Follow The Brand Podcast with Host Grant McGaugh

Nurturing Difference, Leading Change: How Nicole Dieudonne Is Redefining Compassionate Leadership in Healthcare"

• Grant McGaugh CEO 5 STAR BDM • Season 2 • Episode 35

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The journey from frontline nurse to respected healthcare leader rarely follows a straight path. Nicole Dieudonne's story—spanning 37 years in nursing with 30+ years in leadership positions—proves that sometimes the most powerful leadership emerges from unexpected beginnings.

As a Bahamian American of Haitian and Cuban descent who became a teenage mother, Nicole's multicultural perspective infuses her approach to healthcare leadership. What began as simply "choosing something" blossomed into a passionate career where she discovered her gift for compassionate leadership. Her framework, aptly named "The Compassionate Leadership Circle," centers on creating psychological safety, practicing empathy, and—perhaps most revolutionary—prioritizing leader wellbeing.

Nicole identifies the healthcare industry's critical blind spot: while organizations invest heavily in patient experience metrics, they often neglect investing in their leaders' development and resilience. This oversight creates a troubling disconnect, as these same leaders manage multimillion-dollar budgets, oversee thousands of staff members, and directly impact patient care quality through their leadership decisions. Her insight that "when we take care of ourselves better as leaders, we're more compassionate with employees, which translates to better patient care" reveals the powerful ripple effect of leadership wellbeing.

Now pivoting toward consulting after decades in operational leadership, Nicole offers transformative advice for healthcare leaders feeling stuck: "Push the pause button. Ask yourself: Why am I stuck? What do I need to learn? How do I show up differently?" This reflective practice ensures that when you return, "the better version of you shows up"—a simple yet profound reframing that empowers leaders to reconsider their purpose and impact.

Nicole's definition of legacy transcends titles or achievements, focusing instead on showing up with intention, honesty, and trust. Her commitment to practicing unconditional love in the workplace—separating people from their actions when addressing challenges—creates the psychological safety necessary for innovation and growth in today's complex healthcare environment.

Connect with Nicole on LinkedIn to follow her journey in nursing leadership and learn how nurturing difference and exuding change can transform healthcare from the inside out.

Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Follow The Brand! We hope you enjoyed learning about the latest marketing trends and strategies in Personal Branding, Business and Career Development, Financial Empowerment, Technology Innovation, and Executive Presence. To keep up with the latest insights and updates from us, be sure to follow us at 5starbdm.com. See you next time on Follow The Brand!

Speaker 1:

Welcome everybody to the Final Brand Podcast. This is your host, grant McGaugh. We're going to bring it right back over to Miami, florida, to one of my very, very good friends. I actually met her some time ago I think it was at the Miami Jewish Hospital down there in Miami Met her, we talked. Then I see her over here at Jackson. We had more conversations. I see her at Jackson again. We had more conversations. I see her at Jackson again. We had more conversations. I thought it would be a good discussion to really understand her career, her history and her influence. That is wonderful. So before we get started, I want you to introduce yourself, nicole. Do you mind doing that?

Speaker 2:

introduced yourself. Nicole, do you mind doing that? Absolutely Good afternoon everyone. And Grant, thank you so much for this opportunity. I also actually want to thank Jackson Health System and I want to thank Dr Carol Biggs for connecting us. As you stated, we've met in the past, but this reconnection was because of Dr Carol Biggs. I want to send the kudos and the thank yous to her. So yes, I am Nicole Giordano. I've been in nursing for approximately 37 years or so, and at least 30 of them has actually been in nursing leadership. So that's me in a nutshell.

Speaker 1:

Well, let's get this frame, that story. At the beginning you were just going to. I love to understand a person's origin story. You know, like what got them going. So, when we start at the beginning and we want to understand your inspiration, what inspired you to explore the path of leadership, consulting after decades of operational leadership or nursing leadership, I should say Good question, great question, actually.

