An Idea Whose Time has Long Come: EMPLOYEE satisfaction scoring?

martymoose, BSN, RN · Apr 10, 2015

Survey. LOL. Such a waste of time. We all KNOW what the problem is. Adequate staffing. Which will never happen . Stop wasting our time!!!

klone, MSN, RN · Apr 10, 2015

klone, where do you work? Cuz.....dang. That sounds awesome. And rare.

A large safety net hospital network in Denver.

We got a new CEO a few years ago, and he's making some pretty amazing (IMO) changes.

emtb2rn, BSN, RN, EMT-B · Apr 10, 2015

Agree that they're a waste of time. Nothing ever changes

Caffeine_IV · Apr 10, 2015

We have done the surveys as well and when there were low scores...staff had to get together to devise solutions at more silly meetings. Not management and the low scores were due to them! I don't bother filling them out anymore.

SmilingBluEyes · Apr 10, 2015

Perhaps it's time to rate MANAGEMENT and ADMINISTRATION and our satisfaction or lack thereof? And whoever designs the surveys, would be nice if they had a master's degree or higher, and experience writing surveys that garner meaningful, useful, and quantifiable results. From what I am reading here, the ones being done are useless. Poor design or deliberate? I don't know. Maybe a bit of both.

I think KevinMD is still onto something. He has seen horrific attrition of nursing staff in his ED. I am gratified to know a doctor notices and cares about these things, myself. It's a start.

I have YET to work in a place that even bothered with satisfaction surveys for staff, so it's all new to me. Nowhere did I work was employee satisfaction even a priority. And I bet a lot of the back-biting and "young eating", bullying atmospheres would change. Simply because people who feel better about where they work would be less likely to do such things, or those who were really awful could be removed.

And unit design, who did that? Not a nurse; most of them are designed horribly, with poor ergonomics and ones that impede efficiency for the staff.

I say again, the place that values its employees enough to really look at their satisfaction will have the best retention of the most talented staff.

mmc51264, BSN, MSN, RN · Apr 10, 2015

We have work culture surveys and when a unit gets a low score interventions are put in place to try and raise scores. I was on a committee to try and raise scores, but when pushed, no one wants to admit there is a problem. or that the problems identified seem to vanish. We did get a "market re-evaluation" (or something like that) increase in pay-they are not calling it a raise. It is significant because others hospitals near us pay more (but when digging deeper-the grass is NOT greener) and we lose people, but I think that part of the problem is the unrealistic expectations of new nurses and they just get burned out and defensive.

SummerGarden, BSN, MSN, RN · Apr 11, 2015

It is an illusion. Management seems to claim that they are invested and really listen and react to employee surveys.

Not so for every facility. Maybe your department or the departments you have worked for in the past was not filled with dissatisfied employees as you think?

At our facility it's not an illusion. Those departments that scored low on the employee satisfaction survey are identified.

I know the same to be true. In fact one department I currently work in had a manger fired because she was the reason employee satisfaction was low. She was not fired right away... As you have described in your post, HR attempted to identify specific problems and issues to assist the employees with problem solving and solutions.

In the example I am providing, HR began with a meeting/problem solving session between the employees and the management team at the time. Prior to the meeting the employees were not optimistic.... They figured the manager would be on her best behavior and that a meeting to address her behaviors would do nothing to change her or their situation... However, that manager was so bad she was true to her colors during the meeting and was fired (asked to resign) on the spot! :) The world of that department, or at least the department's management team, is now good. :) It is one of the reasons why I still work in that department! :)

martymoose, BSN, RN · Apr 11, 2015

Thing is , sometimes the biggest factor is lack of staffing. But per mgmt, that's the way it is. So how is some stupid survey going to help? Mgmt has been told to run lean and mean hahahaha.They aren't going to hire more staff. Too bad, so sad.

Too bad this kind of thing can't get out in the general public.

Red Kryptonite · Apr 11, 2015

Thing is , sometimes the biggest factor is lack of staffing. But per mgmt, that's the way it is. So how is some stupid survey going to help? Mgmt has been told to run lean and mean hahahaha.They aren't going to hire more staff. Too bad, so sad.
Too bad this kind of thing can't get out in the general public.

*reflects with smug satisfaction on the "critical need" text she got, and ignored, from staffing today*

Sorry folks, I had a critical need to take my baby girl out for her 17th birthday dinner and I have clinicals all day tomorrow. Not my fault you idiots have been running things so badly that good staff are quitting right and left, and you haven't hired replacements. :cool:

Farawyn · Apr 11, 2015

*reflects with smug satisfaction on the "critical need" text she got, and ignored, from staffing today*
Sorry folks, I had a critical need to take my baby girl out for her 17th birthday dinner and I have clinicals all day tomorrow. Not my fault you idiots have been running things so badly that good staff are quitting right and left, and you haven't hired replacements.

Awww, Happy Bday to Little Red Kryptonite!

Pink Kryptonite?

TiffyRN, BSN, PhD · Apr 11, 2015

We get something like three employee satisfaction surveys a year. Persistent low scores for one of our managers led to action plans Evans eventually she was re-assigned to another position in a much smaller unit; she was a true ding-bat, and I don't throw that term around a lot.

Another led to multiple meetings w/HR where we told them what we'd been telling our manager for a year or so: we do not have the supplies to do our job. I mean, when the charge nurse has to stop by the store on the way in to pick up a can of formula cause it's the weekend so she knows we'll be out, you have a problem.

The result was our manager knew there would be accountability and she instituted real changes to where supply shortages are not unheard of, but they are not usual.

And the hospital HATES to get bad scores on those magnet surveys.

My hospital tries all kinds of maneuvers to manipulate scores, but in the end, they are much better than other places I've worked.

suanna · Apr 11, 2015

We have a policy in our HR department that all employees are required to appear happy and say only positive things about the company at all times, even when off-duty. Complaints or documented instances of non-happiness are "punishable by progressive dicipline up to and including dismissal". That pretty much decides the survey results. Does ANYONE really believe they don't know exactly who put what answers on the survey?