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Nurse Entrepreneurs Share Their Insights into Nurses in Business
Nursing Notes Live looks at nurse entrepreneurs. Our panel discussion is joined by Patricia Bemis, President of the National Nurses In Business Association, LeaRae Keyes, Executive Director of the Nurse Entrepreneur Network and Victoria Powell, founder and current President of VP Medical Consulting. I spoke with them about nurses in business and entrepreneurial positions.
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MP3 Audio Podcast
Facebook
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LeaRae, tell us a little bit about what you did when you decided to move out and work on your own and how that developed.
LeaRae: I have to backtrack a little bit more to probably the early ‘80s when I decided to go into sales because I wanted to be paid more for what I produced than a straight salary. Within six months of getting into sales, I won the national sales award for that company by applying the nursing process to sales which is basically assess, diagnose, plan, implement and evaluate. I found that by applying that process to sales, I was able to quickly soar above the other people who were in sales. I later became a marketing director for a rehabilitation company and I have a staff for which I was responsible. I became a full-time case manager in 1989 and then decided to start my own case management company in 1998. After several Intrapreneurships – an intrapreneurship is starting a division or a company within a company. I did that at least three times: trying a work comp rehabilitation model and applying a work comp case management model to catastrophic case management in healthcare; and then applying a case management model and starting a telephonic case management company. I can that with nurses who wanted to own their own a company or had a company but lack the skills in sales and marketing skills. I decided to start the Nurse Entrepreneur Network which provides lots of information on sales and marketing skills for nurses. It provides other information but it really focuses on sales and marketing.
Jamie: LeaRae, I like what you said about applying a nursing process, your critical thinking aspect of nursing to something that’s not nursing-centered or not patient-focused but really focusing on business. It’s very interesting that you found a way to apply that in other aspects of your life.
LeaRae: Yes. I think a lot of nurses don’t realize that they already have a lot of the skills and tools they need to go into business.
Victoria: I agree with LeaRae. I think the biggest thing that nurses are missing is not the critical thinking to get started in business but just the marketing and sales and asking for the business. That’s where nurses fall short.
Jamie: I think it’s not uncommon. We’re not very good at tooting our own horns. We’re all about everyone else, right? That’s why we became nurses. We’re caring people. It’s hard to be the person who goes out and says, “Look what I’m doing. I can offer you something.” That’s not really something that we focus on in nursing very often.
Victoria: We’re educators. We like to share and we like to teach and that comes pretty naturally to most of us. But we don’t toot our own horns and I think we should do that more often.
Jamie: Pat, tell me a little bit about how you got into being a nurse entrepreneur initially and then taking that nursing education focus that we have and offering some assistance and putting together this opportunity to help other nurses.
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Nursing Notes Live looks at nurse entrepreneurs. Our panel discussion is joined by Patricia Bemis, President of the National Nurses In Business Association, LeaRae Keyes, Executive Director of the Nurse Entrepreneur Network and Victoria Powell, founder and current President of VP Medical Consulting. I spoke with them about nurses in business and entrepreneurial positions.
—-
MP3 Audio Podcast
Facebook
—-
LeaRae, tell us a little bit about what you did when you decided to move out and work on your own and how that developed.
LeaRae: I have to backtrack a little bit more to probably the early ‘80s when I decided to go into sales because I wanted to be paid more for what I produced than a straight salary. Within six months of getting into sales, I won the national sales award for that company by applying the nursing process to sales which is basically assess, diagnose, plan, implement and evaluate. I found that by applying that process to sales, I was able to quickly soar above the other people who were in sales. I later became a marketing director for a rehabilitation company and I have a staff for which I was responsible. I became a full-time case manager in 1989 and then decided to start my own case management company in 1998. After several Intrapreneurships – an intrapreneurship is starting a division or a company within a company. I did that at least three times: trying a work comp rehabilitation model and applying a work comp case management model to catastrophic case management in healthcare; and then applying a case management model and starting a telephonic case management company. I can that with nurses who wanted to own their own a company or had a company but lack the skills in sales and marketing skills. I decided to start the Nurse Entrepreneur Network which provides lots of information on sales and marketing skills for nurses. It provides other information but it really focuses on sales and marketing.
Jamie: LeaRae, I like what you said about applying a nursing process, your critical thinking aspect of nursing to something that’s not nursing-centered or not patient-focused but really focusing on business. It’s very interesting that you found a way to apply that in other aspects of your life.
LeaRae: Yes. I think a lot of nurses don’t realize that they already have a lot of the skills and tools they need to go into business.
Victoria: I agree with LeaRae. I think the biggest thing that nurses are missing is not the critical thinking to get started in business but just the marketing and sales and asking for the business. That’s where nurses fall short.
Jamie: I think it’s not uncommon. We’re not very good at tooting our own horns. We’re all about everyone else, right? That’s why we became nurses. We’re caring people. It’s hard to be the person who goes out and says, “Look what I’m doing. I can offer you something.” That’s not really something that we focus on in nursing very often.
Victoria: We’re educators. We like to share and we like to teach and that comes pretty naturally to most of us. But we don’t toot our own horns and I think we should do that more often.
Jamie: Pat, tell me a little bit about how you got into being a nurse entrepreneur initially and then taking that nursing education focus that we have and offering some assistance and putting together this opportunity to help other nurses.