Planning for a future public health nursing workforce: Recruitment, retention, and succession

A recent survey conducted in 2008 by the state's Department of Employment revealed 50% of public health nurses (PHNs) plan to retire within the next 5 years. In addition, many of the nurses retiring are taking higher levels of education and many years of experience with them when they go. State Nursing Service took a proactive stance and developed a statewide recruitment, retention, and succession plan for PHNs at all levels. The project plan involved developing specific student experiences, expert preceptors, and a succession plan for all levels of nursing in the state. Students often come to PHN without much planning or collaboration with faculty. PHNs do their best to provide a good experience, but often voice frustration as they don't know what to do with the students. Consequently a set of student clinical experiences have been developed to provide positive clinical experiences highlighting autonomy, critical thinking, leadership, and population-focused practice. A continuum of experiences planned for students from various nursing programs such as AD, Basic BSN, Accelerated BSN, and RN-BSN students help to educate and recruit future PHNs. Collaboration with schools of nursing ensured learning objectives were met. Development of preceptors occurs both through preceptor training and naturally as they work with students on pre-designed experiences. Developing and recognizing expertise as preceptors strengthens their leadership skills. Early findings show student and preceptor have been satisfied with the pre-designed experiences. PHNs in the state Department of Health developed a succession plan for each level of nursing from staff nurse to state level administrative positions. National PHN competencies were used to inform the development of the plan. The final plan impacts recruitment, orientation, training, and performance appraisals. The workgroup learned early in the process succession planning does not mean indentifying one specific successor for a management position in an agency. Rather a succession plan involves the development of all members of the team regardless of their position within the department according to their own career goals. An expert in succession planning was an invaluable part of completion and implementation of the plan.