Title says it all . Second semester baby nurse in clinicals at a major hospital.
Patients = Awesome
Most Nurses = Very sweet and helpful
Some nurses are rude, terse, horrible with patients, horrible with students and horrible with each other.
To those nurses I say this, please retire.
Its only a matter of time before management figures out they can live without you and hire some very hungry and very competent new grads that want to be there to fill your dusty shoes....
word...
sadly the vast majority of the time these happen to also be charge nurses....in charge of what? Misery?
"Then, there are the managers who don't understand that we don't work for them ... they work for us. "
Wow well therein lies the problem. it is true that the staff is primarily responsible for delivering the product to customers.
However, make no mistake that in a well run organization the staff understands that they answer to management....not the other way around.
In a hypothetical well run organization, if mid and upper level management observed first line managers running about trying to placate the staff rather than ensuring the staff were performing at acceptable levels, those first line managers would be gone.
I guess there was once a nursing shortage and this is where the hesitation to fire staff stems from....
With the pipeline of new nurses entering the workforce the scales are going to change.....and the entitlement attitude that I see is going to fade away....
Anyway, time will tell, I realize that many of you have many years exp being a nurse and I have none, only the experience of a student half way done. However I do have 25 years of management experience...
Also please understand that management especially first line management cannot take on an ogre like overbearing position and expect the staff to respond favorably. Management must supply the proper tools and positive reinforcement and do their utmosst to maintain good morale.....
However, management must always act to ensure that the staff maintains proper respect for management.....
anyway.....
One of the best ways to maintain good morale is to show the staff, the vast majority being great employees, that management is not shy in pruning a bad apple to maintain a healthy tree....
And as Forest Gump would say...Thats all I have to say about that.....
Well, then ... there ya go ... just another empty suit who thinks that their main function is to keep the "little people" in line and that dismissive contempt is the way to do it ... that working with the bedside caregivers equals "placating" and that the facility exists solely to benefit them and their shareholders.
You'll do well in the current state of the industry ... nothing like an adversarial situation to hoodwink your superiors into thinking you're doing a phenomenal job against those ignorant oafs at the bedside ... never mind that the quality of the product continues to be trashed ... after all, that's what the PR department is for! If the relationship with your workers isn't adversarial to begin with, you'll make it that way just to make sure everyone knows how much you have to deal with.
That much-mentioned 25 years experience in management ... according to you very successful years ... just means that you've mastered the art of swimming with sharks. This would be a useful skill in a nursing manager if it was used to foster an environment of mutual respect and initiative, but, somehow, I don't think that's where your loyalties lie. We've all seen what happens to managers who back up their staff rather than throwing them under the bus.
And don't reiterate the "it's all for the patient" ... it's not and you know it. It's all for YOU: your advancement in the organization, your paycheck, your numbers, your ego.
And, btw, respect works both ways. How about management showing proper respect for staff?
Good for you Mindlor :) I hope it works out. Maybe in time, you will see the full picture :)
Yes and hopefully the OP will reserve his judgements after spending a few years of constant standing with 12 hour shifts, developing plantar fasciitiis, bad back, ruined knees, etc. After you get these ailments, you, OP will probably be a grumpy nurse too. Wishing you well though.
Good on you matey!! It doesn't take much to change your attitude and start being nice and polite to everybody. It just takes maturity, patience and a change in your thinking: you aren't the be all and end all of nursing, and we can all humbly learn something every day - even (gasp!) from new grads or new nurses!! I also think being open to listening to new ideas - even from new people - or new ways of doing tasks - is a sign of maturity, something I've noticed in my nursing travels that many older nurses seem to lack.
Apparently it does take much, because people seem to have a hard time grasping that posting about bitter old nurses vs. eager, young, enthusiastic nurses is pretty insulting to older nurses. That some older nurses are bitter is a statement no more or less true than that some new nurses are twits, but the qualifier "some" seems a little insincere. In both instances. I don't dispute that there are some horrible nurses, although I can't at the moment think of any I'd call "horrible." Sub-par or crappy maybe, and yes, maybe bitter. But frankly, I don't see much in the way of maturity or humility in the original post or the one quoted here. Frankly, the observation that many older nurses lack maturity mostly serves to call into doubt the credibility of the observer. It's quite the opposite of what I've seen, and forces me to wonder what it is the poster means by maturity.
To my thinking, maturity is a complex idea that is only loosely connected to chronological age. One doesn't have to look too far to find people, including nurses, who are less mature than their years. Conversely, there are many very mature young people. To me, it's an ability to face life's event with equanimity, to be willing to look at other points of view, to be firm in ones principles but flexible in ones ideas and opinions. Maturity, wisdom, and humility are qualities, to me, that go hand in hand (in hand--I seem to have lost track of how many hands I have, but in my defense, it's very late). Cocky and condescending--well, they are rarely the hallmark of wisdom.
It's very true that nursing affords us an opportunity to learn something every day. I've been privileged to know a number of nurses who have been doing so for many more days than I have, and I often find they know a lot more than I do. Honestly, I rarely meet a nurse with decades of experience who hasn't overcome many of the obstacles I struggle with, and many of them freely admit they struggled with them, too. If it's unkind, so be it, but I can't help feeling that those whose experience of older nurses has been very different from mine are either very unlucky, or very unwise. I must admit, it is at least possible that I've been more fortunate than I realize to have known mostly wise, compassionate older nurses. It's funny, though, because I've also known mostly wise, compassionate younger nurses. In my own estimation, it's because I have spent enough days learning something other than nursing to be willing to come to nursing with a sense of how much I have to learn, and a willingness to appreciate those who've already learned it.
