The Association for Nursing Professional Development (ANPD) Board of Directors (BOD), committees, and staff have steadily worked to implement the first year of a 3-year strategic plan. Now as we are entering the second year of the plan, it is important to take a snapshot and see how we are progressing. Are we transforming the association as promised? Let's look at the evidence.
VISION/MISSION/VALUES
Our vision and mission guided the strategic plan. This last year, we developed core values that reflect our vision and mission statements. Before starting every meeting, the BOD reviews the Vision, Mission, and Core Values document. This keeps us focused on our purpose, our values, and our destination. Just as a reminder, ANPD's vision is to become "the thought and practice leader for nursing professional development." The association's mission is advancing "quality healthcare by defining and promoting nursing profession development practice." Four pillars provide the strength that supports the attainment of our vision (see Figure 1). Each pillar contains a goal: Nursing professional development (NPD) Role Delineation-NPD practitioners will be identified as a value-added leader in health care; Managing Transitions-NPD practitioners will be recognized as leaders in nursing transition into practice; Leadership-ANPD will enhance its position as the educational leader for nursing professional development; and ANPD Value Proposition-ANPD will strengthen its value to NPD practitioners and be recognized as their preferred membership organization. Each goal has specific measurable, achievable objectives with timelines and tactics for achievement and an individual with assigned accountability. Progress is monitored at each BOD meeting.
PILLAR 1: NPD ROLE DELINEATION
As mentioned earlier, the goal of Pillar 1: NPD Role Delineation is that NPD practitioners will be identified as value-added leaders in health care. There are six objectives under this goal (disseminate findings from the NPD Role Delineation Study, update Scope and Standards, disseminate findings from NPD Value Demonstration Project, complete the evidence-based practice study, endorse standardized competencies, and standardize methods to quantify return on investments [ROIs] of educational program and activities). All but the last two have been completed, and these are well under way.
Warren and Harper's (2015)NPD Role Delineation Study contributed to the 2016 NPD Scope and Standards for Professional Practice (Harper & Maloney, 2016). The scope and standards were completed, approved by the American Nurses Association, and published in time for the 2016 ANPD convention. The convention participants could purchase the scope and standards and receive a monograph of the NPD Role Delineation Study free of charge. For those who did not attend the convention, the last issue (January/February 2017) of JNPD published this study. In addition to these two publications, the NPD Value Demonstration Project (Harper, Aucoin, & Warren, 2016) was also shared at convention as a monograph and published in September/October 2016 issue of this journal. This study sought to answer the frequently asked question, "How many nursing professional development practitioners should my organization have?" The study provided descriptive statistics for the numbers of NPD practitioners per RN and by hospital size for organizations participating in the study, but the study does not make any recommendations about the numbers of NPD practitioners needed by an organization. This study concluded that "ANPD is poised to support NPD practitioners through the continued study of outcomes and demonstration of contributions of the NPD specialty to organizational success" (Harper et al., 2016, p. 247).
The evidence-based practice study with the Center for Transdisciplinary Evidence-Based Practice at the Ohio State University and Elsevier exemplifies work done on the value of NPD practice and in partnership. This partnership was clearly visible at the 2016 convention, when team members from the Center for Transdisciplinary Evidence-Based Practice, Elsevier, and ANPD presented the plenary session, The Evidence-Based Practice (EBP) and U.S. Outcomes: Findings for a National Survey With Nursing Professional Development Specialists. The study found that NPD practitioners lacked knowledge on evidence-based practice, and an action plan will be put in place to offer continuing education on evidence-based practice.
The two objectives under the Pillar 1 goal that have not been completed are endorsing standardized competencies for NPD practitioners and standardizing methods to quantify ROI. Although they are not completed, progress is being made. A member of the BOD has been charged with establishing a work group to endorse standardized competencies based on the 2016 Scope and Standards of Professional Practice. And a taskforce has worked on ROI and published two articles in this journal: Measuring Return on Investment for Professional Development Activities: A Review of the Evidence (Opperman, Liebig, Bowling, Johnson, & Harper, 2016a) and Measuring Return on Investment for Professional Development Activities: Implications for Practice (Opperman, Liebig, Bowling, Johnson, & Harper, 2016b). But their work continues toward developing a tool for NPD practitioners to quantify ROI. Once the tool is developed, the next step is the creation of educational products such as online modules, webinars, and convention workshops that demonstrate the application of this tool in the calculation of ROI. Great progress has been made toward the strengthening of Pillar 1.
