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The Mean Girls Club, or What’s Wrong in Nursing
I always knew I wanted to be a Nurse Practitioner (NP), even before starting nursing school, but I didn’t realize at the time one of the major benefits of being an NP: You’re not really considered a nurse anymore.
During my undergraduate clinicals, I started seeing the ugly underside of nursing, the side that students only hear about if they have nurses in their family: Nurses eat their young. At times it’s said almost jokingly, like a girl describing the awful band her boyfriend likes with a tone of, “I hate it, but that’s just the way it is, and I love him in spite of it.” As a student nurse, I would talk to any NP that would give me the time of day, and one of questions was about the interpersonal dynamics at the provider level: Are NPs catty to each other the way staff nurses can be? Everyone I spoke with said that the environment among providers was overwhelmingly better than being a floor nurse. So y’all can imagine how disheartened I was after spending the majority of my clinical hours this semester on a unit where the NPs are just as much a part of the Mean Girls culture as the nurses. One of the reasons I wanted to become a mid-level provider was to get above the fray, away from the backstabbing and snideness.
The real problem here isn’t my recent morale-crushing experience in the ICU, but rather the general Mean Girls culture in nursing, and the way little seems to be done to combat it. Channeling Regina and Gretchen might be okay in high school (if you haven’t seen the movie, go watch it now), but that kind of behavior is not only unacceptable for nurses, it’s dangerous. And it’s unfortunately all too common. When I typed in “bullying among” the first thing Google autofills to is “bullying among nurses.” That says a lot. There have even been articles written for the American Association for Critical-Care Nurses, American Nurses Association, and the Academy of Medical-Surgical Nurses about bullying in the nursing profession. New grad RNs tend to get targeted the most, and much like the Greek system, there is a strong tradition of hazing in nursing that ultimately puts the patient at risk.
Bullying contributes to the high turnover rate in nursing, and it’s not uncommon for nurses to work on a unit for six to twelve months before transferring to another unit or an entirely new hospital. High turnover rates affect health care costs more than you might think. Anytime a new RN is hired, there’s often a six- to eight-week orientation period, regardless of previous work experience, during which the new RN is paired with an experienced nurse on that unit. For those two months of orientation, the hospital is paying two nurses to do the job of one. Since nursing salaries are covered under the fee of the facility that’s billed, patients ultimately end up literally paying the price for nurses not being able to play nice.
But it can get even worse than just an increase in your hospital bill. Sometimes patient lives are literally put in jeopardy because of the Mean Girls culture. While I’ve never had a nurse refuse to help during a patient emergency, I’ve read stories of nurses who were left to fend for themselves while a patient was crashing. And I’ve chosen to handle a patient emergency by myself instead of asking for help from the other nurses (well, one particular nurse) who had created an adversarial work environment. It’s hard to bring yourself to ask for help when you feel you can’t trust the other person.
I’ve experienced the backstabbing, manipulation, and cattiness in almost every clinical and work setting I’ve been in as an RN and NP student. Fortunately, until this semester, I’ve been above the fray by virtue of functioning as an NP. But all of this makes me ask: Why is it that many times, when women are together in a group, they sabotage and tear each other down? Why are women often more critical of each other than we are of men?
I was reading something on Facebook about the division within my church over women’s ordination, and as someone pointed out, the most vocal critics of having women on the platform came from other women. I’m not convinced that it comes down to biology, as some would have us believe, or women wanting to gain the attention of the best potential mate. Women who are married with children can be just as mean as the single gals.
So what drives women to such lengths, even to the point of putting someone’s life in danger? Is it an innate desire for control? Respect? Status? Or are we perpetually stuck in high school, looking for the approval of the popular girls?
Published in General, Healthcare
I’ve worked for and among both men and women; the experiences were varied. Frankly, the most manipulative and non-supportive boss I have ever had was a male and the “meanest girl” in one company was one of my favorites.
I think employee relations are always based upon a power struggle of sorts but most importantly, smart women realize that it is in their best interests to support those who produce results and make them look good. The nasty woman to whom I refer to above terrified nearly everyone who crossed her path- even her own boss! However, when I left her jurisdiction for a promotion, she looked at me with tears in her eyes and said, “You have never let me down.”