Speaker 2:

I am actually at a point in my career as you stated. I've had 30 plus years of nursing leadership right, the normal trajectory for a nursing leader for me. I started as a frontline staff nurse. I soon became. A few years in between I became an assistant nurse manager.

Speaker 2:

From that I quickly became a manager and then to associate director of patient care services and then director of several different clinical areas and then director of several different clinical areas and for most people, the natural trajectory is now to become a chief nursing officer. That's where probably, or the chief nurse exec is actually the end all. But for me, I decided to push the pause button and I decided to pivot, and I want to say a lot of this pivoting, even though it was a thought in the past, has been due to me meeting you and the brand strategy and blueprint that I have just recently gone through sort of helped to solidify my moving forward with nursing consultant. Because of my years of experience, because of my beliefs now in me being the subject matter expert on many of nursing areas and the nursing profession, I think that I have a lot to offer as a nursing consultant. So, yes, I am pivoting.

Speaker 1:

Well, I think you kind of nailed it there. You have a lot to offer, and when we worked together, we worked together about four or five weeks or so and you shared a very powerful story about your cultural heritage, your personal resilience and how those experiences have shaped your leadership philosophy today. Can you share with the audience just a little bit about that so they get a better understanding of who you are?

Speaker 2:

Yes, Grant, I am, as I shared, a Bahamian American of Haitian and Cuban descent, multicultural. I came over to Florida during my teenage years, not necessarily sure of what avenue or where I wanted to my career paths at that time, just actually lifing right. And, interestingly enough, I became a teenage mom at an early age. So my life story was not necessarily linear or designed with a clear paths for me. I chose them as I moved along and I decided to choose nursing as a career. Only I just my mom always instilled in me you needed to do something. I'm not sure what you're going to do, but you're going to do something.

Speaker 2:

And education was at the forefront for my mom. So in choosing nursing, I just chose something. But interestingly enough, I absolutely fell in love with nursing. I resisted for almost a year the path of nursing leadership, Thank God for the folks and I'm not even sure Steve, I'll call his name that believed in me and kept pushing. And I actually absolutely fell in love with nursing leadership as well, Because I also realized that, hey, I can still affect what happens at the bedside Because I always believed in patient care and caring for patients, but I can actually still do that as a leader, so I absolutely fell in love with nursing leadership as well.

Speaker 1:

Well, I'm glad you did. I know a lot of people have benefited from you and what you bring to the table with your nursing expertise, and you went through a comprehensive brand blueprint process with me. I wanted to ask you what surprised you the most about your own strengths or your own potential? It can't drill.

Speaker 2:

So what surprised me the most about my own strengths, grant, is that Grant is that it was a validation for me. It was a validation that, hey, you are strong enough for this right, you are strong in these particular subject matters. You, too, can do this. What I realized was on point as well was my potentials, my weaknesses in the business strategy right, my weaknesses or opportunities weakness, but my opportunities as it relates to technology and building my marketing platform.

Speaker 1:

So that was always and still is a challenge for me that I am working through a challenge for me that I am working through, I'll tell you I'm glad you said that I feel there's a misstep by a lot of executives today whether you're in healthcare, you're in finance, you're in technology or where you may be that you're not utilizing the digital world the way it can be, the digital platforms as a form of showcasing who you are and what you bring to the table. You can't just rely on a resume, a CV, a small circle of influence to get you to that next level, whether it's career development or business development, because the world is just moving too fast. People do business with or hire people that they know, like and trust. How do you establish that now in a digital first world? And we kind of explored about that how you can take advantage of it.

Speaker 1:

Now, something I learned that you have your own framework or a process called the Compassionate Leadership Circle, which is a very unique program but I want you to share because this is great that you have Most people. You ask them that question so what's your platform, what's your framework, what's your process? That's unique to you, and then you get corrected. You have something the Compassionate Leadership Circle and so I want you to kind of share that with us, you know, and why now is the right time for this kind of leadership feeling, in your opinion.

