Why Mentoring Matters for New Graduates Transitioning to Practice

Undergraduate nursing students' mentoring experiences in the clinical practicum: The United Arab Emirates (UAE) perspective

“…As some new graduates have reported inadequate mentoring as a contributory factor to their decision to leave the profession, Poindexter (2022) strongly advocates the need for formal or informal mentorship programs to support new graduates (Poindexter, 2022). Our study reinforces the extant literature that participation in a mentoring process can increase retention, satisfaction, professional development, and confidence levels in students and novice nurses (Voss et al, 2022).…”

Retaining new graduate nurses

“…Providing coaching and mentorship is a strategy that capitalizes on a multigenerational workforce to promote personal and professional growth. 10,[49][50][51] An effective mentor coaches, teaches, counsels, and guides the mentee to best reach their career goals. 52 For the maximum benefit, Hofler and Thomas advocate for trained mentors with more than 2 years' experience and whose personality is matched to the NGN.…”

“…The advantages of mentorship programs include cost savings due to decreased travel nurses or nurse turnover, enhanced team cohesiveness when NGNs become respected team members and understand the unit culture/ system processes, and awareness of opportunities to advance in the organization. 10,51,54 Mentoring NGNs and helping them feel valued while they adjust to their new professional role may help with retention rates. 10,55 Creating healthy work environments to promote nurse wellbeing and resilience.…”

Who dismantled nursing mentorship systems and how do we get them back?

“…The evolving global nursing shortage—made more acute by the burnout of the profession during the COVID‐19 pandemic—and the disregard at policy tables for nursing perspectives that the pandemic conditions exposed—means that the mentorship crisis is of urgent proportion. By some miracle, young people still compete to enter the profession, and schools of nursing continue to produce excellent graduates; nevertheless, we see increasing accounts across the globe of the difficulty retaining these new nurses (Almost & Mildon, 2022; Voss et al, 2022). Despite their being our hope for the future of health care globally, we are not yet succeeding on a wide scale to convince policy makers and health administrators that their care and feeding is a wise investment.…”