Educating Others About the
DNP Degree
Lisa Astalos Chism DNP, APRN,
GNP, NCMP, FAANP
Author of The Doctor of Nursing Practice:
A Guidebook for Role Development and
Professional Issues, Second Edition
Educating Others about the DNP
• Know who you are!
• Know your degree!
• Seize opportunities to educate others
about the DNP degree
• Promote trust and credibility in your setting
• Join and volunteer at professional
organizations to increase awareness
• Contribute to the profession of nursing
• Disseminate your work
Know Who You Are…
• Nursing
– American Nurses Association (1995),
nursing is “the diagnosis and treatment of
human responses to actual or potential
health problems” (p. 6).
– Nursing evolves to meet the societal needs
of others by caring for individuals, families,
and communities in an effort to maintain
their health and well-being in various states
of health and illness (Chism, 2012).
Know Who You Are…
• Nursing Practice
– Both the act of caring for individuals, families,
and communities in an effort to promote health
and well-being as well as the relationship that
develops between nurse and patient (Chism,
2012).
– Profession of nursing includes a knowledge base
(discipline) and reproducible modes of inquiry
(science) that purport to explain how, why, and
what nurses do when providing care (nursing
practice).
Know Who You Are…
• Advanced Practice Nursing
– Advanced practice nurses “acquire
specialized knowledge and skills through
study and supervised practice at the
master’s or doctoral level in nursing” (ANA,
1995, p. 14).
– Includes NP, CNM, CNS, CRNA per AACN
– Expanding informally to nurse
administrators, educators, public health
Know Who You Are…
• Medicine
– defined as “the science or practice of the diagnosis,
treatment, and prevention of disease” (Medicine, 2007).
• Physician
– includes “a person skilled in the art of healing; educated,
clinically experienced, and licensed to practice medicine”
(Merriam-Webster, 2008b).
• Doctor
– Bailey (2003) agreed “today, the term ‘doctor’ is applied to
both a person with a doctoral degree in non-medical
subjects, as well as physicians and surgeons” (p. 490).
– “to teach”
Know Who You Are…
• Doctor of Nursing Practice
– A practice-focused doctorate and the terminal practice
degree for nursing.
– Designed to prepare nurses to meet the changing
demands of health care and healthcare delivery
systems.
– Curriculum focused on evidence-based practice,
scholarship to advance the profession, organizational
and systems leadership, information technology,
healthcare policy and advocacy, interprofessional
collaboration across disciplines of health care, and
advanced nursing practice (AACN, 2006b).
Know Your Degree…
• DNP- Understand Origins, Rationale (Chapter
One)
• The 2000, 2001, 2003, and 2010 IOM reports,
RWJF, National Academy of Sciences led to a
set recommendations for all healthcare
professionals:
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Provide patient-centered care
Function in interprofessional teams
Employ evidence-based practice
Integrate quality improvement standards
Utilize various information systems (IOM, 2003)
Know Your Degree…
• Other rationale for DNP Degree:
– Parity with other professionals
– Need for longer graduate programs to fulfill
requirements for advanced practice
– Current needs for nursing faculty shortages
– Increasing complexity of healthcare
systems requires additional information
included in nursing graduate programs
(Marion et al., 2005)
Know Your Degree…
• Standards of the DNP degree are a result
of a collaborative effort between the
AACN, NONFP and NACNS
• In 2006, the AACN published the
Essentials of Doctoral Education for
Advanced Nursing Practice.
***Considered the “foundational outcome
competencies deemed essential for all graduates of
a DNP program regardless of specialty or functional
focus” (AACN, 2006a).
Seize Opportunities
• Take every opportunity to educate
others about your degree
– Explain your preparation, including origin
and rationale of DNP degree, to patients,
nurses and other health care professionals
Provide Educational
Opportunities
• Offer to present formally and informally
within and outside of your setting to
educate others about the DNP degree
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In Services
Newsletters
Community events
Professional events
Volunteer events
Professional blogs
Professional columns
Promote Trust and Credibility
• Quietly educate others rather than
preach about the DNP degree
• Lead by example
• Mentor others including fellow nurses,
advanced practice nurses, DNP
students
Join and Volunteer for
Professional Organizations
• If not already involved in professional
organizations, join
• Volunteer as committee member, run
elected office within the organization
• Give your time through participation and
organization of conferences
Contribute to Profession of
Nursing
• Once you finish your degree, you have a
responsibility to contribute to the profession
• Become active in educating other DNP
students as preceptor
• Involvement in policy
• Develop innovative practice (Menopause
Practitioner)
Disseminate Your Work
• Publish your project!
– Work collaboratively with your
chair/mentor, second authorship
consideration (Chapter 4)
• Present at professional conferences
– Poster or podium presentations
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate: Shaping Your Brand
(Sneak preview - Chapter 11)
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
– Marketing vs.
branding
– Becoming a
“marketpreneur”
– Mission statement
– Vision statement
– Your “elevator pitch”
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The interview
Appearances
Networking
Becoming a voice in
the community
– My marketing tools
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• Marketing
– Defined by American Marketing Association
as “an organizational function and a set of
processes for creating, communicating, and
delivering value to customers and for
managing customer relationships in ways that
benefit the organization and its stakeholders”
(AMA, 2011).
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• Branding
– Describes a component of marketing, is an
essential marketing strategy.
– A brand consists of a “trademark, a
distinctive name, and a combination of
images that creates associations and
expectations in the minds of consumers”
(Beals, 2008).
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• Why develop a “Brand”?
