Flexible working hours

english_nurse · Jul 15, 2007

the question for me is what is your trust policy on friendly working hours and are you actually able to reject her request at all???

cheshirecat · Jul 15, 2007

What about improving working lives? Can you not employ someone for the 13.5 hours she does not want to do? Plenty of nurses out there looking for work.

Do you really want someone working for you who resents coming into work for 1/3rd of the time?

Give this lass a break. She needs to reduce her hours, or she would not have asked.

paris2 · Jul 15, 2007

the question for me is what is your trust policy on friendly working hours and are you actually able to reject her request at all???

There no way we can accomodate the set days or set hrs, and so on that ground yes we will be able to reject. Another alternate is job share, we may be (not definate) able offer half , half 18.75 each. Though i suspect she may not want so little hrs.

Will be seeing my lead nurse tomorrow so will let you know.

cariad · Jul 15, 2007

the question for me would be the statement that you made

"my staff nurse"

are you in the slave trade or are you just her manager?

i certainly wouldnt like to work for someone who thinks like you. there must be a reason that she needs set days and hours and there must be some reasonable way that you can accomadate her. after all this is the uk culture where family is supposed to come first isnt it?

allnurses Guide · Jul 15, 2007

My staff nurse wants to reduce her hours from 37.5 to 24.
She has came up with set hrs and set days she would like to do.
Serive we work in is unplanned patient activities and flexibility is priority.
A full time person is needed to meet the quality care. Jobs share is not apropriate in for this service.
Human resource agrees with my decision.
I need strong and logical argument if i am going to reject her request.
Any ideas or suggestion?
Thankyou.

It sounds like you are in quite a difficult position and whilst you want to provide family friendly hours and keep your staff happy you do still have a service to provide. I agree that appointing someone on 13.5 hours may not meet those needs (am I right in thinking you work in a very specialised area rather than on a general ward)

What you have said above sounds like a logical argument you need to pad it out a bit with rationale as to why you need a full time member of staff or 2 equal job share. Working as a specialist nurse there are the training issues - this is prolonged if you are training a nurse up on part time hours as they are not there frequently enough to learn the job quickly, this will detract from patient care for longer.

It would be difficult to fill the hours with only 13.5 and get them trained quickly to meet your service needs.

I have a nurse practitioner within my team on 20 hours and to be honest it is taking ages to get them to the stage of independant advanced practice, they also do not get the continuity that the full timers get which means the patient also do not get the continuity that other patients get within specialities with full time NP's attached and although I appreciate this is less of a problem on the wards when running nurse led clinics and recalling patient the reduced hours means that patients may have a prolonged wait to see thier nurse practitioner. Whilst I try to be accomodating when it comes to flexible working as a manager you do still have to ensure the service we provide for our patients is there.

Is there any option for compromise, maybe write down alternatives that suit your service needs as well as her family needs, maybe if there is a middle ground to meet on then your member of staff can have her needs met whilst you maintain a quality service.

It is very difficult to be a nurse manager, firstly you are a nurse and you want to keep your collegues happy, you also have pressures to make sure that you provide a quality service for your patients. THis is a fine balancing act and sometimes it is really difficult to please everyone but ultimately the patient needs have to be met

I hope this helps Paris

english_nurse · Jul 15, 2007

i am just wondering what area of practice this is in as not knowing makes it difficult to understand the reasons behind the intended refusal

RGN1 · Jul 15, 2007

The hospital trust I worked in was able to accommodate my need for family friendly hours with no problem. I worked on an acute medical ward.

I worked 3 earlies but from 8.30 to 14.30 during term time & 3 late's - varying from 15.30 - 21.30 or 14.30 - 20.30 depending on need during the school holidays. I did sometimes stay the full late as bank & occasionally did a full early if organised in advance.

Now I'm closer to home, in a hospital with slightly different shift patterns. I work 2 full earlies & one full late a week, working every other weekend. I don't tie them down to exact days though.

Maybe you could offer that - either 2 lates & 1 early or 2 earlies & one late - then you can fill out the other shifts with a job share??

I too don't see why you can't find someone else to fill out the hours she doesn't want to work - nurses are crying out for work right now after all!

I'm grateful that my employer was flexible for me & I do help out by doing extra shifts on the bank, swapping if I can when asked & working hard when I'm there, in return for that.

english_nurse · Jul 15, 2007

thats what good management should be- give and take on both parts, it would be a shame for her to leave if your area requires special skills after all you will have to invest time in a new staff member, by training them etc, which will be a strain

plus i did think it was government policy to provide a person friendly work enviornment, however i may have this wrong.........

caliotter3 · Jul 15, 2007

I would tell her that if she were to bring in a qualified worker to job share with, to make up for the lost hours, then I would accommodate her request. If she can not provide someone to work in her place, then you can't accommodate her. I've worked at a place that due to a change in the labor laws, totally rearranged their work schedules. Many people with transportation and babysitting problems were put into a lurch. The employer coupled this new schedule with an overhaul of their employee structure and got rid of both those who could/would not change schedules and others deemed less desirable. Nobody in management shed any tears for the employees who left. If your employee needs to cut her hours, then she is certainly entitled to do so. Likewise, the employer is entitled to find an employee who can work the stated schedule. Give her a chance to find a solution for the problem by bringing in another employee, otherwise you have to accomplish the mission of your organization.

allnurses Guide · Jul 15, 2007

thats what good management should be- give and take on both parts, it would be a shame for her to leave if your area requires special skills after all you will have to invest time in a new staff member, by training them etc, which will be a strain
plus i did think it was government policy to provide a person friendly work enviornment, however i may have this wrong.........

I think that that is policy unless you can prove that it will be detremental to your business in our case patient care. I have read our work life balance policy quite carefully and although you can request flexible working your employer does not have to oblige if they can demonstrate it is not in their best interest.

My hubbie works in a comercial industry - nothing to do with healthcare and he laughs at the flexibility we have in the NHS, he thinks that we are very protected as employees within the NHS.

paris2 · Jul 15, 2007

the question for me would be the statement that you made
"my staff nurse"
are you in the slave trade or are you just her manager?
i certainly wouldnt like to work for someone who thinks like you. there must be a reason that she needs set days and hours and there must be some reasonable way that you can accomadate her. after all this is the uk culture where family is supposed to come first isnt it?

i don't appreciate your comment "are you in the slave trade", yes in the uk we do have family friendly policy, but the area we work in is highly specialized, we work in all area of hospital, this to include nurse led clinics (ultrasound, laser, per-post ops), our work also takes on the ward and theatres. to have someone in this post you are required to be rgn, with a post basic course in our speciality and furhter training to be specialize in area of our practice. it would take at least a year to train someone in this very specilized area and to have someone for 13hrs or so a week would just not work.