A Few Minutes With ANA’s Vice President Of Innovation Oriana Beaudet
Oriana Beaudet DNP, RN, PHN started her position as ANA’s Vice President Of Innovation just as the pandemic was beginning to impact the world. Some would say that it was a tough time to start a new job focused on innovation for nurses. Weren’t all nurses busy with pandemic-related duties? When would they have time to “innovate?”
The pandemic forced nurses out of their organizational routine procedures. It changed the way they got things done making the environment a fertile ground for innovation. It’s this fertile ground that Dr. Beaudet is sowing with the “seeds” of innovation. We caught up with her recently to find out more about innovation and creating innovation spaces for nurses.
Q. Can you share the innovation work happening at the American Nurses Association Enterprise and tell us something about yourself?
I am the Vice President of Innovation for the American Nurses Association Enterprise and the American Nursing Association. The American Nurses Association Enterprise consists of three different organizations. It is the ANA, our membership organization where we create the scope and standards for the profession. It’s also where we have the Center for Ethics and Human Rights and where we do our Policy and Government Affairs advocacy work on behalf of the profession. Then we have the American Nurses Foundation, which is our philanthropic and research arm, and the American Nurses Credentialing Center, which is focused on credentialing and accreditation of nurses and organizations.
My role in the innovation space is to work across the ANA Enterprise to support the growth and advancement of the 4.3 million nurses in the space of innovation and build and grow our capacity and skills.
Q. How can innovation improve the work and lives of nurses?
Prior to the pandemic every organization had a fairly structured process for how change occurred within their organization. When the pandemic started unfolding in early 2020, we saw organizations, facilities and nurses who had to completely change what they were doing. Almost overnight, they weren’t going through their normal organizational change processes. They were innovating on the fly. They were trying to figure out how to address an emerging pandemic.
We were also dealing with supply shortages and had different COVID-19 hotspots around the country. Part of the innovation work that emerged from this situation was the realization that nurses could make positive, impactful change quickly within their organizations without having to go through lots and lots of steps. They were able to test and try new models, new care practices, new ways of working and communicating. Facilities and organizations had to turn on a dime to meet the needs of the people. We saw lots of innovations. We saw the changing clinical presentation of patients and how hospitals had to care for their staff differently related to COVID-19, the list is quite extensive. But the biggest takeaway is the fact that people were willing to jump in and navigate new things at every turn to get the work done and to take care of each other.
Q. How do ANA and NACNS work together? How can CNSs get involved in the ANA Innovation work?
The work of the CNS is so important because they’re the translators between practice and research. They bring the newest research to practice and cut down the length of time it takes for research to be implemented into practice. CNSs work to shrink that gap, and they’re bringing this new knowledge and research to practice which creates space for innovation to happen faster.
As an affiliate, NACNS has access to our innovation resources. Information is posted on https://www.nursingworld.org/innovation We have an innovation newsletter that we put out monthly, the “See You Now” podcast, Innovation Award and Virtual Innovation Lounges. Please engage with any of our activities we would love to see and hear from all CNSs who are doing incredible work. One of the things we just launched is an innovation community for members with almost 13,000 nurses who are already have an interest in this space.
Q. What are the biggest challenges and opportunities that nurses are navigating today?
The last 18 months we saw where our health care infrastructure and organizations struggled and where they shine. I would say the challenge is to not revert to old ways of thinking. Learn from what has transpired do better and to keep striving forward. I think the opportunity is recognizing how the pandemic has truly created a space for the profession to highlight their skills and their scientific training. Nurses are passionate about their careers and their work, so we need to make sure we are positioning them to truly step into innovation spaces to guide healthcare forward.