Lied to in Interview

[westieluv]

Has anyone else experienced this? I just accepted a new position in an acute rehab facility. During the interview I was told that I would be replacing someone who wanted to work a different schedule within the company. I was also told that I would only rarely have to stay past my scheduled shift but that most days I would get out on time. I told the interviewer that I will work my five days each week but do NOT want to be called on my days off, as I am not interested in any overtime and she said she would make a note of it and wrote it down.

I am now a few days into orientation and I have learned from the other nurses in the facility that a.) I am replacing a nurse who got fed up with the working conditions and left the company without a two week notice, b.) I will end up having to stay over the end of my shift pretty much every time I work in order to get everything done, and c.) I received a phone call this morning at 6:30 where I was pressured to come in and work to cover a call off, even though I told the caller that I do not want more than five days a week and I am still on orientation to boot. She was not very happy when we hung up.

I feel duped and scared that I have gotten myself into something that I will regret. I do not appreciate being lied to and I think it was unethical to do so. Part of me wants to run before I get in any deeper and part of me feels like I need to stick it out, except that I'm worried that I will decide to do so only to find that I am constantly pressured into picking up overtime, being forced to stay over, and getting nagged to come in on my days off, in which case I will kick myself for not getting out right away. I am not afraid to say NO to the requests for overtime, but if this is an ongoing thing, it will make my life miserable anyway.

What would you do?

[TheCommuter, BSN, RN]

Hey Lucky724, I just accepted a position at Baylor! I was just wondering what location and unit you are referring to . Please PM me if you would like!

The poster to which you were referring accepted a weekend position (known in some areas as the 'Baylor Plan') but never actually worked at a Baylor hospital.

[westieluv]

Wow. You're lucky you got hired at all. This is very demanding of a potential employer and it says to me that you are not a team player.

I respectfully disagree. I have been a nurse for many years and after too many years of allowing myself to be manipulated and made to feel guilty if I did not do everything in my power to solve my employer's staffing problems, I have finally grown a backbone. I do not want to work more than five days a week and I do not want any overtime, period. My obligation is my scheduled shifts only, for which I show up on time and work hard, and yes, I am a team player, often helping the aides with patient care that "isn't my job" if it means that patients will get better and more timely care. They aides act like this is a big deal and really appreciate it, so it must not be the norm. I would rather do my job for 40 hours and do it well than pick up overtime left and right and drag around all burned out and resentful and doing the minimum that I can get away with.

If an employer cannot keep staff and are consistently short staffed because of it, how is this my problem to fix? The more nurses give in to this kind of manipulation, the less willing a facility is going to be to admit that they can't keep staff because they don't treat employees right and be forced to do something about it. I have worked at facilities in the past that didn't "get it" until they were forced to hire agency staff. When it hits them in the pocketbook is generally when they are finally ready to do something about it, and agency nurses cost much more than paying existing employees overtime.

There are nurses in the rehab facility where I just started who work 16 hours, go home for eight hours, then turn around and come back for 16 more hours. The faciilty does not care, they just want a warm body with a nursing license. I should have never accepted a job in a place with this kind of culture. I can already tell that some of the staff will resent it if I do not want to work seven days a week and leave them short staffed and just assume that because they are willing to spend their lives at work, everyone else should be too. Again, how is this facility's staffing shortage my fault?

[jadelpn, LPN, EMT-B]

I am so disheartened reading this, awful that within a profession that is so highly trusted by communities and requires that level of trust someone would so blatantly mislead/lie to you about the conditions of employment and working conditions when you clearly asked very specific and detailed questions. Sorry you are having to deal with this.

You can pretty much set your clock by the fact that in any acute care setting it can become unpredictable quickly, and yes, you may have to stay over to finish up when and if that happens. Additionally, policies are such that most schedulers have to go down the line and call everyone when they are short. This is the way of any sort of acute care, rehab or not.

It would be akin to if one of your patients on the machine in dialysis had an issue as you were finishing, and this was your last patient of the day. They needed to be seen in the ED, and you needed to call EMS. You certainly are not going to leave the patient out in front of the building to wait because you need to be home at 5:30.

In other words, no manager can say with any clarity that things are not going to come up--with regularity or rarely--that would require you to stay over until things are stable.

Further that you are not going to be on the list of employees that would be called in the event of a call out. Or a "disaster" or an "emergency".

And really, your dialysis manager also can't say that. If a patient is late on the machine, has issues....Does it happen often? Maybe not. But it can happen. Or that on Tuesday or Thursday if the nurse calls out you will not be called and asked if you want to work.

[westieluv]

You can pretty much set your clock by the fact that in any acute care setting it can become unpredictable quickly, and yes, you may have to stay over to finish up when and if that happens. Additionally, policies are such that most schedulers have to go down the line and call everyone when they are short. This is the way of any sort of acute care, rehab or not.

It would be akin to if one of your patients on the machine in dialysis had an issue as you were finishing, and this was your last patient of the day. They needed to be seen in the ED, and you needed to call EMS. You certainly are not going to leave the patient out in front of the building to wait because you need to be home at 5:30.

In other words, no manager can say with any clarity that things are not going to come up--with regularity or rarely--that would require you to stay over until things are stable.

Further that you are not going to be on the list of employees that would be called in the event of a call out. Or a "disaster" or an "emergency".

