Nurse Bully, please protect your young: "Don't eat them"

Nurses are divided in two groups. The first is tough skin, and strong willed. The second is sweet, angelical, compassionate and don’t have a mean bone in their body. When group number one gets frustrated they take their grievances to the young and docile. Please don’t do it Mr. bully. Have some guts and face your boss and his rules, the ones you really have a problem with. Nurses Announcements Archive Article

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I believe nurses are very special individuals. Think about it. They are professionals who take care of others in their dire moments. They patiently heal the putrid wounds of some; calm the fear and hopelessness of others; tolerate ingratitude and hostility daily; endure day after day of toiling around the sick and dying. Is only natural you'll find compassionate and warm hearted beings among nurses. I have been in other professions and the contrast is clear to me.

But because nursing is a tough job; some of us develop a thick skin. In a way, is a protection mechanism some develop to survive - you either get tough or you die. Although there is nothing wrong with being tough, some nurses can become quite aggressive and hostile to other nurses. We all have met them at some point, I surely did. But even being aggressive and assertive, nurses cannot match the aggressiveness of some bosses. Oh yes, let's talk about them bosses.

But bosses are people too. Yes, there are reasons why nurse bosses are sometimes so bossy. But bosses also have their though fights to fight. They too must develop an even tougher skin to survive the trials and tribulations of health care. Sometimes bosses are just nurses who left the floor because they simply couldn't take it anymore. Then to find even more stress in management.

Nurses are usually between a rock and a hard place. They have lots of responsibility, but lack the power to make decisions on their own. Doctors have much more say so in regards to their professional lay out. They call the shots, they can fire patients and are respected by most. Nurses on the other hand need to make decisions but always filtered by a set of rules created by others. Nurses must endure whatever BS is thrown at them. If you have an abusive patient, all you can do is to write a note and hope for the best. Most nurses can't simply fire a patient or they'll get fired.

Nurses run the show but are told how things should run. Often by someone who is deciding for them from an office chair; people who never worked on a floor or have not worked in years and can't remember anything. So, nurses are in a pressure cooker situation. Pressure from all sides and not an outlet in sight.

Well actually there is: and that is to relief the pressure on the least dangerous and inconsequential outlet - the young and vulnerable ones. The perplexed and scared nurslings are the recipient of a lot of pent-up anger. But why older nurses engage in this predatory and coward behavior?

It must be their inability to change the system and claim their power. Their extreme frustration lead them to eat their young. The ones they should be nourishing, protecting and grooming to take nursing to the next level just got eaten for lunch. Just like scared animals - they step on their own eggs. This is unfortunate.

If young nurses were well groomed and nurtured they would be the ones able to take nursing to the next level. Instead nurses create a culture of perpetuating the errors inflicted in them by transferring it to the young.

Protecting the young

Again, if you want to bully someone bully the oppressor and not the oppressed. Bully your problems and not the people who are here to learn. The bully energy is good energy but wasted and pointed in the wrong direction.

The alternative to bullying is to preserve and protect the young: because teaching the young the right ways is the only viable way to change nursing culture. It changes things because the young always will change the world. But instead we teach them the culture of bullying. We create perfect students in the art of bullying others. Nothing changes.

So, Mr. Bully next time you decide to torture the young, think of why you went into nursing back in the day. Bullying the young will only perpetuate the culture of abusiveness you were ounce, and continues to be a victim of.

OrganizedChaos said:
But you only discuss "protecting the young" when lateral violence is a real issue regardless of anything. It doesn't just happen to young, new nurses.

This. As a baby nurse (almost 2 years) I have seen sniping and infighting amongst ourselves. There's always the ICU vs. floor vs. ED vs. psyche vs. hospice...etc etc. "I have my BSN, I have my RN - MSN..." New nurses are also capable of being less than gracious with their preceptors who are trying to show them the ropes.

