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Innovation with Heart
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Intro
[ Michelle Podlesni brings over 25 years of successful business experience to the National Nurses in Business Association as it’s recently named President. Michelle is a Navy Veteran, RN and former corporate executive whose clinical background led to a career in healthcare data analysis and software development. With a proven track record of leading start-up companies to financial success, as well as their subsequent mergers and acquisitions, Michelle has directly managed the strategic, operational and technical areas of start-ups and multi-million dollar companies serving Fortune 500 clients. Michelle speaks nationally on Nurse Entrepreneurship and is the author of the bestselling “Unconventional Nurse: Going from Burnout to Bliss!” She is the founder of Unconventional Nurse® Business Coaching and Training Programs.]
Nurses make great business owners; however many nurses don’t realize this. I didn’t realize when I first left the hospital setting that I would become a successful serial entrepreneur! You don’t know what you don’t know. I had been working in hospitals for over ten years and feeling frustrated by the bureaucratic red tape that interfered with my patient care. I was burned out with working shifts, Holidays and many weekends. I started to search for how I could use my nursing knowledge and experience outside of the traditional setting. This was in the mid 80’s and at the time I did not know one nurse that worked outside of hospitals, clinics or educational settings. I found medical and pharmaceutical companies looking for nurses to fill sales positions and a large insurance company looking for a Healthcare Resource Specialist. That sounded right to me so I applied and secured that position. This was a pivotal moment in my nursing career; I had a knack for analyzing contracts, coordinating resources and delving into the world of computer assisted healthcare data analysis. In short, I became a nurse nerd.
My new passion opened many doors for me in different business sectors. While working on a Medicare contract, I was recruiting a physician to be on our peer review panel. It ended up that he recruited me to help him implement his software program into a major administrator’s company in Atlanta. I became a product manager and developer. A few years later I really jumped into entrepreneurial waters, becoming part of a two member team starting a company that provided software and services to the Property & Casualty markets. When revenues exceeded 24 million dollars we merged with the rehabilitation company, GRS, and formed GENEX. After this merger the software company that we originally partnered with to provide services, recruited me to run their company. This is the answer to the question I was continually asked “how does a nurse end up being the president of a software company?”
The bottom line was that I was able to synthesize my healthcare background with IT knowledge to impart useful information for decision making. I had a knack for problem solving and the ability to define and manage processes, programs and projects. I am outlining this information so nurses can readily see how being a good nurse can transfer to being a good entrepreneur and business owner. Believe me, if I can do it, other nurses can do it.
Here is a list of business success principles for nurses willing to give entrepreneurship a try:
I believe in Zig Ziglar’s famous quote, “You can have everything you want in this life if you help enough people get what they want”. In 2011 I created Unconventional Nurse® because I saw a real need that nurses had to learn business skills that would assist them in owning and running their own businesses. I provide nurses in depth coaching and training programs on how to build and grow business profitability.
Being the president of the National Nurses in Business Association, I have the opportunity to mentor a great variety of nurses in different stages of business. Every day I am learning new ways that nurses have found to use their education and experience in creating rewarding, thriving and profitable businesses. One of the strongest recommendations I can make to nurses is to try something new! It is human nature to hesitate because we are all afraid of making a mistake. Be aware of this tendency, get comfortable being uncomfortable and try new things anyway. You don’t know what you don’t know and who knows, you could find the career and life of your dreams!
About the National Nurses in Business Association:
The National Nurses in Business Association (NNBA) is the most recognized and leading association providing business career development and support for self-employed nurses and nurses in business. For over 29 years, NNBA membership provides further opportunities to connect, grow, learn, inspire and contribute in a safe and secure environment. To become a member and sign up for NNBA’s free newsletter go to www.NNBANow.com.
© 2014 Michelle Podlesni RN, BSGI. All rights reserved
This is a very informative and cleverly presented video by Emily Knowles, Nicole Panzer, Sae Mi Park, Ashlely Roberts, Juliana Reif in 2011.
It is well worth the 9 minutes to catch up on the news: The future of caring for health is in nurses hands!
In America, National Nurses Day is celebrated annually on May 6. It marks the beginning of National Nurses Week, which ends on May 12, the birthday of Florence Nightingale.
Florence Nightingale (1820-1910), a pioneering English Nurse, known for improving sanitation, reducing infection and mortality rate in soldiers; she also brought dignity to their care and honor to the vocation of nursing.
She carried an oil lamp on her nightly rounds to check each person in her care, and became known as “The Lady with the Lamp”.
National Nurses Week was first observed in October 1954, the 100th anniversary of Nightingale’s mission to Crimea. May 6 was introduced as the date for the observance in 1982.
Allegedly Florence was immortalized as the “Lady with the Lamp” in this poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. ” Saint Philomena is a patron of the sick.
SANTA FILOMENA
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
November 1857
Whene’er a noble deed is wrought,
Whene’er is spoken a noble thought,
Our hearts, in glad surprise,
To higher levels rise.
The tidal wave of deeper souls
Into our inmost being rolls,
And lifts us unawares
Out of all meaner cares.
Honor to those whose words or deeds
Thus help us in our daily needs,
And by their overflow
Raise us from what is low!
Thus thought I, as by night I read
Of the great army of the dead,
The trenches cold and damp,
The starved and frozen camp,—
The wounded from the battle-plain,
In dreary hospitals of pain,
The cheerless corridors,
The cold and stony floors.
Lo! in that house of misery
A lady with a lamp I see
Pass through the glimmering gloom,
And flit from room to room.
And slow, as in a dream of bliss,
The speechless sufferer turns to kiss
Her shadow, as it falls
Upon the darkening walls.
As if a door in heaven should be
Opened, and then closed suddenly,
The vision came and went,
The light shone was spent.
On England’s annals, through the long
Hereafter of her speech and song,
That light its rays shall cast
From portals of the past.
A lady with a lamp shall stand
In the great history of the land,
A noble type of good,
Heroic womanhood.
Nor even shall be wanting here
The palm, the lily, and the spear,
The symbols that of yore
Saint Filomena bore.