Speaker 2:

Grant. Another great question, another great thought. Compassionate leadership circle is actually something that we do every day as nursing leaders, or we want to do every day as nursing leaders, Choosing to lead with compassion. It is a framework based upon having empathy, based upon providing psychological safety, based upon your daily interactions with not just your employees, but your interactions with yourself.

Speaker 2:

Oftentimes, as leaders, we do so much of taking care of other people, but we have to find compassion and choose and sort of take a look at those what's available to us in compassionate leadership for not just our employees, for ourselves, so that we can better lead with empathy and better lead with care and kindness. It is so important we have to model that behavior within ourselves so that we can impart that onto our employees. So what does it actually do? Because I've also mentioned that I realize that leadership still affects the patient at the bedside. So when we take care of ourselves better as a leader and we're compassionate and we're addressing our employees in a compassionate and kind way, that translates to compassionate care to the patients at the bedside.

Speaker 1:

It's a trickle down domino effect for everyone and this is important Because I work in that technology world. I work with a lot of people outside of the bedside, the care world, and they need people like yourself that know the front lines and they know the business lines, the strategies and the finance, because when they're developing programs or they're developing applications they kind of miss the mark sometimes and because they just don't understand what it's like in the real world to operate in the nursing setting right. I want to know, from a challenging standpoint, do you think you're going to face some transitioning from a traditional role in nurse leadership to transitioning more about you know and bringing forth your visibility and influence as a nurse consultant to help these other?

Speaker 1:

industries really find out, because they all want to sell or present a solution to the healthcare world Without really understanding all that that's happening. What challenges do you think you're going to face as you transition?

Speaker 2:

First and foremost, believing in myself is the first challenge. You have to get over that hurdle, that, oh, am I right for this? Is this right for me? You know, I almost want to be cliche and say join the Me Too movement, I too can do this right.

Speaker 2:

In that sense, what challenges I will face, or I will potentially face, is the lack of business acumen. I have to make sure that I am knowledgeable, just as knowledgeable as I am about nursing, knowledgeable about the business of healthcare consulting right. So it's vast. There are many avenues or there are many lanes that you can swim in, but what exactly is it that you want to do? So, knowing what it is that you want to do, which lane that you want to be in, and knowing the business around this nursing consultant is going to be important. Me is technology, and you touched on it before, so I'm not going to belabor the point, but I will absolutely have to be more involved in creating my platform and making sure that I'm visible on whichever platform it is, whichever organization, nursing organization, just sharing my story and being present.

Speaker 1:

I think that's so key key that you get it, you understand that and you're helping everybody on all sides of the ball that are. You know, at the end of the day, we all want to have a better positive health outcome for people and there's certain things you can do well and then we find that certain you know aspects of businesses just don't understand why this is not going to work. I think you fill that gap and speaking of gaps, we're talking about especially doing our program, a skills gap analysis. I want to know how did that skills gap analysis help you first, that skills gap analysis help you first gain clarity on your next chapter?

Speaker 2:

And what specific areas did you focus as far as improvement? So I remember I think this was after week two or week three you and I reviewed this and it stood out for me because it actually speaks to me and it resonates with me quite well. The areas was, if I remember correctly, was strategic communication, business development, healthcare policy, regulatory, which I am great at. In healthcare, I'm great with leadership development. The emotional intelligence part for me, I managed to shine, I did well. Where my opportunities were was again in the business segment of it, as well as the marketing. So the skills gap for me, not only did it provide and I thank you for this and I thank you for this what my opportunities were are, but it also provided for me a roadmap on how to go about improving those. So now it's up to me to do the work Right.

Speaker 1:

So the skills, the skills gap is important, not just for me to know, but for me to work on, okay, we came up with a brand tagline during that process. We did, and we're free, and that was, you know, n-d. Right, which is your initials, and that's nurturing difference leading change. Now, did you think that resonated with you? Did that like? You got those four to five words? Does that like just say, does this exude?