Sometimes I think nursing school and the NCLEX makes us all so frazzled and fragile in general that by the time we get to our first job we think we know it all. This could not be further from the truth, but I think it happens. When I was 19 or 20 one of my non-nursing jobs I was complaining about someone that I thought wasn't doing it right. My mentor set me straight right away. She pointed out I had the luxury of just walking in to this and that the person I was criticizing knew the environment much better than I did. I learned a very important lesson and I have never forgotten it.

We can all learn from each other. New nurses do often criticize their preceptors. After all, we passed NCLEX, we got a job, we want to prove ourselves right NOW! We all need to take a step back and respect that person has been there, in that environment, for longer and they have wisdom. As we baby nurses gain experience and wisdom, we will see with experience comes knowledge that can only be learned on the job. A big part of it is checking our ego at the door I think. As new nurses we are so proud we passed the NCLEX, but there is still so much to learn.

I value my preceptors and their dedication to training new nurses. It's not easy! I have been corrected and I am grateful every time for it. I personally am thankful for everytime a more experienced nurse grabbed me by my scruff and said "Hold on, whippersnapper." They saved my skin!

Specializes in ED, psych.

As a new nurse who just accepted her first job (but hasn't started yet), I truly dislike these articles. Sure, I could skip reading them, but NETY-readings seem to pop up every other week. See the Cannibalism thread last week alone, and an "article" no less.

"Bullying" isn't unique to the field of nursing. When I was a teacher, I witnessed my fair share. Teacher against teacher, speech and language against teacher, teacher against OT, principal against everyone ... if you happen to be a bully, you'll be a bully -- regardless of position. My own teenagers see the bullies at school. My sister-in-law is a bully -- she works in business, and she's a Class A jerk. She brings it home, and spending the holidays with her? Oh, so much fun.

My point is: focus on lateral violence. Not NETY. Focusing on NETY does such an injustice -- it spooks new nurses, doesn't focus on the "old" nurses who might be facing lateral violence (esp. from their younger peers), and overall perpetuates a evergrowing myth that nursing is a free-for-all on the "young."

You know what would be cool?

An article as to:

-What to expect from a preceptor

-What to expect from an orientee

-Things you wished your preceptor did (for instance, being upfront with the manager about not being able to precept due to personal reasons)

-Things you wished your orientee does (for instance - not questioning the preceptor's actions, being opened to criticism, not complaining to other nurses, etc.)

-Managers being upfront as to what to expect during orientation (i.e. whether they have the staff that is opened to precepting)

-Workplaces hiring nurses whose main purpose is to precept, as opposed to forcing staff nurses to precept on top of their workload

pixierose said:
As a new nurse who just accepted her first job (but hasn't started yet), I truly dislike these articles. Sure, I could skip reading them, but NETY-readings seem to pop up every other week. See the Cannibalism thread last week alone, and an "article" no less.

"Bullying" isn't unique to the field of nursing. When I was a teacher, I witnessed my fair share. Teacher against teacher, speech and language against teacher, teacher against OT, principal against everyone ... if you happen to be a bully, you'll be a bully -- regardless of position. My own teenagers see the bullies at school. My sister-in-law is a bully -- she works in business, and she's a Class A jerk. She brings it home, and spending the holidays with her? Oh, so much fun.

My point is: focus on lateral violence. Not NETY. Focusing on NETY does such an injustice -- it spooks new nurses, doesn't focus on the "old" nurses who might be facing lateral violence (esp. from their younger peers), and overall perpetuates a evergrowing myth that nursing is a free-for-all on the "young."

Thank you. This is exactly the point of many of us who are tired of NETY threads that generalize and stereotype.

Which is why this topic gets heated at times.

There are other ways to discuss true bullying. Pointing fingers at older nurses always eating younger nurses simply creates disharmony and frustration and won't solve a gosh darn thing.

chacha82 said:

After all, we passed NCLEX, we got a job, we want to prove ourselves right NOW! A big part of it is checking our ego at the door I think. As new nurses we are so proud we passed the NCLEX, but there is still so much to learn.

