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uLeadership

HPSG’s uLeadership Acquisition Deepens Its Investment in Nurse Leadership Development

Healthcare Plus Solutions Group® (HPSG) is excited to welcome uLeadership®, a nationally and internationally recognized professional development and research company focused on relational leadership education for nurse leaders to our family of companies.

The founders of uLeadership—Dr. Kay Kennedy, CEO; Dr. Lucy Leclerc, Chief Innovation and Learning Officer; and Susan Campis, Chief Wellness Officer—are known for creating the Human-Centered Leadership in Healthcare® framework for nurse leaders based on qualitative research. It establishes a healthy mindset and self-care practices that prepare leaders to get results through relational leadership. Their mission is to develop the people who lead the people who care for the people.

This acquisition illustrates our priorities, in that it reflects our long-held conviction that nurses are pivotal players in creating strong, resilient healthcare organizations. It also demonstrates our commitment to the “people-first” leadership style that today’s workforce increasingly expects.

“This is a natural next step for us,” says HPSG co-founder Quint Studer. “We’ve always valued nurses and sought out their voices, and we’ve always had a ‘people-first’ mindset. Across our work in healthcare for four decades and have always been committed to creating great places for people to work, practice, and receive care.”

When HPSG was founded in 2022, we partnered with the American Organization for Nursing Leadership (AONL) and the American Nurses Association (ANA) to fund research that included the voice of thousands of nurses. We saw the need for a good diagnosis in the “day in the life” of a nurse, and thought, “Who better to partner with than those two organizations?” Now, three years later, we’ve added the uLeadership science and founding team to continue to guide our path to having an impact in healthcare.

The evidence-based work behind uLeadership is the perfect supplement to HPSG efforts since we began:

  • The Human Capital Ecosystem™, a framework to reimagine the “people pillar”.
  • Precision Leader Development™, our platform designed to create individualized development plans for leaders across any organization.
  • Our publications: Rewiring Excellence: Hardwired to Rewired, Human Margin: Building the Foundations of Trust and coming soon, Genfluence: How to Lead a Multigenerational Workforce.

The uLeadership acquisition helps ensure that HPSG can continue delivering on the promise on which they built their business from the beginning.

As an organization, uLeadership’s focus on well-being, excellence, trust, and caring fits hand-in-glove with how they see the world—and dovetails with their own learnings on “where the puck is going” in healthcare. They believe organizations that embrace this style of leadership will be the winners in a rapidly shifting talent marketplace.

“There is a disconnect between what today’s talent wants/needs and what leaders sometimes know how to give,” notes HPSG co-founder Dan Collard. “Together, we can bridge that gap. We know where the industry is headed, and the synergy we create will help our client-partners get there faster.”

Kennedy, Leclerc, and Campis captured their philosophy in their 2021 book, “Human-Centered Leadership in Healthcare: Evolution of a Revolution. Their soon-to-be-published book, “Human-Centered Leadership in Healthcare: The Revolution Continues”, will be published this winter by the American Nursing Association.

“It’s meaningful that the authors highlighted the word ‘love’—written in reverse—within the word ‘revolution’ in the subtitle on the cover of their first book,” says Collard. “Love is naturally intertwined with leadership. It’s a big part of what makes us human.”

“One plus one equals three”: new value for leaders, caregivers, and the communities we serve. By combining our strengths, we’re helping ensure that when we care for our people, they can care for patients…and everyone wins.”

Dr. Kennedy says she and her colleagues could not be more excited about the partnership and how it will benefit the current organizations they serve.

“From the minute we started looking for an acquiring partner, HPSG was our first choice,” she says. “We’ve known Quint and Dan for a long time and based on our observations of their internal values—and the fact that they’ve always put people front and center—we were confident it was the perfect fit. In fact, our model and their model literally start with the same word. Human.

“Most importantly, in thinking of how we’ve led Human-Centered Leadership, we realized how seamlessly our missions dovetail,” adds Dr. Kennedy. “HPSG’s leader development work centers on attracting and retaining great people to organizations and the industry. We’re thrilled that this partnership will help us expand our reach and amplify our impact…and we anticipate many years of working together to build cultures of well-being, excellence, trust, and caring.”

To learn more about uLeadership and “Human Centered Leadership”, visit https://www.uleadership.com/

Learn More About uLeadership

About Kay Kennedy, DNP, RN, NEA-BC, CPHQ, FAAN

Dr. Kay Kennedy is a nurse executive, educator, and entrepreneur. By combining a love for nurses, patients, and quality improvement, she has led large nursing teams to create healthy work environments; satisfied patients; and consistent, high-quality care. Kay has held multiple leadership roles, from the bedside to chief nursing officer. She holds an adjunct associate professor role at Emory University School of Nursing along with other adjunct appointments at Massachusetts General Hospital Institute of Health Professions and Case Western Reserve University. Her goal as a leader is to ignite innovative problem-solving, develop others to be their best, and lead by serving others.

About Lucy Leclerc, PhD, RN, NPD-BC

Dr. Lucy Leclerc is a dedicated nurse leader, nurse scientist, entrepreneur, and professor with over 30 years of diverse nursing experience. Early in her career, she spent time as a bedside nurse in high-risk labor and delivery before falling in love with nursing leadership as an officer and flight nurse in the United States Air Force Reserve. She is a lifelong learner and received her PhD from Medical University of South Carolina in 2010. She teaches all levels of nursing students, from undergraduates to DNP students. Her research focuses on generation of contemporary nursing-specific leadership models.

About Susan Campis, MSN, RN, NE-BC, NBC-HWC

Susan Campis is a nurse executive, health and wellness coach, and entrepreneur. Susan is a nurse leader whose passion for coaching and mentoring others helped produce successful and engaged nursing teams throughout her career. As a nurse leader, Susan understands the importance of a safe and healthy work environment and worked to create a culture of excellence, trust and caring where her team could perform at their best, ensuring quality care and patient safety. Susan cares deeply for the health and well-being of healthcare professionals, and, as a health and wellness coach, her goal is to work with others to help them reach their full potential.

About uLeadership®

uLeadership is the vision of three healthcare executive leaders with decades of bedside nursing and nurse leadership experience. In coming together, they recognized that each one had experienced successful leadership journeys but had left themselves and their self-care out of the equation, which led to burnout. They now understand effective leadership starts with you, but it’s not about you!

By embracing authenticity, courage, inclusiveness, and respect for others, the attributes of Awakener, Connecter, and Upholder develop and emerge. Nurse leaders incorporate the skills of cultivating people (Awakener), building community (Connector), and recognizing the humanity in others (Upholder) into their nursing leadership practice. Nurse leaders who embrace these attributes have the ability to create and sustain cultures of excellence, trust, and caring, which lead to sustained and positive outcomes.