Speaker 2:

who you are. Absolutely Nursing different, exuding change Absolutely. Again, I stumbled on nursing. It wasn't something I said oh my God, I'm going to grow up and be a nurse. However, I always find that I want to make a difference and I always want to leave a place far better than I found it. So exuding change for me is, even as a simplistic in what I do on my day-to-day and when I'm visiting someone. It's just that innate in me. So, nurturing difference, exuding change yes, for me it's absolutely true.

Speaker 1:

I love it. I love it Now. You've chosen to lead with trust, empathy and cultural intelligence.

Speaker 2:

So, in your view, what do you feel is the biggest blind spot in current healthcare leadership today the biggest blind spot, I think, in healthcare.

Speaker 2:

On a daily basis, the leaders are insisting on us ensuring that we care for the patients. There is a lot of effort for a better choice of words around patient experience and making sure that we are measuring our metrics or reaching our metrics and accountability. Measuring our metrics or reaching our metrics and accountability the blind spot for me is the leader. How are we taking care of the leader? How much are we actually investing in our leaders so that they can do all of those other things, such as meet the metrics, ensure safe and effective quality patient care and ensure staff morale is held and staff are excited or happy about what they do every single day? The blind spot is the leader. We really and truly need to find a culture and do a culture shift in nursing leadership, where we're caring for our nursing leaders. They, too, come to work on a daily basis with so much going on, but they're expected to take care of so many other people. Right, they must take care of themselves first.

Speaker 1:

You got what you just said there the investment. Wherever you put in our dollars, especially if you're a leader, you're responsible for millions and millions of dollars in revenue and profit and loss and those sort of things, thousands of employees. But what investment do we have? Not just always salary wise, it's the training, the understanding, building cultural awareness around that. I think what you just said there as far as a blind spot, something we should take note of and really really think through that and say, hey, are we truly investing in our leadership? Because if you're building a building, these are the linchpins or the pillars of the organization and if it becomes weak, the whole building you know it kind of breaks down.

Speaker 2:

So which leads me to my next question, which you know during this whole process now, did you have a breakthrough moment, like during your brand journey, where everything you felt started to click for you during this process, yeah, wow, yes, I think when you I think maybe it was session one or two, maybe session one and you said to me and I was toggling or between exactly what I wanted to do as director of nursing operations, and I've done that, and I think I've done that well and I may I still have some to learn. But I also have this consultant piece and you'd ask me say, nicole, write your story? And I'm like write my story, what do you mean? Write my story? I've never written my own story, you know, but writing that story, writing my story, and just taking the time to do that was what clicked for me. It brought me so much clarity into what I want to do next, or what I want to be a part of Consulting, leading change, helping other organizations bring forth change as a consultant, other organizations bring forth change as a consultant, future state consulting on my own.

Speaker 2:

And you know, interestingly enough, grant, though, it brought clarity because we do this. I've been doing this for years and I think a lot of nurses do it. I've traveled as a interim director of nursing to different organizations across the state and it's interesting when you hear someone's asking you outside of your typical organization for your voice and for your opinion, as the subject matter expert, to something that's happening. And I'm going oh my God, they're asking me Right to something that's happening and I'm going oh my God, they're asking me right. So what brought me clarity was writing that story and helping me to connect the dots to what I want to do next and making sure, making me aware of what it is that I do well and what it is that I have to offer.

Speaker 1:

Okay, working with you has been a treat for me because I learned also. I learned from every single person that I work with and I'm always humbled by what I discover and find out. People share their personal story of wow, I just didn't, I didn't know that. You educate yourself. These are real experiences. Teaching youates you and you get an appreciation.