I think this is a problem in itself. I remember graduating from nursing school; a well respected program that area employers looked on very favorably, hiring many of the graduates. The message I received from my nursing school was that now I was a NURSE. Bona fide. I had joined the ranks of nurses. What I didn't understand at the time was how very little I actually knew myself - the support of the nursing instructors and hospital staff obscured that fact. I remember watching the experienced nurses during my preceptorship and observing uncomfortably the huge gap between my level of practice and theirs. But I had graduated and was about to take the NCLEX, so wasn't I competent too? Big reality check.

Nursing school prepares students to begin practice - they are far, far from being competent nurses (their only experience and knowledge base is nursing school and student clinicals). The big danger is that new graduates don't know what they don't know and need a lot more education and mentoring/support from experienced nurses before they can practice safely by themselves, and often don't understand that they don't know enough to practice safely unsupervised.

My issue is the title.

The title assumes that bullying is occurring with senior/older nurses as the bullies to younger or newer nurses. I can tell you that often it is the younger nurses bullying the older nurses or nurses bullying one another, irrespective of age or length of service.

in addition, what one person deems "bullying" another does not.

Specializes in Geriatrics, Home Health.

When older nurses say they have been bullied by their younger and or less-experienced colleagues, they are generally believed. No one suggests the poster might be the problem. No one says "Grow a thicker skin, snowflake!" No one tells them bullying doesn't exist.

It goes both ways. I have seen it go 50/50.

Specializes in Specializes in L/D, newborn, GYN, LTC, Dialysis.
Not_A_Hat_Person said:
When older nurses say they have been bullied by their younger and or less-experienced colleagues, they are generally believed. No one suggests the poster might be the problem. No one says "Grow a thicker skin, snowflake!" No one tells them bullying doesn't exist.

Not true. The opposite is true, actually in many cases. I had a preceptee eating me for lunch. This person learned almost nothing, nearly killed a patient during my preceptorship with them---- and I was blamed for being "mean" when trying to take this person to task and correct them (in private I might add). A bad outcome did occur once this person was on their own after our hellish preceptorship was over. Every time I tried to teach this arrogant person anything, I got the eye-roll and attitude. I could teach them nothing, and I ended the preceptorship with notes outlining my concerns. And again, I was blamed for giving a "bad orientation" after the bad outcome , by this poor "picked-on" nurse. Management did not listen to my concerns but sure listened to theirs.

But still---- The poor young nurse was the "victim" once again of a mean old preceptor nurse----- and despite the bad outcome. So nope, the older nurse is NOT always believed when they report the younger one is the problem. Believe that.

Yea the young do eat the old. Often.

Specializes in Specializes in L/D, newborn, GYN, LTC, Dialysis.

And I have seen right here where young nurses wish the old ones would just retire already so they can have their jobs. Well sure, I will, when you take over my bills, you can have mine.

Specializes in "Wound care - geriatric care.

Thank you for all the comments. I'm happy you had thoughts about it and I take all your feedback seriously.

Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
DTWriter said:
You know what would be cool?

An article as to:

-What to expect from a preceptor

-What to expect from an orientee

-Things you wished your preceptor did (for instance, being upfront with the manager about not being able to precept due to personal reasons)

-Things you wished your orientee does (for instance - not questioning the preceptor's actions, being opened to criticism, not complaining to other nurses, etc.)

-Managers being upfront as to what to expect during orientation (I.e. whether they have the staff that is opened to precepting)

-Workplaces hiring nurses whose main purpose is to precept, as opposed to forcing staff nurses to precept on top of their workload

Most of those topics have been addressed in previous threads, with the exception of workplaces hiring nurses whose main purpose is to precept. How would that work? If your job isn't taking care of the patients, you lose perspective on what taking care of the patients actually entails.