And really, your dialysis manager also can't say that. If a patient is late on the machine, has issues....Does it happen often? Maybe not. But it can happen. Or that on Tuesday or Thursday if the nurse calls out you will not be called and asked if you want to work.

I get what you're saying, and it is true, except that this facility has call offs every day. It is not an occasional thing, it is constant to the point where the lack of staff is a critical problem. Nurses routinely have to take two halls/carts and everyone is grumbling all the time. Punishing someone who does show up for work by giving them double the work load is not an effective way to retain staff, and neither is expecting them to work every day of the week.

Also, I am very aware that working over is something that is expected in acute care occasionally, I have years of acute care experience and would expect that. The problem here is that when I specifically asked in my interview how often nurses end up working over, I was told "once in a great while, it's pretty rare", but the nurses have all told me "Oh, you'll be working over everyday. You have to or you won't ever get done." I specifically told the interviewer that I have to get home and let my dog out and she said she understood completely and it would not be a problem. Well...problem.

The dialysis facility is only open on MWF, and there are no plans to add TThS patients, so I would never get called in on my days off at this point. If someone needed an emergency treatment on an off day, they would go to the ED and be run by acute dialysis staff.

[Nurse4592]

Wow. You're lucky you got hired at all. This is very demanding of a potential employer and it says to me that you are not a team player.

I think that is a very judgmental thing to say. She knows what works for her and this is what she told her employer upfront and the employer agreed to it. During her days at work she may be a great team player, but actually want time off *gasp* for othe things or have responsibilitis in her life where she needs her free time for things other than work, like taking care of a family member. You never know!

[BuckyBadgerRN, ASN, RN]

I think you're not only new here, you're new to nursing overall...

I am so disheartened reading this, awful that within a profession that is so highly trusted by communities and requires that level of trust someone would so blatantly mislead/lie to you about the conditions of employment and working conditions when you clearly asked very specific and detailed questions. Sorry you are having to deal with this.

[magnolia44]

I have worked at two different rehab facilities, at interview asked all the pertinent (tough) questions I hoped would elicit as much information about the position(s) as possible and was outright lied to both times, and it went downhill from there. Constantly being hounded to come in on days off, in-services and meetings many days of the week when I was supposed to be off, pressure to join committees etc. In my experience rehab's are pretty much all the same and do this kind of thing for all the reasons already stated by others here. I would understand the OP's ethical issues had she been working there for a time and was being pressured to leave without giving proper notice, but under the circumstances I think there is little reason to struggle with this decision, especially since you already KNOW you will revel in the other opportunity, it is not an apples to apples comparison. Just my 2 cents.

[Julius Seizure]

Been there, done that, got the scrub top.

I love this. Can I get scrub tops with this printed on the back?

[TriciaJ, RN]

You can pretty much set your clock by the fact that in any acute care setting it can become unpredictable quickly, and yes, you may have to stay over to finish up when and if that happens. Additionally, policies are such that most schedulers have to go down the line and call everyone when they are short. This is the way of any sort of acute care, rehab or not.

It would be akin to if one of your patients on the machine in dialysis had an issue as you were finishing, and this was your last patient of the day. They needed to be seen in the ED, and you needed to call EMS. You certainly are not going to leave the patient out in front of the building to wait because you need to be home at 5:30.

In other words, no manager can say with any clarity that things are not going to come up--with regularity or rarely--that would require you to stay over until things are stable.

Further that you are not going to be on the list of employees that would be called in the event of a call out. Or a "disaster" or an "emergency".

And really, your dialysis manager also can't say that. If a patient is late on the machine, has issues....Does it happen often? Maybe not. But it can happen. Or that on Tuesday or Thursday if the nurse calls out you will not be called and asked if you want to work.

I really don't think the OP is saying she wouldn't step up in a pinch. But the rehab facility runs on "crisis staffing" and there's a difference.

Responding to true emergencies is one thing. When your whole life (and your family's) revolves around a chronically short-staffed and poorly-managed facility, that's another.

[Spidey's mom, ADN, BSN, RN]

The OP stated she just accepted the job and was a few days into orientation. That time period is perfectly fine for deciding you made a mistake about a job and have decided to quit. The facility also has the right, during orientation, to look at the person they hired and decide that it wasn't a good fit and let the new hire go as well. In fact, they can fire you at any time really.

Again, there is no ethical consideration here for the OP to just stick it out until she/he finds a new job.

[Loracs72]

I interviewed for a job and they told me what the pay would be, gave me a tour and introduced me to my manager. They promised that I would have orientation on the unit. Well after I was hired the hourly rate was not what they told me, the manager never showed up the day I started and never explained to nursing why she wasn't coming in. She never came back ! They also promised me a bonus after 3 months satisfactory performance, which I repeatedly went to management and got no satisfaction. My hourly pay rate was not what they told me either, surprise !

Always, always get things in writing ! They could promise you the moon but that doesn't mean they will. I really needed the job so I stuck it out for 6 months until I was offered another job with everything written. I finally did get the "sign on bonus" after I told them I would report this to the Labor and Industry. They made up an excuse that they never had the agreement signed. I learned from that mistake and was able to get everything in writing after that when interviewing for jobs if I was offered the job. Of course they can also decide to hire someone else ( whose naive), but at least stick to your rules for accepting a job.who'

[NPOaftermidnight, MSN, RN, NP]

Wait, are there nursing jobs that don't involve staying late and constantly getting calls/texts about OT??