Please, help me understand the culture

[mccmaeve]

This is a tough one for me. I am a new nurse, 7 months as a nurse at age 49. I have had other careers, Social Work 18 years, and (oddly enough), Banking 3 years. so I have education, worked lots of places, with lots of people. I always wanted to be a nurse, and when I got laid off from my last position, took the opportunity to go to Nursing school and here I am. I am very aware of how much i have to learn, probably overly cautious, well liked by patients and my manager says i am doing well and "right where I ought to be for a 7 month RN". It is a very busy Surgical Oncology floor in a major Cancer Center. This floor is known as 'the best floor in the hospital' I love the patients, the science, and since I want to be an ET Nurse, it fits my goals to be on the floor. I think most of the staff on this busy floor with VERY ill patients are very good nurses. I ask lots of questions, and I am a team player.

My problem is this-Many staff are very negative. There is a lot of 'back-stabbing'. There are cliques. Nurses complain about other nurses; What was not done on the last shift, What a mess the patient is because the last nurse did not do their job. Who 'lied' about what they did. People are frequently whispering, about other people. (I am sure they whisper about me, too) The negativity is an added stress to an already stressful environment. I have seen 'office politics' before, but this is more like 'cattiness'...I don't really join into too many conversations, because people seem to be cliquish, and i am not into that. I have in my mind identified people who can be trusted to be helpful, and those who should be avoided. Depending on the people on the shift, I don't have anyone that I feel I can get or give support to, as a result I feel isolated, and that is not so nice either. Sometimes I just feel like-"Come on, can't we all just get along?' Does any one out there know how to fit into an environment, without taking on the negativity, and letting it become part of me? I am starting to feel the negativity in my own attitude, and i don't want that, Please tell me any ideas for how I need to either change my thinking, expectations, or what? Thanks!!!

[Katnip, RN]

Unfortunately, you will find units like this everywhere. And you will find the opposity types of units, where that stuff doesn't go on. I've worked in both.

You will get some answers like: "well it's because the majority of nurses are women, and women are catty."

I don't think that's the real reason because I've worked on units where it was all women and everyone got along.

It seems to me when you have a negative unit like that there are usually one or two people who drive it, and the rest just kind of follow. And even if management frowns on it, they don't want to stir up the waters or else coworkers aren't documenting harmful, hostile behavior, and management can't really do a lot with individuals unless there's solid documentation.

If you're comfortable, you can talk to your manager and tell her this isn't conducive to a great working environment. If you have a supportive manager she might be able to at least try to do something about it.

But in the end, it's up to you and your colleagues. Unfortunately, once a culture like that is so ingrained, it's really hard to change it.

[P_RN, ADN, RN]

We've pondered this very question many times here. I saw it in a couple of non-Nursing jobs I have held but you are correct in saying it is also found in Nursing.

I don't know why. Maybe it's stress, maybe it's the fact that there are so many more employees on the role on a Nursing unit than say in a bank or real estate office.

If you can try to tune out the negativity-it's all too easy to want to hear what Miss Thing said or what someone didn't do.

Up on the top bar here is a search button. Try checking negativity, or cattiness, or some such. There are thousands of words written here in the past 10 years that reference this same attitude you have picked up on.