By Rose O. Sherman, EdD, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN
One of the complicated conversations that leaders conduct involves staff who applied for a position in their institution and were not selected. A director recently presented this challenging situation:
Katie is one of our strongest RNs in the emergency department. She is interested in a career change and wants to move to clinical informatics. She served as a clinical champion and superuser with our recent change to the EPIC EHR. She did a superb job, and I was rooting for her when a new position in clinical informatics was announced, designed to support our acute care efforts to move to virtual nursing. Unfortunately, our health system is well-known and high-paying. There were numerous outside candidates who came with the skill set needed to do the job immediately. Katie was not even interviewed for the role, which frankly was a blow to her ego. She is bitter and skeptical about her organization’s commitment to upward mobility. She alerted me that she would start looking outside our organization, and I might be receiving reference referrals. I am not quite sure how to handle this because I see both viewpoints in this situation. Our clinical informatics director had great candidates and Katie’s skills in this area were limited compared to other candidates. On the other hand, this is a no-win for Katie, who needs to be given a chance.
This director had given Katie opportunities for “grow in place” activities to learn more about clinical informatics. At this point, her options were limited as to what more she could do to support Katie’s growth. She could help Katie look for continuing education opportunities and offer to support them. She also had the option of giving Katie some shadowing experiences with clinical informatics staff.
I recommended that this director reach out to the Clinical Informatics Director to discuss the dilemma. Ideally, this Clinical Informatics Director would be willing to sit down with Katie and do some career coaching on how to develop the skill set to make her more competitive for future roles. This would help Katie feel valued by her organization. It could be that Katie might need to seek out a clinical informatics role in a less competitive organization or possibly even relocate.
These are hard conversations to have with highly valued staff. Twice in my 25 years with the Department of Veterans, I was detailed into director of nurse recruitment roles because of profound nurse staffing issues. On a number of occasions, I found myself having these discussions. Nurses in staff positions often feel like they are being held back because it would be challenging to replace them. Whether true or untrue, they experience these emotions.
I always recommend to leaders who are hiring that they look carefully at and interview internal candidates who may not meet all the criteria but have a good track record with the organization. Sometimes, these may be your best candidates (the research tells us that internal promotions are less likely to leave) but even if they are not, they are provided with an opportunity to go through the interview which in and of itself is a growth opportunity.
Yes, this takes additional time but I have learned nurses like Katie don’t keep silent about this experience. Her story can quickly ripple through an organization and undermine organizational efforts to promote career mobility which today is essential for nurse recruitment and retention. Each of these situations should be seen as a leadership moment where you can choose to take that extra step to walk the talk in your health system.
© emergingrnleader.com 2024
Brand New Workshop for 2024 – Leading in the New World of Work. Click on Flyer The New World of Work Workshop
Bring the Nurse Leader Coach Workshop to Your Facility Virtually or Onsite. Click Here for the Nurse Leader Coach WS Flyer
LinkedIn
Instagram