My Mom has recently been diagnosed with Parkinson's and I have chosen to stop my traveling lifestyle and stay close to her at home in Northern MN. I am 52 years old. Finding work has always been difficult here due to being so rural and there being so few nursing opportunities.
At our local hospital I recently applied for three critical care positions, one of ICU's 8 half time positions, one full time cath lab and one half time ER. Being a peds nurse since '82 when hired with this same 'local hospital' in '89 I was introduced and worked successfully for four years in their ER. I have been working in ER ever since. During my employment I do vividly remember having a bully of an ER nurse manager and a vague memory of being written up once for what I remember being some rediculous reason.
I received a rather rapid response to my applications stating: We have completed the initial screening of applications and regret to inform you that you are not among those that we have chosen for further consideration. We were fortunate to receive a large number of candidates whose skills and experience more closely fit our needs.
To my knowledge I am as skilled and experienced as any applicant could be as my record is clean, my references are tight and I interview, accept and complete travel contracts regularly without a hitch. What gives!! Am I on a, Do Not Rehire list, and if so what can I do about it? I feel discriminated against.
Two things of interest; one is that this facility also has their staff wearing tracking devices! Two, what is going on in their relatively small ICU to have 8 positions open?
"I feel discriminated against."I'm not tracking here....how do you go from a polite "sorry, we're not interested" response to your resume, to discrimination? It's not even as if you've interviewed and had reason to think that they saw/heard/felt something to discriminate against.
I think it's because there are so many openings and she has a lot of experience that most employers would find desirable, and she's wondering why she received such an immediate rejection. I imagine that's why she posted her age to us, as if to question if there might be a component of ageism. Either that or she is on an eternal do-not-hire list because of a vindictive nurse many moons ago. I think I'd wonder about all kinds of reasons why I would be rejected so quickly, too, if I wore her shoes.
OP--our do-not-hire lists around here are an absolute joke. People get fired and put on this list and will be rehired by the same facility months later. I've seen it several times. I still doubt that is the problem.
I only heard two mentions of having the right to see my file to verify the actual problem. So, who knows about our actual legal rights. This is a private hospital.
I believe the fact that I have 18 years of experience; raising my pay, may play into this, but again, that is discrimination.
It is just so unexpected for me to be so scrutinized for a permanent position when I can choose, apply, interview and accept a travel position in as short as a 24 hour period.
As far as covering themselves with posting the positions while hiring within; there is not enough staff to hire from within.
The tracking devices...if that is not micromanaging I don't know what is, the concept is still new to me but I can't EVER see myself in that situation. Points to a serious distrust issue with employees to me! I have never worked a facility that overhead paged for RN's, but where we did have phones. Electronic tracking seems like an expensive method of communication!!
When I applied for a nurse extern position a few months ago I received a message that said almost exactly the same thing. I was devastated. Then I got a call a few weeks later calling me in for an interview. When I asked about the message, they told me that it was automated and everyone who applied for that position received the same one. It made absolutely no sense to me and caused a lot of unnecessary stress. I ended up getting the position.
I did clinical at a facility who used tracking devices. You could go to a monitor in the nurses station and see who was where. Good if you were a student looking for your RN (bad if you were an RN trying to lose a student, LOL)
I remember reading a feature story in the newspaper in my area about the tracking devices. As I recall, the hospital was being touted as the first to employ the devices. I distinctly remember crossing that facility off my mental list of prospective places for employment. I disagree with their use on a fundamental level.
I've gotten to the point now where I'm irritated if the hospital doesn't have a tracking system. It is so easy, and cuts down on time spent on futile hunts.
Baloney Amputation, BSN, LPN, RN
1,130 Posts
I think it's because there are so many openings and she has a lot of experience that most employers would find desirable, and she's wondering why she received such an immediate rejection. I imagine that's why she posted her age to us, as if to question if there might be a component of ageism. Either that or she is on an eternal do-not-hire list because of a vindictive nurse many moons ago. I think I'd wonder about all kinds of reasons why I would be rejected so quickly, too, if I wore her shoes.
OP--our do-not-hire lists around here are an absolute joke. People get fired and put on this list and will be rehired by the same facility months later. I've seen it several times. I still doubt that is the problem.