After an employee opinion survey, the human resources department came to Lisa Pettrey with a huge question: What are you doing to create the environment that we're trying to create elsewhere in the hospital?

There is no easy answer, other than everything Pettrey does to open communications and instill the pride that cements unit managers, nurse practitioners and staff nurses into a single-minded team focused on patient care.

"I don't consider myself an executive. To me, that's somebody in a suit in an office," Pettrey said. Nonetheless, she is accountable for the leadership and operations of myriad departments: the cardiology catheterization and electrophysiology labs, echocardiograms and diagnostics, cardiac rehabilitation and more.

"I really feel like I'm a nurse," Pettrey said. In that tradition, she makes daily rounds. "That's how the staff learns to see me and trust me so that they will feel free dropping in my office, calling if they have an issue. They don't do that because I'm the director. It's because they've been used to seeing me come around. They know I know something about the issues."

Aside from her experience as a staff nurse, the heart services team also sees Pettrey's ardent support of the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses. She encourages her staff to tap professional organizations as a network and as a way to stay abreast of developments that may better serve their patients.

More and more, though, it is Pettrey's team that is recognized as leaders, nationally and within the medical center.

"The biggest thing I've tried to accomplish in the last two or three years is to have people see that we have a lot to be proud of and we're doing good work," Pettrey said. "We had nine posters from staff and management that were presented at national conferences. That was unheard of."

One, she said, explored postoperative open-heart surgery pain management and changes made to improve patient comfort.

"For a staff person to go to a national conference and have people from all over the country coming up and asking them about their project, you can't pay for that sense of pride and accomplishment," Pettrey said.

It's the same within the medical center, too, as evidenced by the administration's interest in replicating Pettrey's success. "I'm certainly proud that we have developed a leadership team at heart services," she said. "They're people who are asked often for advice. People come to them for best practice."