It surprises me very little that I agree with Ma Vida Loca, in this case that it's unfortunate that a student who posts an opinion runs the risk of getting flamed, and I have to admit, that "walk a mile in my shoes" tune sometimes gets overplayed. But, you know, a lot of student/new nurse vents really do use the word, "old" pretty freely, and "some" of them do come across as whiny, petulant, know-it-all...well, twits. Not all. Not even many. But some.
ETA: It may appear to some who don't know me well that in defining maturity and wisdom in terms of how I see myself I might seem rather impressed with myself. A fair objection, if you don't know me well, but since you don't know me well, you'll just have to take my word that I am actually being quite modest in understating my own wonderfulness. That, or I should already be asleep and am not making a lot of sense. Good night.
Specializes in Emergency Dept. Trauma. Pediatrics.
Yes, but you know how PCA's have the lockout feature after pressing the button too many times? Make it possible for the patient to overdose on the stuff so it's one less person to deal with.
Specializes in Peds/outpatient FP,derm,allergy/private duty.
Mindlor, I think you're being deliberatively provocative for your own entertainment!
I would say that 'actively removing people' should be the last resort. How about management first becomes hypervigilant about ensuring that staff have the time, resources and support to do their jobs properly?
Act III close curtain. And the "final reveal" - a receptive audience some of whom are sure to feel much more guilty than we probably should.
Mindlor Since I am extremely comfortable with my role as a nurse and a teacher of things I do in my job to many new nurses, I can say that your story could've been told just as effectively without creating a real life psychodrama. I don't think the kind gentle nurses you appreciate would want you to **** off a group of people you don't know in order to thank them.
There's an entire thread full of thousands of "what's your story" stories. Mine is in there, as I would imagine many others who share common events and experiences that propel us into nursing.
If you felt we were bitter dried up nurses who should retire and want to vent - that is your right. Posting a series of observations about what sort of nurse you do or do not want to be - please do! Posing as one to deliver the other bothers me.
Please realize I am in no way shape or form denying the sort of nurse you complained about exist, however you miss the crucial point that "new blood" is not equivalent to no more "bad blood" but there are many incipient dried-up bitter old nurses in training at this very moment.
I have a degree in management and tons of management experience, as soon as possible it is my goal to become a nurse manager and guess what, It is going to my mission in life to bring customer service back to nursing care. Remember the customer? Yes, the one in the bed, yes, thats right, the patient.
Arrrrrrrrrrggghhhh! (yea, that piercing sound you heard is me screaming!)
How can you even think this? Customer service? I'm not sure there's a nurse alive whose main reason for getting up and completing an often grueling shift is not so they can take care of the patient (sorry, can't make myself call them customers). No nurse, I know or have heard of goes to work to neglect, be mean or cruel to a patient. All most of us are asking is that these patients realize that we are there to help them in their quest to regain their health, we are not there to be abused or assaulted by patients and their handlers.
And as long as the view of management remains that customer service means that nurses will be subservient and take abuse from patients without protest, I (and I hope other nurses out there) will continue to be opposed to the customer service model.
Act III close curtain. And the "final reveal" - a receptive audience some of whom are sure to feel much more guilty than we probably should.
Mindlor Since I am extremely comfortable with my role as a nurse and a teacher of things I do in my job to many new nurses, I can say that your story could've been told just as effectively without creating a real life psychodrama.
There's an entire thread full of thousands of "what's your story" stories. Mine is in there, as I would imagine many others who share common events and experiences that propel us into nursing.
If you felt we were bitter dried up nurses who should retire and want to vent - that is your right. Posting a series of observations about what sort of nurse you do or do not want to be - please do! Posing as one to deliver the other bothers me.
Please realize I am in no way shape or form denying the sort of nurse you complained about exist, however you miss the crucial point that "new blood" is not equivalent to no more "bad blood" but there are many incipient dried-up bitter old nurses in training at this very moment.
Dear friend I do not recall placing you or anyone else in any sort of group whatsoever, including the group that this post was directed toward. Now if you are placing yourself into any particular group then so be it.
I would humbly encourage you to read the thread....my initial observation is that you may have scanned it in bits and pieces and may have taken certain elements out of context.
One of the most humorous end results of a multi-sided discussion, to me, is when one side or another runs out of logical and insightful things to say and resorts to emotional appeals, ad hominem attacks and other fallacies commonly used in debate...
Dear friend I do not recall placing you or anyone else in any sort of group whatsoever, including the group that this post was directed toward. Now if you are placing yourself into any particular group then so be it.
I would humbly encourage you to read the thread....my initial observation is that you may have scanned it in bits and pieces and may have taken certain elements out of context.
One of the most humorous end results of a multi-sided discussion, to me, is when one side or another runs out of logical and insightful things to say and resorts to emotional appeals, ad hominem attacks and other fallacies commonly used in debate...
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joanna73, BSN, RN
4,767 Posts
Good for you Mindlor :) I hope it works out. Maybe in time, you will see the full picture :)