Resilience in Newly Hired Nursing Faculty: Practical Evidence of a Complex Construct

Resilience plays a role in workforce retention and has been linked to job satisfaction, quality of life, and organizational commitment in nursing faculty. Research on the nature of faculty resilience, however, remains sparse.

The purpose of this study was to contribute to the understanding of nurse faculty resilience by describing examples of specific ways that a group of newly hired nursing faculty enacted resilience during their first few years on the job.

Transcripts from one-on-one interviews with 23 faculty in 7 U.S. states were analyzed in a secondary analysis, which generated exemplars of resilience in practice.

Faculty expressed resilience through specific measures that included positive self-talk, reframing of adverse events, drawing analogies to familiar experience, asserting self-worth by helping others, and extensive social networking.

These actions enabled faculty to find meaning and support in difficult circumstances.