Cool new ideas come from thinking in ways we have never thought
before. In years of attending staff meetings, committee meetings,
and the like, I've rarely seen a cool new idea expressed. Typically
these formats are designed to transmit information in a way that
stifles imagination and resists challenging the status quo.

Recently, my company started using a program call "TrainOne" by
Jeffery Gittomer. It is a training program designed for sales
people. My intent is not to train better sales people, but rather to
get fresh ideas and stimulate thinking. The process of sales is
really just persuasion. I think all nurses should study sales in
order to learn how to be more persuasive. We all have to persuade
someone of our ideas: persuade our kids to pick up their rooms,
persuade our administrators to implement a new protocol, or persuade
our patients to take their medications. Persuasion is an important
skill, and sales training is a great way to learn it.

But mostly, I like the idea of looking outside of our own industry
for cool new ideas. When we are only looking at how we do things in
comparison with how others in our own industry do them we are not
challenged to stretch very far. Nursing education is a good
example. We teach new nurses basically the same way we have for
years. Even our new "high-tech" classrooms are not really
innovative, they've just added new projectors and screens so that our
boring PowerPoint slides look better.

If you want to be a better educator, I would suggest taking a class
in the elementary education department at the local college. These
teachers have cool ideas! Or, attend a seminar on sales, and learn
more about how to persuade people – isn't that what teaching is
about – persuading your staff to do something new?

If you want your staff to "get it" without having to repeat it over
and over again, you've got to get some new and cool ideas. And the
best ones come from outside of our community. Look around for cool
people, cool ideas, and wacky thinkers. Get some of these people on
your committees, or in your department. Ask them for ideas. Forget
about "thinking outside the box" and discard the box entirely – think
outside the medical industry! You will find that when you start
actively searching for cool ideas, that they will start coming to you
from everywhere. Ask some wacky thinkers for their suggestions and
really give the idea some thought.

Cool new ideas will keep your material fresh, make your teaching more
interesting, and make your job a lot more fun! Make it your mission
to find them and use them. The results are extraordinary!

Best wishes,

David W. Woodruff, MSN, RN, CNS, CEN
President, Ed4Nurses, Inc.
www.Ed4Nurses.com

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