Newbies Who Want to Pay ZERO Dues Schedule-Wise

Nurses Relations

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We have a new nurse in our dept, hired as a new grad to ER in this less than stellar job market. The other day I got to hear his whining about his lousy schedule.

He's a likeable guy, but is only a year out of school and landed a pretty sweet position, got a great opportunity, and seems very unappreciative. He is really mad at my manager who is actually quite a reasonable person in my opinion.

Do some new nurses totally not get it, regarding the hours and scheduling demands of nursing?

Specializes in School Nursing.

Some of you have made some pretty good points. Long-time nurses complaining that new nurses don't want to 'pay their dues' and accept crappy schedules with even crappier reimbursement. It's funny, because many of these nurses 'paid their dues' by entering the field when new nurses had their pick of specialties right out of school, sign on bonuses, generous differential pay, including being paid 40 hours for working 36 hours a week.

I think for some of you, the 'dues' were paid to you, not the other way around. :p

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Specializes in School Nursing.

BTW- new grads have families and lives too. Is it really fair to ignore that FACT, simply because you're a 'seasoned' nurse? I don't think so.

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Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.
It's funny, because many of these nurses 'paid their dues' by entering the field when new nurses had their pick of specialties right out of school, sign on bonuses, generous differential pay, including being paid 40 hours for working 36 hours a week.

I think for some of you, the 'dues' were paid to you, not the other way around. :p

Lets keep in mind that the conditions you describe have gone away due to so many people being gullable and buying into silly, and obviously false "Nursing shortage" propaganda. People who fail to take even a cursory look into the field they are thinking of investing a lot of money and time into, are then SHOCKED to find that there is no signing bonus and sweet job waiting for them.

People saw a boat that was alfoat and jumped on it without bothering to notice that it was already sinking. So thanks for that.

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Specializes in Trauma, Teaching.

No, we don't ignore the fact that newbies have families and lives. But the fact remains, some schedules are more desirable than others, and bluntly, using them to retain someone who has demonstrated a willingness to stay long(er) term is far cheaper than continually training new grads. Not to be mean, but we have a lot of new grads that get trained, and by the time they are going strong, they leave with that magic "experience" under their belts. If you put time and effort into a place, don't you expect some kind of positive return? You earn those desirable shifts.

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Specializes in Oncology/Haemetology/HIV.

My favorites are the perpetually pregnant at the holidays.

This group whines or calls in or begs switches for any holiday.

They are either off for all the Winter holidays the first few years, because they are recovering from giving birth. The next few years, they want off for Baby#1, #2 or #3's holidays, leaving the same older nurses or single nurses covering the undesirable holiday shifts. And if any of the mommies have to work, they make absolutely everyone miserable beyond all belief with their continual whining and moaning about how it is wrong to make them work a few hours when they have children.

For the past 20 years, I have done 2-4 12 hr shifts in a row over Christmas so that the mommy crowd can be off. This year, however, I got diagnosed with breast cancer and had a bilateral total mastectomy with initial stage reconstruction (staging/tissue expanders placed). As luck would have it, the reconstruction completion date should actually fall before Christmas, with me having to be off for 8 weeks.

Someone asked me at lunch, when I was going out for my new breasts, and I told them. Which had some griping and moaning about possibly having to work Christmas, and how unfair that it was to THEM!

(I actually will probably delay until after Christmas to have the reconstruction. But it is kind of interesting to play with their heads)

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Specializes in Emergency Room, Trauma ICU.
BTW- new grads have families and lives too. Is it really fair to ignore that FACT, simply because you're a 'seasoned' nurse? I don't think so.

Yeah that doesn't matter because EVERYONE has lives and families. That's why it goes by seniority. Otherwise people who choose to stay single would get screwed on every schedule. Going by seniority keeps things fair.

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In my ICU they needed nurses BADLY on days but people from the other units who were going to transfer there internally (PCU/step down) wanted NIGHTS.

Why?

1. In my experience the crew on nights were more close nit and fun to be around (IMO)

2. DAT PAY!!!!!!

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Specializes in Med/Surg, ICU, ER, Peds ER-CPEN.

My biggest pet peeve are the ones who feel that their co-workers without children should work all the holidays so they can stay home with their precious spawn :down: If you don't want to work Holidays and weekends then find a clinic spot!

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I would have to believe this problem exists for every person whose job covers a 24/7 type of employment.

Safe to assume that police and firefighters have this problem, as do the people who work convenience stores and retail chains that don't care who works, as long as SOMEONE does.

I remember something in the news (last year?) about some big department store chain---maybe it was Target? JCP's?---that was announcing that they were extending their usual "DoorBuster" hours for Black Friday (that in recent years have crept back to start at MIDNIGHT the night before) to include plenty of hours on Thanksgiving, so that shoppers could get extra time on their time off to shop. People would have to WORK those hours, of course, so....not sure how that turned out. Guess we'll find out soon enough, when the flyers/advertisements try to coax us away from Family Time on Thanksgiving to be the first to buy a Widget for Christmas ;)

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Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.

Safe to assume that police and firefighters have this problem,

Oh I very much disagree. I think that is a very inaccurate assumption. Police and firefighters, being mostly men, don't really expect to have their schedule catered to them to meet their family needs. There are also far few single fathers trying to coordinate child care and other responsibilities.

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Oh I very much disagree. I think that is a very inaccurate assumption. Police and firefighters, being mostly men, don't really expect to have their schedule catered to them to meet their family needs. There are also far few single fathers trying to coordinate child care and other responsibilities.

Good point. I guess I was just drawing the parallel between the kinds of jobs that are 24/7, comparing the need to staff all these shifts, with nursing jobs.

Certainly there are differences between parental responsibilities, but chances are most every worker falls into a category in which they will want a holiday off: to visit with parents/children/family, even if they don't have them residing in their home. People do travel to visit relatives and friends, and therefore want holiday time off that someone else wants off for the same (or different) reasons.

Main point is that while most people don't want to work on a given holiday for any number of reasons, there ARE reasons why they will have to work; 24/7 jobs require SOMEONE to hold down the fort!

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I hope this link works.

The sad words of a Bobby who has had enough… | UK Cop Humour

It seems as if it's not just us who have problems with work/life/family quality

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