Meet Ndapota Grace Mhlanga, unit manager, operative services, Grey Nuns Community Hospital

When Ndapota Grace Mhlanga joined the nursing staff at the Grey Nuns Community Hospital in 2019, she felt something unexpected - like she was coming home. As a new Canadian, she had dealt with challenges when it came to getting around in a new city and adjusting to a northern Alberta climate. But when it came to work, her team at the Grey Nuns helped make the transition easier by making her feel truly welcome. 

“There is just something about this place,” says Grace. “The people are lovely. They genuinely seem to care about you - not just as a nurse, but as a person.”

Grace followed in the footsteps of her mother and grandmother by becoming a nurse, but she credits the labour and delivery nurses who supported her during the birth of her first two children with inspiring her to enter the field.

“There’s something about having a couple of kids that makes you want to care for people - especially when the people caring for you are so fantastic. I wanted to be one of them,” she says.

While her family is African, Grace was raised in England, where she completed her nursing training and worked as an operating room (OR) nurse. She and her family emigrated to Canada in 2016, and she began working in healthcare right away as a service attendant in the OR at the Stollery Children’s Hospital in Edmonton while completing the Bridge to Canadian Nursing program. After completing the program, she worked as a graduate nurse before taking time away to welcome the birth of twins. She returned to work as a registered nurse on the front line at the Grey Nuns and was soon promoted to an assistant head nurse position.

Grace says she found the shift from working in England to working in Canada to be relatively easy; hospital procedures in Canada, particularly those in the OR, are like hospital procedures in England. And she was already used to walking the lines between different cultures, coming from an African family and being raised in England. That experience made it easier for her to ask for help, she says.

“Being African, you’re taught to be quiet and respectful, but I was raised in England where I learned to speak up for myself. When I was struggling (at work), I spoke up and people responded, but I can understand how challenging it might be for other international nurses.

Nurses from overseas often don’t want to speak up because they are afraid of making mistakes, says Grace. “They carry the weight of the world - trying to prove they belong, and it’s hard to ask for help when you feel like you’re already being tested.

Grace finished a master’s degree in education in 2024 partly focusing on why minority nurses do not often seek leadership roles. In October of that year, encouraged by her colleagues, she applied for the role of interim unit manager for operating services at the Grey Nuns hospital. Though she initially hesitated to move into leadership, she reconsidered when other minority team members told her, “If you do this, I might believe I can do it too.”

Since taking on the role, she has found leading a team to be both challenging and rewarding.

Now leading a team of about 50 employees, Grace still usually wears scrubs to work, even though much of her current role is spent behind a computer. “If you wear scrubs, you’re ready to jump in,” she says. “And I believe leaders should always be ready to help.

Grace’s advice for other international nurses coming to Canada is to “give yourself space to fail, room to grow and permission to ask for help. You are not alone,” she says.

When asked her thoughts on working with Covenant Health, Grace says it is an organization that lives its values.

“I love it here, truly. They walk the talk. You feel the values in the air.”