Speaker 1:

Now you had two areas what I call your differentiation, how you're different from other nurse leaders that might have a similar background that you have, but you really shine in these two areas of leadership. What I call leadership retention, how you retain leadership. Team well-being, which you kind of talked about even during this podcast, how you really look out for the team, including yourself as the leader. And then cultural recovery, which I didn't know. I said cultural recovery, system alignment. I'm like, help me understand that even more because you live in this world. So, yeah, if I were a nurse leader and I'm listening to this and nurse leaders who they might feel stuck what's one thing you would tell them about reclaiming their own voice and redefining their own success?

Speaker 2:

Reclaiming your own voice and redefining your own success. First and foremost, I will say push that pause button. First and foremost, I will say push that pause button. Push that pause button because I think, as nursing leaders, nursing is forever evolving and there's always something that's going on Right and we're moving really, really fast because we have one project, and it would be a financial project or be it a project that affects direct patient care. We're moving rapidly.

Speaker 2:

Push the pause button and say to yourself what about me? Why am I stuck? What is it that I need to learn? What is it that I need to do differently? How do I show up differently in order to affect the change? Additionally, when you push that pause button, take a look at what you're doing. Are you doing it for the status, the next level, the career, or does it really and truly make you happy? Take a look within and then reclaim. Take some time out for you, take some time out for Understanding who you are and what it is that you really want to do. Next, and it might be going right back into what you're doing, and that's OK, it is absolutely fine, but at least push the pause button every so often so that when you show up. The better version of you shows up.

Speaker 1:

You can't even say that. Even better, the better version of you shows up. All right, can we coin that? Can we just put that up? Yeah, the better version of you shows up. I love that, and I'm sure someone needed to hear that right now. You know why that's important because it's about what you love. It's about what you're good at, right, you know what it is. You know it's got to be able to support you.

Speaker 1:

And then what the world needs and the world needs more leaders like yourself, in my humble opinion, because you come across as very genuine, because you are genuine, you're just being who you are, which I think leads to legacy, right, and I want to ask you what does legacy mean, you know, for Nicole, and how are you building a future leadership that lasts beyond titles and gives real impact?

Speaker 2:

Wow, grant. When I think legacy, I honestly think back to my mom. She left a legacy of showing up, being strong, showing up for others. I want to do the same. I want to show up with intention. I want to be intentional. I want to have the legacy of being honest, of accountability. I want to have that legacy of trust and I think you and I've talked about that before, and I think you and I've talked about that before Believing in people, in my other leaders, in people that I meet, uplifting someone. I want to have that legacy of someone that you can come to, someone that's helped to empower others to believe in themselves and to show up to be the person, the best person that you are this day.

Speaker 1:

I think that is. You know that, and I love how you frame the story, because I think legacy is something that's handed down to a certain degree, no matter good, bad or different, but taking the good of everything you experience, you know, filter through and then present it to someone else in a more refined, repackaged point to get them to that next level, because we all are going to go through certain experiences in life, good, bad or indifferent that you may not have the experience around around and it makes you feel good when you say you know what?

Speaker 1:

Oh, I have confidence in this area and I know that I can excel in this area and do well, because I can feel myself propelling myself to such a level of expertise that it becomes undeniable. That's your visibility right. You've gone through the brave framework. Now You've gotten your brand identity. You've done your research right. You see your authentic self. You're becoming more and more visible and now you're executing the plan.

Speaker 1:

One thing I like working with you, because it was throughout our whole process. You would ask me questions like Grant, how do you see this, grant? What is this? Oh, here's something I'm looking at doing. Give me your input. That's when you take accountability right and you become a responsible and you're actually doing the work, because I can't create a brand for you.

Speaker 1:

I reveal the brand of who you are and, as you said, because sometimes you're working, you're doing things for maybe a number of years and you don't always step back and see yourself and where you're at in this process. Or have you really even crafted a path forward for yourself over the next one to three to five years and actually tactfully going about that? And when you have a blueprint, you can say, okay, where am I at? You know, sometimes you have to pull up the road right like, where am I at here, am I supposed to be here? And you look, and you look at the compass, like when now we look at a gps, is this, am I on the road right?

