1. Tell us about your experience putting together your portfolio for the AL-CIP?
Putting together the portfolio for the AL-CIP required all of the hard choices and temperature checks of updating the Annual Infection Control Plan. You at times struggle to maintain an overarching perspective over all the domains of work, and are continually asking yourself questions like: Are the outcomes of this piece of work in this domain objective, significant and sustained? Did we see real change? Is there a better story to be told by choosing a different project?
2. Can you provide tips for writing a successful rationale?
I fully endorse using the STAR method to write your rationales (Situation, Task, Action, Result). Although of course i rebelled against this structure at times, it was a simple method to ensure i was describing the the problem, the action that was required, what we did and the results in a concise yet complete way. You have to remember, someone has to read and score all of these statements! so you don't need to use the entire word count each time.
3. What advice would you give to someone considering the AL-CIP?
I would say consider it as an early adopter of the credential if you want to take a different approach to making the case for your team and your program that is based upon impact. For instance, if you are advocating for increased IP staffing, use the AL-CIP to show to your organization the positive impact on patient safety your program has had, and how they can support greater impact by approving more staff. For applicants to your open positions, use the credential to show them what kind of experts they could be learning from, and impact they could be making.
4. What does earning your AL-CIP mean to you?
Earning the AL-CIP immediately brought home to me the immense validation that my career, while not always the most visible within our organization, has made a difference to our patients, as well as profession. As we all know. We rarely if ever complete projects entirely on our own, so I consider this a 100% collective accomplishment and direct reflection that recognition can, and should come to those who do the often unsung work of making sure harmful things do NOT happen to those under our care, even though most others are none the wiser because we were successful.