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Organizations are complex with cultures that influence excellence, commitment and job satisfaction. In nursing schools, faculty are required to succeed within the performance driven culture of academic scholarship alongside the organizational culture that influences the work environment. The purpose of this article is to describe the process that a School of Nursing engaged in using complexity science and liberating structures to shift a perceived unhealthy organizational culture to a healthier one. Complexity science focuses on patterns of relationships within a system while Liberating Structures provide strategies for people to identify new patterns of working together which can contribute to culture change. Over two years, faculty identified the culture issues, the desired positive outcomes and implemented an action plan using Liberating Structures such as Shift and Share, Discovery and Action Dialogues, TRIZ (Theory of Inventive Problem Solving) and 15% Solutions (Power to Create Change Now). The work included a focus on understanding culture challenges, uncovering positive practices, and creating new ways to respectfully interact with each other while implementing the work of the School. Culture is ubiquitous, takes time to alter and can be difficult to measure any substantive change, however on evaluation after two years, there was guarded optimism that a healthier culture exists with knowledge of how to continue to build on the work done. While problems still arise, the new knowledge, strength of leadership within faculty and having the understanding and confidence to interact respectfully, continues to build new relationship patterns and a healthier culture within the School., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Nurses frequently experience horizontal violence in their interactions with nursing colleagues within the workplace. By definition, horizontal violence includes such disrespectful behaviours as intimidation, coercion, bullying, criticism, exclusion or belittling. Educational programs addressing horizontal violence have been developed, but few have been evaluated with respect to knowledge acquisition and transfer. The purpose of this paper is to describe an experimental effectiveness study, using a pre/post design with a control group (total N=164). The research evaluated an innovative educational program in which nurses, using avatars, role-played strategies to address horizontal violence within a virtual nursing unit developed on the Second Life platform. The results of participating in this program were compared with more traditional educational methodologies, such as a workbook and a self-directed e-learning module. While all strategies were perceived by participants as beneficial, the findings from this study suggest that learning through the self-directed e-learning module followed with practice in a virtual world is an effective way of acquiring knowledge, skills and abilities to better address horizontal violence.

University Health Network (UHN) became a demonstration site to test a health human resource planning model to foster inter-organizational collaboration, knowledge transfer and exchange of nurses between an urban academic health science centre and a remote region in northern Ontario. Funding support was provided by the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care. The partnership between UHN, Weeneebayko Health Ahtuskaywin (WHA) and James Bay General Hospital (JBGH) addressed retention, recruitment, professional practice development, planning and succession planning objectives. The primary goal of this partnership was to supply the staffing needs of WHA/JBGH with UHN nurses at a decreased cost for four- to six-week placement periods. This resulted in a marked decrease in agency use by approximately 40% in the WHA site during the months UHN nurses were practicing in the north, with an overall agency cost savings of $165,000 reported in the pilot year. The project also served as a recruitment and retention strategy for all organizations. It provided an opportunity to practice in new clinical settings and to engage in knowledge transfer experiences and professional development initiatives between remote and urban practice environments. In the pilot year, 37 nurses (30 from UHN and 7 from WHA) participated. They returned to their respective organizations re-energized by the different "landscape" of practice experience and toward the nursing profession itself.