PILLAR 2: MANAGING TRANSITIONS
For the overarching goal that NPD practitioners will be recognized as leaders in nursing transition to practice (TTP), there are three objectives: support NPD practitioner roles in TTP, promote interprofessional continuing education (IPCE) and collaboration, and provide NPD practitioners with resources to facilitate organizational transitions.
The first objective is still in the planning process, starting with a gap analysis to determine the state of current TTP programs across varied settings. The second objective of promoting IPCE is well under way. There were four concurrent sessions with the topic of IPCE at the 2016 convention. These were followed with an August webinar Playing in the Sandbox Nicely: Planning Interprofessional Continuing Education (IPCE) with 174 participants. To achieve the final objective of facilitating organizational transitions with resources, methods of disseminating the results of global environmental scanning membership are being explored. To better share information with membership, Trendlines is now provided monthly, instead of bimonthly. In late November 2016, a resource for organizational transitions, Rapid Cycle Improvement in Healthcare, became available on the ANPD Professional Development Center. Although progress toward Pillar 2: Managing Transitions has been made, work remains to be done, particularly in TTP and providing resources to support organizational transitions.
PILLAR 3: LEADERSHIP
The goal of Pillar 3: Leadership is that ANPD will enhance its position as the educational leader for nursing professional development by achieving solid fiscal health, creating a framework to support NPD inquiry (research, evidence-based project, quality initiatives), developing a process to support the creation and dissemination of white papers and position statements, implementing leadership development programs, and developing a succession plan for ANPD leadership. Much progress has been made on strengthening ANPD's third pillar of leadership.
Our fiscal strength has grown. We have made solid investments and will continue adding to our investments. Our Spirit of Inquiry task force has developed research priorities, procedures for managing Spirit of Inquiry projects, and a job description for a director of inquiry. Standardized definitions for a position paper have been developed along with a template for their development. Issues such as copyright and transfer agreements have been addressed. Leadership development has been a high priority as exemplified with the availability of the Frontline Leader Development program and the publication of Leadership in Professional Development: An Organizational and System Focus. The ANPD education committee has a goal of implementing leadership development activities based on the new leadership book. Leadership development and succession for ANPD will continue as a priority into the future.
PILLAR 4: ANPD VALUE PROPOSITION
The final pillar is the ANPD Value Proposition. ANPD is working to strengthen our value to NPD practitioners and to be recognized as their preferred membership organization by providing educational products and services and maintaining ANPD's American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) provider unit. The BOD and staff have undertaken various initiatives including conducting a member survey to determine what is of value to our members and providing more educational products and services to better serve members' needs.
One of the most popular educational products is our presentation of free webinars, which have been well attended with an average attendance of 215 in 2016. These webinars are provided in partnership with Lippincott Solutions and will continue through 2017, resulting in another year of free webinars for members. Another popular educational offering is ANPD's NPD Certification Preparation Course with 19 courses for over 400 participants. This course has been revised to align with the ANCC's content outline for the revised certification examination beginning June 2017. ANPD's status as an ANCC Accredited Provider of continuing education has been renewed through 2020. Excellent educational offerings, publications, and networking opportunities increase ANPD's value proposition. Strengthened value is evidenced by the growth of our membership. We have consistently maintained over 4,000 members for the last 6 months.
TRANSFORMING VISION
ANPD's vision is to become "the thought and practice leader for nursing professional development." The four pillars support this vision (see Figure 1). Much work has been done to strengthen the pillars that support our vision, and this work continues. As mentioned in prior columns, this work requires an engaged membership. We need you to transform our association into "the thought and practice leader for nursing professional development."
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