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Background: Recent articles have described the challenges in developing nurse leaders to advance nursing science, improve health, healthcare, and health equity, and build the next generation of nurses. Over the past 25 years, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) has implemented many programs to develop nurse leaders to address these challenges., Purpose: This article shares lessons learned from four RWJF programs and how the authors recommend those lessons can be applied today., Methods: The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) has supported nursing leadership development for over fifty years. Discussion of four RWJF nursing programs including the Executive Nurse Fellows (1998-2017); the New Jersey Nursing Initiative (2009-2016); the Nurse Faculty Scholars (2007-2017) and the Future of Nursing Scholars (2013-2023) is used to highlight strategies and lessons learned., Findings: Key lessons for developing the next generation of nurse leaders and strengthening the nurse leader pipeline include the importance of continuing leadership development over the course of one's career; accelerating the nursing PhD to faculty pipeline; strong intentional mentoring; and building supportive communities to ensure long term impact., Discussion: While these program examples had purposeful philanthropic funding, the lessons can also be implemented by building partnerships with federal agencies, philanthropy, and universities., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: It is important for nurses to serve on hospital boards, largely to give voice to matters of quality and patient safety., Purpose: Describe what one nurse was able to accomplish on a statewide board over time as chair of the board's Quality and Patient Safety Committee., Methods: The experience was analyzed using auto-ethnography and narrative analysis., Discussion: After describing the organization, the paper summarizes the key issues on which the nurse took the lead, measures of success in the role, and learning acquired along the way., Conclusion: The "system" orientation of nurses is an asset in getting hospital boards to view themselves as institutional champions of quality., (Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Nurse Faculty Scholars program was created to address the nursing shortage via development of the next generation of national leaders in academic nursing., Purpose: The leadership training combined development at the scholar's home institution with in-person didactic and interactive sessions with notable leaders in nursing and other disciplines., Methods: A curriculum matrix, organized by six domains, was evaluated quantitatively and qualitatively., Discussion: What set this program apart is that it immersed junior faculty in concerted leadership development with regard to all aspects of the faculty role so that teaching interactively, making use of the latest in information technology, giving testimony before a policy-making group, participating in strategic planning, and figuring out how to reduce the budget without jeopardizing quality were all envisioned as part of the faculty role., Conclusion: The domains covered by this program could easily be used as the framework to plan other leadership-development programs for the next generation of academic leaders., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: Mentoring has long been regarded as one of the key components of research training and faculty development., Purpose: The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Nurse Faculty Scholars program purposely facilitated scholars' development of a mentoring network by providing each individual with three mentors: a school-of-nursing mentor (primary), a university-based non-nurse research mentor (research), and a nationally-recognized nurse leader at another university (national)., Method: The Mentorship Effectiveness Scale was used to assess the effectiveness of each type of mentor in the first five completed cohorts., Discussion: The ratings of mentorship effectiveness for all three kinds of mentors were generally high. Scholars valued most their mentors' support and advocacy; the biggest weakness in dealing with all mentors was accessibility., Conclusion: Even when one mentor proved a poor match, another mentor turned out to be an advocate and helpful, thus reaffirming the benefits of a mentoring network as opposed to only a single mentoring relationship. One lesson learned is the importance of preparing mentors for their role via written materials, in-person or phone orientations, and discussions at the annual meeting., (Copyright © 2016. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Background: The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Nurse Faculty Scholars program was created to address the nursing faculty shortage and thereby decrease the nursing shortage., Purpose: The purpose of the study was to describe the program development, implementation, and ongoing outcome evaluation., Methods: Data on scholarly productivity, impact of research, research funding, and leadership positions were compiled, including an h-index (impact of publications) comparison with a comparison group of other interdisciplinary faculty at the same institutions of the 90 current and alumni scholars., Discussion: There is evidence of the achievements of the individual scholars; however, the effect of the synergy of the multiple components of the program is difficult to capture in traditional evaluation strategies., Conclusions: The sense of possibility and responsibility (to the profession, to improving the health of all Americans, and to one's school of nursing and university) was a significant outcome of the program. Lessons learned from the program are important for the leadership development and retention of nursing faculty., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Nurse Faculty Scholars program was conceptualized as not only promoting the growth and development of early-career faculty but as enhancing the research infrastructure of scholars' schools of nursing., Purpose: At the completion of the scholars' three years of support, deans/directors were asked to provide feedback regarding the institutional impact of the scholars' participation in the program., Methods: Phone interviews were conducted on the first five completed cohorts and a six-item questionnaire was developed to obtain some quantitative data., Discussion: The program was viewed as having accelerated the scholars' leadership and scholarship, and their influence within the school/university and regionally/nationally. Deans/directors generally agreed that the scholars' experience helped build the school's research portfolio., Conclusion: Looking back on how the participating schools of nursing fared, one can say that the program's institutional expectations were achieved most of the time. The program helped scholars build their own reputations and that in turn had consequences for the school's standing as a whole. A number of components are described that can be replicated singly or in various combinations by schools/universities interested in adopting aspects of this program., (Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

This paper describes how the John A. Hartford Foundation sought to maximize the influence of its various geriatric nursing projects by organizing and managing them collectively as the Hartford Geriatric Nursing Initiative (HGNI). This initiative aimed to develop a shared identity, encouraged cross-pollination of efforts, convened project leaders to address opportunities and problems, launched across-project collaborations, and created tools and resources to support overall efforts. This paper ends with some reflections on the processes implemented to maximize HGNI effectiveness, particularly the importance of forging a common identity in order to encourage expanded solutions. The HGNI can serve as an example of how intersecting interests can fuel new ideas, thus helping others think more strategically about change efforts in the future., (Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

The Institute of Medicine's quality initiatives have collectively emphasized the importance of information technology to the transformation of health care. Not coincidentally, federal initiatives in 2004 have signaled the start of "the decade of health information technology." Building on those reports, this article describes the informatics revolution in process, and nursing's readiness to move in that direction. The promise of informatics in reshaping practice is sketched out in terms of seven aims for improvement, followed by a listing of some of the issues that must be addressed for nursing to realize those possibilities. In similar fashion, changes in academia are discussed both in terms of the promise of informatics applications and the barriers to achieving that preferred future. The article ends with some policy recommendations and reflections on opportunities at hand, particularly the growing emphasis on patient self-management support.