Lexie Hille

I have had so many amazing mentors along the way. My current boss is Laura Ringard, and she is a truly amazing woman that has paved an amazing path for me and gave me this full-time role upon my graduation. Amy Journey, the president of my hospital, also was a key aspect in creating the role for me that I'm in now. Dr. Mary Jo Kreitzer and Dr. Megan Voss over at University of Minnesota Earl E. Bakken Center of Spirituality and Healing, which is the facility in which I graduated my DNP program from, have done such amazing things in the integrative space, fostering this path for us in creating this DNP. They have both been so foundational in getting me where I am today. When I was in my DNP program, Dr. April Crunchy was one of my mentors at the time and helped me through my final clinical and my DNP project. They all have been such amazing women to learn from and continue to learn from.

I received advice from my cross-country coach in college: don't get caught up in the outcome, get lost in the journey. Although in the moment he was needing for me to apply that to running, I feel like I really do apply it to all parts of my life. It's so hard sometimes to know what your end goal is, or to want that to happen immediately, but a lot of times, the true learning starts in the in-between, and the connections and the collaboration and all of that is in the in-between, and that's pretty much, when you look back, the fun part, the meaningful part. Something I've also learned through my career is to have every relationship - actually, I'll just keep that quote.

I would say know your why. Stay strong and close to that, be proud of who you are and proud of the things that got you to where you are, and be creative in your thinking and your approach. Research the industry and create networking opportunities as much as you can. And really, if employee well-being is something that someone is interested in doing, know the difference that it will make for nurses and other healthcare staff down the line.

Right now, it is a little bit of a niche area within healthcare, and a lot of the work is really surrounding physician and advanced practice provider well-being. At the moment, we are doing a really great job of starting to encompass all healthcare staff into the research and programming that we are creating. But because it is a little bit of a newer field, there is just a lot of ambiguity in what we do. It's not necessarily black and white, so that's good for some people, and for some people, it's a little bit more challenging. Having more of an open, being able to be creative, and learn from other companies - because of that, a lot of networking is important to learn about what's working and where we can continue improving.

I would say integrity and compassion. I could list off a million, but I think those are the two big ones. To me, integrity encompasses so much more - it's fostering trust, and being able to present yourself in a fashion where everyone can feel as though what you said is exactly what it is.