HELP!

you are fighting an uphill battle since mgmt made the mistake of keeping the low performers and letting go of the higher performers. There is a group of people who REFUSE to be involved in anything unless motivated by loss of job and it sounds like your employer is not using that motivation.

Otherwise, be politically correct, do not raise your voice, always keep lists of who DID attend inservices and mandatory education so at some point if you need to prove that person is not competent it won't come back on you. Do not worry about them liking you because they won't. It has taken six years but now the staff knows I am honest with them and try to treat everyone the same. I go by the book and expect that of them as well. Some people resent mandatory education for any reason but I now know they will eventually slip up and make a mistake that will get them turned over to BON or fired or both. I try not to let that bother me as I am doing my part.

lol! I got called into office..and first thing the administrator said was....dang you're getting NOT popular FAST ! I said good. I didn't come here to make friends....

Thanks for the advice.

Having walked in your shoes, one of the first things I did was to remember what the staff complained about when I was not "admin-*****", the RN's and LPN's were both upset about IV's piggy-backs etc. The RN's would have to take time from their patient's, med rounds, charting to hang and check IV's for LPN's. I contacted our Pharmacy vendor and arranged for and LPN IV medication certification class. This was really appreciated. Next, I conducted a skill's lab, but with the CNA's being the patient's. The one's who were most difficult in assisting in team work and patient care were able to be the patients in:

• "wet diapers" and "lumpy diapers" (tennis balls and water to imitate.....),
  
• cloudy plastic cups over their eyes trying to feed themselves, or be fed by staff who were speaking to one another and not "paying attention to the patient",
  
• securing one in a wheel chair with 1-2 cinder blocks being dragged behind so they could see what it felt like to want to get somewhere and have to struggle.
  
• The proper positioning in bed to prevent bedsores. I had teams of two place each other in bed as they would a patient, then position them properly.
  
• I even had them perform oral care, face washing etc on each other so there could be instant peer feedback.
  

Though not all change was instantaneous, the biggest that I saw was empowerment of staff who were oriented the wrong way vs right way, and they would apply the "right" knowledge. As for your drama queens who will quit on the spot. Fine, but remind them pt neglect is against the law. Always keep a paper trail of the infractions and conversations had with the employee. If you type a summary of the conversation ask the employee to sign if they agree. Remind them it is not a warning, or goes against them, it is to "remind" you that you've discussed this with them and won't need to repeat information to the same people twice wasting their time! I hope all of this helps and wish you to enjoy your new adventure.