Hailey Wilson

I think a lot of it is just really being perseverance through things. What actually started me being interested in healthcare was I had a pretty bad head injury when I was in high school. I was a junior in high school applying for colleges, and I had a head injury that caused me to lose my ability to read and write, and I had to relearn on that. Out of all of that, you know, that actually made me really interested in healthcare because I was talking to people in healthcare every day in my rehab. And I think part of that also made me grow stronger and encouraged to persevere through, you know, challenges that happen all through your career, your health, friends, family, you know, there's so many things that can cause you to have that perseverance that keeps you going.

One of the things that has stuck out the most to me was something that my CMO at a previous hospital had said to me, and it was take the time first to listen before you react. When you're having conversations, you know, professionally or personally, you need to wait. Listen to what others are saying before you react, before you say something. Because a lot of times, people will tell you truly what they're feeling and what their thoughts on maybe what can fix things, if you just allow them to be the ones that speak first.

I think some of the best ways just to get involved, whether it's coming and volunteering at your hospital, or going to local chapter events, just really getting out there and talking to people. Ask them, you know, what did you do? How did you get to your spot? And being willing to try something new. I mean, when I originally graduated with my bachelor's degree, I'd fully planned on going back to school to get my physical therapy degree, and I said, you know, I need to take a break from school for a little bit. I did go to school straight through, and said, you know, I just need to take a break. So I went into administration, just being an executive assistant to kind of pay the bills. And then I talked to my leaders, and they really were encouraging of, you know, try this. See if you like it. And they're the ones that encouraged me to get my master's degree. I never thought I would be in administration.

I think some of the biggest things in healthcare right now, you know, we have some shortages of staffing, and that can be really challenging. And, you know, I think COVID really highlighted that for a lot of people, that they noticed, you know, there's things that we need to question how we do procedures. You know, if we say it only takes so many people, or so many equipment items, and really, we need to be doing, you know, more kind of questioning the status quo and figuring out what works for the future. In terms of opportunities, I come from a hospital that's a research-based hospital that I'm currently at right now. I think some of the greatest opportunities that I'm getting to experience and to see comes from the research. You know, whether that be what we do in our future with, you know, AI, what we use with equipment, the things that we can influence healthcare with, you know, more knowledge, how we treat different types of things. I think it's really that research portion that really is helping influence what the future will look like.

I think really that open and honest communication is one of my big key things. If you are open and you're kind and talking to each other, you're going to accomplish a lot more things than, you know, being abrasive. So, really just that kindness and, you know, that golden rule of treating others how you want to be treated.