– To benefit your career
– To increase personal recognition
– To improve your reputation
– To promote your employers business
– To obtain new clients/patients
– To advance your own social beliefs or
cause
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• Become a “marketpeneur”
– Employing leadership and innovation when
marketing (Mackey & Estala, 2008).
– Marketpreneurs have a “vision they can articulate
and sell this vision to others” (Mackey & Estala,
2008, p.14).
– Marketpreneur has “desire, determination,
dedication/commitment, and a focus on success”
(Mackey & Estala, 2008, p. 14).
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• Mission statement:
– Defined as “a sentence describing a company's
function, markets and competitive advantages; a
short written statement of your business goals and
philosophies” (Entrepreneur, 2011).
– A mission statement defines “what an organization
is, why it exists, its reason for being”
(Entrepreneur, 2011).
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• DNP graduates develop their own mission
statement based on their setting or specialty.
• DNP graduate defines exactly what they bring
to their setting and decide how their unique
talents and skills may be marketed.
• A mission statement defines focus and
channels efforts to achieve their mission
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• Vision Statement:
– Defined as an “aspirational description of what an
organization would like to achieve or accomplish
in the mid-term or long-term future”. (Business
Dictionary, 2011).
– More broad in spectrum than mission statement.
– Think about long range goals. Where do you want
to be in 5 yrs, 10 yrs…?
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• Next, develop an “Elevator Pitch”
– The elevator pitch is a brief introduction that takes
60 seconds or less to introduce someone to who
you are, why you are unique and what your
expertise is.
– The elevator pitch “gets to the point and places an
image in the listener’s mind…it should be brief,
descriptive and paint an interesting picture”
(Beals, 2008, p. 29).
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• The Interview: Pertinent for DNPs
• What experiences to you have that qualifies you for the
position?
• What distinguishes you from other candidates?
• What are your strengths?
• What are your weaknesses?
• What are your long-term goals?
• What experiences have you had working with others in
teams?
(Pagana, 2008)
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• Appearances:
– Appearances matter when marketing
oneself as a DNP graduate, especially
while the DNP degree is still relatively new
to others.
– “No matter what people say, you are
judged by the way you dress” (Pagana,
2008, p. 43).
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• Networking
– Use acronym OAR to aid conversation
– “O” stands for observation, make a comment
about the event in general
– “A” stands for ask a question, such as “have you
been here before”
– “R” stands for revealing something personal
(Pagana, 2008)
Marketing Yourself as a DNP
Graduate
• Becoming a voice in the community
– DNP graduates should become involved
speaking in their community
– join a speaker’s bureau related to one’s
specific specialty
– volunteer to speak at community events
DNP Graduate as Ethical
Consultant
(Sneak preview - Chapter 7)
DNP as Ethical Consultant
• The DNP graduate may integrate several roles such
as leader, researcher, clinician, policy advocate, and
educator.
• Within each of these roles, the DNP graduate will
likely encounter various ethical scenarios.
• Many DNP curricula are currently including ethics
coursework to prepare the DNP graduate with the
skills necessary to evaluate ethical issues.
DNP as Ethical Consultant
• Ethics Consultant Role:
– Fulfill formal role as ethics advisor within an
institution
– May serve on ethics board/committee locally or
within an institution
– Serve as consultant formally or informally for
ethical issues within your setting
– Mentor others in your setting regarding ethical
issues/questions
DNP Ethics Toolkit
• DNP graduates will need to develop their “Ethics
Toolkit”
– Review ethical terms
– Review ethical theories
– Review bioethics
– ANA Code of Ethics for Nurses
– ICN Code of Ethics
– Nursing's’ Social Policy Statement
DNP Ethics Toolkit
• Ethical Terms
– Review ethical terms
– Ethics - “the study of ideal human behavior and ideal ways of
being” (Butts & Rich, 2008, p. 4).
– Morals - “specific beliefs, behaviors, and ways of being
derived from doing ethics” (Butts & Rich, 2008, p. 5).
– Code of ethics - standards of conduct, and state certain
principles regarding responsibilities and duties of those
professionals of who they apply to (Pozgar, 2010).
DNP Ethics Toolkit
• Ethical Terms
– Values - “ideals, beliefs, customs, modes of conduct,
qualities, or goals that are highly prized or preferred by
individuals, groups, or societies” (Burkhardt & Nathaniel,
2008, p. 83).
– Reasoning - the “use of abstract thought processes to think
creatively, to answer questions, solve problems, and to
formulate strategies for one’s actions and desired ways of
being” (Butts & Rich, 2008, p. 9).
DNP Ethics Toolkit
• Ethical Theories
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Virtue ethics
Natural Law Theory
Deontology
Principlism
Utilitarianism
Casuistry
Narrative ethics
Critical theory
DNP Ethics Toolkit
• Bioethics
– Autonomy
– Beneficience
– Nonmaleficence
– Justice
DNP Ethics Toolkit
• ANA Code of Ethics for Nurses
– Found at:
http://nursingworld.org/MainMenuCategories/EthicsStandards/
CodeofEthicsforNurses.aspx
DNP Ethics Toolkit
• ICN Code for Nurses
– Found at:
http://www.icn.ch/about-icn/code-of-ethics-for-nurses/
DNP Ethics Toolkit
• Nurses Social Policy Statement
– Found at:
http://www.nursesbooks.org/Main-Menu/Foundation/NursingsSocial-Policy-Statement.aspx
Questions?
The Doctor of Nursing Practice:
A Guidebook for Role Development and Professional Issues,
Second Edition
To purchase a copy or request an Instructor’s Review Copy, visit
http://go.jblearning.com/DNP2
Thank You!