Speaker 1:

But if you don't have that compass, you don't have that blueprint, you don't have that uh, manuscript, you're just have that blueprint, you don't have that manuscript. You're just a little bit lost. You seem to me as someone has found their rhythm. You know what you want to do. You're going after it. I'm so very proud of you. If you have any last words, I want to make sure that we get everything that you feel you want to talk about out, because I think your story is so fantastic.

Speaker 2:

Well, thank you. The only last parting words that I would say as it wraps its arm around compassionate leadership is that. Another thing that's important to me is a lesson that I've learned on unconditional love. Right, and when you say you talk about unconditional love, I'm talking about how we show up and how we addressed our employees and we address each other when we are working with employees or we are addressing each other. It's not about if something's going wrong, it's not about the person. We have to take the person outside of that and just look at the actions. It is the actions that we want to correct In healthcare. Let's take a look at what it is that we want to change Not all of the negatives, but how do we wrap our arms around what is positive? How do we move forward, Whether or not we are dealing with people, whether or not we are dealing with processes, whether or not we are dealing with large or small systems? How do we move forward with unconditional love for this career called nursing and move it to the next level?

Speaker 1:

I think that you said that best let's move it to the next level. I wanna get some honest feedback right now. I always like doing this live discussion for myself. You've gone through this framework. You work with me now the last four to five to six weeks. Would you recommend this to someone else? And if you would, why would you do that?

Speaker 2:

Oh, absolutely. I've already recommended it to other people and I've already had this conversation. I think I started recommending it. It just brought a conversation I found myself in the midst of and I was sharing it, how I had gotten so much clarity and, once again, the writing that story, my story, really brought clarity to me, really brought clarity to me. And what I also like about the program is that you're not just providing, you're providing a roadmap and a plan. So it's not as if I'm being left with this information and there's nothing to do. There's a path. There's still work to do. It's not over, it's kind of just the beginning, right? So I most definitely will recommend this and I will most definitely want to ask you to invite me to come back. Future state I want to talk about because I am so excited about this and following the plan when will I be next On the next segment of this journey, because it's a journey.

Speaker 1:

All right, we got to have a Nicole part too, yeah.

Speaker 2:

Yes, 2.0.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, this is going to be wonderful. This is great. Now I know you have a LinkedIn presence. I want you to tell our audience how to contact you, so we can actually see a little bit of your journey as you progress right, right, and so I think that would be great to leave the audience with that information.

Speaker 2:

So I am on LinkedIn. I am in the midst of updating my LinkedIn profile and, yes, you can find me on LinkedIn. I'm not sure there's what. Do you call it a handle or is it hold on? And it talks about me as a director of nursing. It will. It talks about me, um what I've done in the past, my years of experience and my vast years of experience I've traveled um nursing operations, um linkedin. You'll find all my skills that I've mastered became the subject matter expert in LinkedIn. You will find my story, yeah.

Speaker 2:

You will actually find my story on LinkedIn.

Speaker 1:

Your great story, your wonderful story. We want your. You say you have a daughter and you want her to read that Like wow. Yes, I do have a daughter and you want her to read that Like wow.

Speaker 2:

Yes, I do have a daughter and I'm very she's very proud of me. I would love for her to read that as well.

Speaker 1:

We're going to make sure she does that and she can look up all the stories. You're going to be one of the over 200 different episodes that we have had on the Follow Brand Podcast. We go into our fourth year. This is wonderful. This is a library of information and resource for people to truly understand like, hey, what's it like to be a nurse leader? They can just tune into your episode and there's over 200 episodes of different individuals in different areas of career development, business development, technology and information, personal branding, executive presence, brand mastery. All of that is for all of you to tune into. You can do that at Firestar Video. That is the number five. That's star S-T-A-R. B for brand, b for development, inframasterscom. I want to thank you again for being on the show and being a great student of mine.

Speaker 2:

I want to thank you for having me.

Speaker 1:

You're most welcome.