The Night Shift Witches.... scheduling dilemmas

[littlecheese]

:angryfire I am super angry at my night shift. I have never met such a mean group of people. As the manager and the person who does the schedule I placed a request for the staff to cover 2 days that the hospital was offering the CCRN coorifice. I had night workers who are not going to the coorifice and who stated they really are not interested request off on the days others would need so they could go. Since the place has a union all requests are driven from the most to least senior person. It may actually come to pass that some of the staff signed up for the coorifice may not be able to go. Knowing the staff I know that this is just a spitting contest. They get even worse. Our night shift's holiday is the eve, and they are not required to work an eve and a day. So when it comes time for signing up no one signs up to work the actual day. They also do not pencil themselves in for the unofficial holidays such as Easter or Mother's day. The rule is the least senior person gets to work. The olders nurses never sign up, the younger nurses never get one holiday at all, and the unit never keeps the newer blood that we hired. I have seen nurses purposely request a night off that is already short so that someone with less seniority can not have that time off. I am not new to this world of nursing and the back stabbing that goes with it, but when will these nurses grow up and start helping each other out? My hands are tied because of the union. I am wondering what other places do with their holiday schedule, and how do you keep newer staff happy and not feeling like they are dumped on all the time?

Thanks-littlecheese:uhoh3:

[Elisheva]

Please don't be offended but misspellings are a pet peeve of mine, mostly because it was drilled into our heads as nursing students that misspellings reflected poorly on our charting. The word "coorifice" refers to inferior quality or a rough texture, so I think the word you want to use would be "course." Just trying to be helpful. I'm really not a mean old witch nurse.

[oncRN3]

The unit I work in also helps each other out as best as possible. We also socialize togetherjquite a bit and are a relatively happy family. We have our moments but we always have each others back. I have been here 15 years and a number of nurses have been here longer

[NFuser]

I am also fortunate to work on a supportive, close-knit unit, where these issues are nearly always worked out to everyones' satisfaction.

We use a 3-cycle (alternating annually) holiday rotation. Those who choose to work 12-hr shifts get Christmas Eve and Christmas Day off every third year. Those who choose to work 8-hr shifts work an extra holiday per cycle. As holidays are sometimes overstaffed due to census, we draw names of those scheduled for the holiday a few days prior, and staff are low-censused in that order. Those who wish to work cross their names off the list to give the next person down a chance.

For vacations, we sign up for each week in rotation by seniority. Single days off can be requested at any time prior to the finalization of the next cyclical schedule. Only 2 licensed staff are allowed to request off per 24-hr weekday. (Emergent situations allow this rule to be "bent".) Appropriate trades are nearly always approved. Any rare conflict is resolved by the unit manager. We are a small unit, and our acuity is high. Everyone must work together for the good of the patients...and each other. (btw, we are not union)

littlecheese...Night shift staff frequently feel as if they "get the short end of the stick" in a daytime world (personal experience here). Has anyone delved into possible causes for these nurses' dissatisfaction? Is there a way to involve more than one person in the scheduling duties? Could there be a way to "reorganize" your staffing policy to avoid these conflicts? (Maybe even keep time-off requests confidential until they are approved?)

I am sad to hear you work with "professionals" with such strange ideas of cooperation...

obrnheather...sign me up for the "naive and lucky" crowd...