Staff Satisfaction / Turnover

[NurseyPoo7]

My unit has had a large amount of turnover recently and it seems we have quite a bit of unsatisfied staff. Unfortunately, I seem to have been labeled a Negative Nancy, as I am one of the few people who have expressed my frustrations to management and apparently, I am one of the very few who has done this.

Been thinking about suggesting the unit do their own anonymous "staff satisfaction" survey. Has anyone else's facility done anything else to gauge or fix staff satisfaction ??

[DixieRedHead, ASN, RN]

Anonymous Staff Survey. Wow. About 4 months ago this happened at our facility and the fall out is not over yet.

The first thing that happened was that the DON was gone. After that there have been sweeping changes. And I must tell you that at present, I cannot find one person who will admit to turning in a survey.

The thing is, when you stir up a fecal storm, it doesn't rain raindrops and roses. It rains fecal material, and it rains on the just and the unjust.

Not only have I not seen and increase in staff satisfaction, the staff are more dissatisfied. T

We have corporate QA nurses all over the place. Into all the paperwork. Heads in bathrooms, dining room, writing things down and reporting back to corporate. More people have been let go.

Be careful what you wish for, you might get it, and remember about fecal material. It rolls downhill.

[canoehead, BSN, RN]

Those "anonymous" staff satisfaction surveys have demographic questions that would identify almost anyone- warning.

[Amanda.RN]

In the past we did them annually, as well as satisfaction surveys of other departments within our system. They were welcomed and appreciated by staff because they felt their opinion and satisfaction matters. It's a good suggestion!

[nerdtonurse?, BSN, RN]

We had an "anonymous" survey that the boss handed out when I was in computers. I happened to feel the back and felt a small bump. Turned it over, and he'd made indentions in the letters that spelled out my initials. Went to the person in the next cube, and same thing. We confronted him, and he admitted he wanted to know who wasn't happy (read -- next to be fired). Taught me one thing -- there's no such thing as "anonymous."

If you fill one out, don't use your own demographics. Yes, you're a RN/LPN (unless you're the only one, then select the most numerous one), but change up years as a nurse, age, something so they can't immediately say, "oh, that's got to be Sue."

[tokmom, BSN, RN]

Yes, we do them once a year in our organization. Some people are paranoid that managment will single them out. Hmm, hasn't happened yet and if there are less than 5 done in a dept they don't run the survey.

Our last ones were not favorible. We had just recently moved into a brand new hospital and the move was stressful.

The hospital got the staff together in different meetings and asked them to be honest about their feelings. People were pretty open. Management has listened and things are turning around. Moral is improving and managment is listening. Can't ask for more than that!

[KelRN215, BSN, RN]

My experience with staff satisfaction surveys is that if the powers that be don't like the results, they are swept under the rug and they pretend that the survey never happened.

My facility participates in a national survey on such things every other year. Their results in 2010 were awful, scores dropped in every single category, and instead of saying "what can we do to make it better?" they pretended it never happened. They think they're right about everything, so if people are unhappy they're the problem, not the institution.

NurseyPoo, by reading your OP, I almost thought you might have been one of my co-workers. I'm in the same situation as you, I'm one of the few who cares enough to try to address the issues and by doing so, basically get told that I'm bringing everyone else down (there isn't any more down to go, not one single person I work with is happy right now) and that if I don't like it I can leave. We have had six people leave in the last few months and several more are going to be on their way out the door the second they find a new job.

[systoly]

The problem with anonymous surveys is that they are only needed because there is a huge barrier to communication. The survey doesn't fix this. As you said, you've been labeled for voicing concerns. What hope do you have that a survey will meet open minds?

[tokmom, BSN, RN]

I wanted to add I worked at a place for 16 yrs that didn't and still doesn't give a crap what people think. Never would I work in a place like that again. Not all hospitals are alike thank goodness!

Maybe those nurses that left did the right thing. Hopefully they found better moral elsewhere.

[Mulan]

If you speak up about anything you just get accused of being "picky", labeled a troublemaker, etc.

Those people that agree with you in private, as soon as you speak up, disappear or adjust their opinion 180 degrees.

[wooh, BSN, RN]

Those "anonymous" staff satisfaction surveys have demographic questions that would identify almost anyone- warning.

Haha, we had one of those. By the time they got your gender, years as a nurse, years employed there, race, age, etc... I put all my complaints, then faked all those questions.

[nicurn001]

We had poor morale on our unit , so a corporate Honcho came to talk to us individually , this confidential /anonymous discussion occurred .Nothing changed , except a little later somebody anonymously gave the staff a transcript of those discussion .That sure as heck had an effect on morale , don't think it was the effect managment wanted LOL !