AMSN Introduces the New Board of Director Role, The Emerging Professional Liaison
AMSN Introduces the New Board of Director Role, The Emerging Professional Liaison
The Academy of Medical Surgical Nurses (AMSN) Board of Directors (BOD) recently 
approved a new role called the Emerging Professional Liaison. The person serving in this position will be a member of the AMSN BOD, Jacqueline Savalle, BSN, RN, CMSRN. The role was created to provide newer nurses the opportunity to have a voice in their profession at the national level as well as to gain experience on a nursing board.
The majority of AMSN members have between 5–15 or 16-25 years of experience which adequately reflects the experience levels of the current AMSN BOD. The gap we felt we had on our current board was the voice of the nurse that has been in the profession for less than five years. About a year ago, several of the AMSN board members attended leadership training where the Emergency Nurses Association presented a poster on the development of the emerging professional position for their National Board.
The AMSN BOD discussed how it would be beneficial to have an emerging professional join our board to provide their perspective on key issues and to add diversity to the Board.
What is the AMSN emerging professional liaison role? This new role is an AMSN member that is appointed to the AMSN BOD for a two-year term and is currently a non-voting member on the Board of Directors. The expectation of the emerging professional liaison includes providing content and perspective from the new nurse perspective and to be fully integrated in BOD discussions.
Our main goal with this new position is to see what more we can do as an organization to support medical-surgical nurses with less than 5 years of experience.
The new role is intended to provide a direct avenue for the Board to learn about the priorities of this key demographic who are the future of their organization. We also want to grow and provide our members leadership opportunities for individual growth.
The criteria established to select this individual is a nurse that is a full member of AMSN and is in good standing with five years or less of experience as a medical-surgical nurse with at least 50% of their work spent in direct patient care.
Previous AMSN volunteer experience and earning the CMSRN credential are recommended. We had over 20 great candidates apply for this inaugural position. After interviewing numerous qualitied candidates, the consensus model was utilized to choose our first emerging professional. We are excited to announce our first emerging professional appointed to the AMSN board is Emerging Professional, Jacqueline Savalle, BSN, RN, CMSRN and she began her two-year appointment in May 2020.
Jacqueline has been a nurse for three years. She currently works in Rochester, Minnesota and works at Mayo Clinic St. Mary's Hospital. She is a full time direct care nurse on a Medical Thoracic unit and will continue to work in direct patient care through her term. Her job providers her with the experience she needs to speak to the issues and barriers affecting the medical-surgical nurse.
She comes to our board with previous experience serving on the Michigan Student Nurses Association Board of Directors as a Membership/Nomination and Elections Director. In this position, she was the point person for all school chapters and the state board; she recruited members for the next board, and assisted in planning a state-wide convention. Jacqueline was also the President of her undergraduate nursing program’s nursing association and Vice President the two-years prior to that.
These positions provided her with even more valuable leadership opportunities and allowed her to collaborate with nurses from all levels of the program.
Jacqueline shared why she applied for this position, “This position interested me right away. A huge portion of med-surg nursing encompasses new graduate nurses and very few professional organizations recognize emerging professionals. This position allows for this demographic to be able to make a direct impact on the practice they are involved in and have a voice sitting at the table.”
Next spring, we will begin to look for our next emerging professional liaison. Jacqueline will be in the second year of her term and will serve as a mentor for the newly appointed emerging professional for that person’s first year. Jacqueline shares after a few months in this new role, “This has been an amazing experience.
The Board has been welcoming, supportive, and genuinely interested in the viewpoint and impact of emerging medical-surgical professionals. I look forward to continuing to support and advocate for my fellow emerging professionals and the rest of the med-surg nurses during my term on the Board.”
Submitted by: Jennifer Kennedy MSN, RN-BC, CMSRN, CNE, CNE-cl, AMSN Board - Director
