The Nurses.co.uk Academy

The Nurses.co.uk Academy supports the wellbeing and career development of nurses, midwives and other clinicians and care staff. It helps employers increase retention and deliver on staff promises.

We are passionate about supporting the frontline clinical and care workforce and demonstrating that they are not only recognised and valued, but that they have a voice that (once heard) can help organisations provide better patient care.

Bupa Health Insurance testimonial for Nurses.co.uk

The Academy harnesses the transformational qualities of coaching to overcome the known challenges facing nurses and nursing staff. The Academy understands the aims of organisational employee support (e.g. The People Plan for the NHS is the obvious example).

NHS testimonial for Nurses.co.uk

More information

Our Academy has been designed by a Registered Nurse and Qualified Career Coach who has 35 years nursing experience, including in the NHS - Nikki Goodhew.

Nikki is extremely passionate about the immersive benefits coaching can bring to people's lives and careers.

It also uses our 15 years experience of connecting clinicians and care professionals with employers and the knowledge of our advice section.

We have provided Academy services to paying customers including NHS Trusts, ICSs, CCGs and private healthcare providers including Bupa.

Testimonials for our work

Rita Trewartha

Head of Clinical Services

Bupa UKI

I took on my role as Head of Clinical Services at Bupa during some challenging workforce changes. Our annual employee engagement survey (via Glint) told me that we could do more to show our clinicians how much we value them and the vital work they do to support our customers. Nurses.co.uk were hired to provide clinical career coaching to all of my clinicians to do that. It’s my belief that the guidance, validation and listening time that Nurses.co.uk spent with my team has been a critical factor in our recent Glint employee survey, which came back showing a strong improvement. It’s something I’m incredibly proud of and demonstrates how we really care about our people at Bupa.

Claire Flavin

SVP Workforce Lead

NHS Devon

We worked with Nurses.co.uk . The team had a great collaborative working style and worked with energy, commitment and flexibility. We would be happy to work with them again.

What our learners / coachees have said

Each quote, or word, is from a different coachee… enjoy!

What an amazingly insightful experience. If you’re curious, open and vulnerable with Nikki then you start to see the world in a different way. This helps to you re focus on who you are and that you are more than good enough. This experience can apply to work, home, every aspect of life, Nikki provides lifelong lessons to take forward that stay with you long after your session has finished.

I just wanted to let you know I got the quality improvement role and also had an offer accepted on a house (on the same day)! Thank you again for the coaching and I hope you are well.

Just wanted to give you an update after the interview – I got the job! So so pleased. Thank you for your support, reminding myself “this or something better” definitely helped reduce the stress I was putting myself under. I even had my wife telling me this or something better for the days leading up to it!

Thank you for all your support and encouragement; most of all for making me understand my value.

You've helped me to carry on with my best way of working.

I liked having an outsider's perspective.

It was like a journey.

For me it was about career progression.

Exploration.

It was about recognising where I am.

Holistic.

I loved the neutrality of it.

I was given time, that’s what I loved about it.

I felt recognised.

It was personal time and we never get that.

I could be candid, and knew I was safe because it was confidential and impartial.

Just having that time given to me was phenomenal!

This is coaching and guiding just for us clinicians and that's special.

I have to say, this surpassed all my expectations!

I felt, like, let's look at the aspirations I have now!

It was a chance to stop, I felt lucky.

I've been able to see how far I've come and where I can go.

You are enablers!

I just wanted to send an email to say thank you for our sessions. They helped me feel like I could do more than I have been and I wanted to let you know I applied for a senior midwife secondment and was successful. I start next week 😊

I realised I could be confident.

You've helped me affirm all the skills I have.

I felt heard.

You helped me look at the journey I've been on!

For me it was complete validation.

Like, for 21 years I've felt like a Newly Qualified Nurse but now I see how much I have to give.

I would describe what you did for me as 'new beginnings'! I think I just felt stuck before.

I undertook coaching and found it a very positive experience. When I started the coaching, I had just been unsuccessful in a job interview, feeling low on confidence and unsure which direction I should take in the next step of my career. I felt ready to move into a more senior role but was finding it difficult to identify the right role for me.

Coaching helped me to first map out what an ideal post would look like for me, considering what would give me job satisfaction and which parts of my current role give me fulfilment. Taking this time to discuss these things and how a new role needed to align with my core values gave me a clearer picture of what I was looking for. I then went about looking at other roles with a different mind-set; rather than looking for the ‘perfect job’ and feeling disheartened when I couldn’t find one or settling for something that wasn’t right for me, I looked for roles that prioritised the things that aligned with my priorities: improving patient safety, ability to travel and work alongside a wide range of teams and a role that would allow me to use the skills and knowledge I had gained in postgraduate study.

Having applied for a new job that fulfilled what I was looking for, Nurses.co.uk helped me to go into the interview with confidence and a positive mind-set so that I could perform at my best. Having found a role that I felt excited about, it was natural to slip into an ‘all or nothing’ mind-set and put additional pressure on myself. We discussed how to shift this perspective towards the mantra ‘this or something better,’ and this shift allowed me to go into the interview feeling less nervous than I ever had before, despite it being a job that I desperately wanted. I was able to give my best effort at the interview and was successful in being appointed to the role.

As I was preparing to move roles, we discussed how I could use my exit interview as a positive experience to end this chapter of my career. Talking this through allowed me to formulate my reflections on my time in my role and how I could use those experiences to help the future of the role and the service.

Overall, I am truly very grateful for the experience I had going through career coaching with Nurses.co.uk. It helped me through a challenging time in my career and I am taking with me some valuable skills that will help me maintain a positive mind-set going forwards into my new role.