term applied so liberally these days.

Nurse Keith at the NNBA

This weekend, I'm in Orlando at the National Nurses in Business Association (NNBA) annual conference, along with many of my nurse entrepreneur colleagues, including my business partner and RN.FM Radio cohost, Kevin Ross.

Nurses and Social Media

Many of you know that I'm the expert nurse blogger over at LPNtoBSNonline. Over the last few weeks, I've been posting about social media as it relates to nurses. Here are links to those posts, all of which are relatively short and sweet.

Nurse Empowerment: "Now" Is Always The Time

Nurses have a long history of being significantly disempowered. Historically, nurses served as "handmaidens" to all-mighty physicians, running at doctors' beck and call. The role of the nurse has changed over the years, but we nurses still need to feel empowered to fulfill the promise of our profession.

Nursing and Happiness Are Not Mutually Exclusive

Many recent clients who have come to me for coaching are curious how to actually get what they want. Sometimes it seems we nurses are simply convinced that we need to work too hard for too many hours without being happy. This seems like a given in the profession, and some nurses see no way to create satisfaction and balance in their personal and professional lives. So is it possible to be happy as a nurse?

Nurse.com 11 Most Well-Written Nursing Blogs

I am thrilled and honored to have been included in the Nurse.com list of the 11 most well-written nursing blogs on the Internet. It's always a humbling experience to be chosen for such distinctions.

Nurses and Relationships: Cooperation is Key!

Relationships between nurses are impacted by multiple factors, including stress, workloads, personalities, as well as the "culture" of the institution where those nurses are employed. What can nurses do to enhance their relationships at work, especially when it comes to cooperation?

Board Certified Nurse Coaches: A New Reality

This week, dear Readers, I'm writing this brief post to share with you the exciting news that I am now a Board Certified Nurse Coach (NC-BC)!

Infographic: Family Nurse Practitioners To The Rescue

Thanks to Chamberlain College of Nursing for this very interesting infographic regarding Family Nurse Practitioners (FNPs), Advanced Practice Nurses (APN) that will be needed in increasing numbers as our population ages and healthcare reform comes to fruition.

Book Review: "The Secret Rescue" by Cate Lineberry

"The Secret Rescue: An Untold Story of American Nurses and Medics Behind Nazi Lines", is a brilliant book outlining the harrowing tale of nurses and medics who, after crash-landing in Nazi-occupied Albania in 1943, survived an ordeal that tested the limits of their courage, determination and faith.

Evolving As A Nurse: The Work of the Soul

The evolution of a nurse and his or her career is a very individual experience, and this experience expresses the spirit, nature and personality of the nurse in question. And when soul is infused into that journey, the entire tenor of the journey is deeply and irrevocably changed.

Nurses: Compassion For The Self

Nurses, when you consider the level of compassion with which you treat your patients, do you also consider the possibility that you can treat yourself with that same compassion? Do you feel that you deserve it?

Nurses: Surviving Versus Thriving

Many nurses talk about needing to survive. And what are they surviving? Their shifts? Their home life? Their financial responsibilities and constraints? Their marriages? What does it mean for a nurse to reject simply surviving in exchange for actually thriving?

Nurses and the Scourge of Hostility

My last two posts about nursing and nurses here on Digital Doorway have garnered a great deal of attention and commentary. Nurses indeed want to feel respected, and it appears that the general consensus is that we basically don't respect each other. Where does this hostility originate?

The Obesity of Americans--and Nurses

It appears that the American Medical Association has decided to designate obesity as a disease. So, if one in three Americans is now classified as being obese, does that mean that one in three nurses is obese as well?

A New Nursing Infographic

Please enjoy this infographic on the ways in which nursing is growing, changing and creating opportunity.

Burnout, Recovery and Work-Life Balance for Nurses

This weekend, I'm speaking at a regional nursing conference here in New Mexico, and the subjects of my two talks are burnout (prevention and recovery) and work-life balance. It's a sad reality that nurses need to hear about these particular issues so often, but as long as they do, I'm willing to get on that stage and preach the gospel of self-care. 

An Unexpected Occupational Hazard: The Nurse Gets Rattled

At the rural New Mexican home where I do home-based nursing care, the pace of work and the 360-degree view of the mesas, mountains and sky is quite different from other nursing milieus. While home care may not always seem glamorous to those in the ICU, trauma or other specialties, sometimes things happen that make me realize how interesting this specialty can truly be.

Journey to Joy Launches on June 6th!

On June 6th, a new book about joyful transformation for women will launch worldwide. I'm proud to say that my wife, the coach Mary Rives, is one of 35 fascinating and inspiring contributing authors to what will certainly prove to be an Amazon bestseller.

Nurses As Connective Tissue

Last night on RN.FM Radio, we were graced with three guests, including the editor and two contributing authors from a new book, "I Wasn't Strong Like This When I Started Out: True Stories of Becoming A Nurse". It was a fascinating and inspiring conversation, to say the least.

Nurse Bullying: We Shall Overcome

On May 20th, 2013 on RN.FM Radio, we discussed nurse to nurse bullying with Renee Thompson, a national expert on the subject. In the course of that discussion, we heard that bullying among nurses continues to be a problem nationwide--and most likely worldwide, as well. What will it take to turn the tide on what appears to be a widely acknowledged form of aberrant workplace behavior within the healthcare industry?

Nurses Week--Or Nurses Year?

Last week, we celebrated Nurses Week, and many of us acknowledged our pride in this awesome profession of ours. Some of us were even on the receiving end of others' gratitude in the form of gifts from our employers, colleagues, friends or family members. But why do we only get to acknowledge ourselves once a year?

The Nurse's Personal Dashboard: Tune Up Time?

I recently posted here on Digital Doorway about each of us having our own personal dashboard. While that post made metaphoric mention of the speedometer, tachometer, fuel and lubrication, we didn't talk about the need for a timely tune up. So, let's take that metaphor and run with it, shall we?