It’s a problem faced in corporate America as well that people (male or female) don’t understand how to develop and use their people to their own advantage.
I liked the one female boss I had (would have asked her out if she wasn’t attached, so probably liked her a bit too much).
But there was that one time that business was not going smoothly. A fellow manager encouraged me to leave a critical note, so I did. I came in the next day and she was crying.
And yes, of course I felt horrible even though I was right. How do women do that?
Can we blame this on the Millennials?
You tell me. My experiences were strictly among Boomer Babes. :)
You are so right about this. I’m not sure why women are naturally so passive-aggressive. I do a pretty good job fighting that tendency, but it slips out every so often. Perhaps the passive-aggressiveness is an attempt to seem nice when actually trying to communicate displeasure with someone/something, but in the end it’s so much more harmful than just being upfront about what’s bothering you. I do find that women that are more direct are often criticized for it, however.
Who do you think gave us the Millennials?
The only way in which women might be better in leadership is our more inherent attention to detail and better organizational abilities. Why do you think the Nashville Mega Meet Up was so successful?… ;-)
Quote from James of England on his Japan meetup: “I needed an Amy.”
One of the very best parts of homeschooling is that you do not have to deal with the other moms.
As my Boomer husband and I chose not to procreate, you must educate me on this particular topic. I have no idea what intra-generational damage might have occurred. Do tell.
I was soooo hoping you would comment!! I think there’s a really awkward dynamic between nurses and residents that creates some of the enmity. As a newly minted doc, you have all the book learning and some clinical experience, but at that point the older nurses still know more than you do, and they’re catching your mistakes. But you’re the doctor!- you’re supposed to be higher up on the pecking order. With time, that changes and the docs surpass the nurses in skill and knowledge. I’m sure for some older nurses, they see some young pup resident and think “Who are you to tell me what to do?!” The whole thing leads to bullying back and forth. My best friend’s husband always spoke down to me and pretty much all nurses because he saw nurses as useless. Now that he’s older and more settled in his practice, he’s changed his attitude towards me completely. It’s too bad that nurses and doctors can’t learn to value what each other brings to the table, and respect each other’s role in caring for the patient. Take ego out of it- it should be about the patient.
No, they’re not. When I worked with mostly male nurses, it was glorious! A large number of students in my program are male, and in my BSN program, almost 1/3 of the students were men.
Lovely thought but the country needs visionaries as well as organizational assistants; perhaps a polite term for secretaries?
Women have vision and creative ability and in my generation we didn’t have to deal with the profit- stifling politically correct millstones hung around the necks of nearly every business executive today. We were expected to kick a** like everybody else and make the donuts. And we did.
BTW, your previous derogatory remarks about women in business make me want to chastise you for interpreting your own deficiencies into some antiquated world view of all women.
Show me a low to moderately regulated environment and I’ll show you a place that doesn’t provide health care! hah!
My wife worked as a teacher’s aide in a sweet little elementary school for 10 years, and there was always high drama behind the scenes. She came to the conclusion that it was because the women outnumbered the men about 10-1.
Absolutely. I think people, especially those in leadership/management, do themselves a great disservice by limiting the knowledge and skills of employees under them, as though they’re afraid if someone else knows how to do the schedule or the budget they’ll lose their power and position in the company. Cross training and developing people’s skills is really important. After all, when you’re the only one that knows how to do something, you’ll never be left alone while you’re on vacation…
I’m sorry; do I know you? To what deficiencies are you referring? I was under the impression you were a new member. I’d be rather surprised if you were not, because creating new accounts when old ones have been banned seems it ought to be a CoC violation.
Incidentally, I just had lunch with my preceptor from last semester- a wonderful, smart woman my age who asked to precept NP students so she could pass on the positive precepting experience she had as a student. She knew that I was unhappy in the ICU I’ve been working in, but at lunch I got to give her the lowdown on what’s been going on. The first thing out of her mouth was “Why are women so mean to each other?!”
Fortunately, tomorrow I’m starting in another ICU with a different NP who I know to be super sweet and loves to teach.
Um… can’t get a job?
I haven’t read all this yet, but, as an aside, it is now weird seeing that clip and hearing a joke about “crack” right before Lohan speaks. And then she mentions it.
Please, ladies, let’s keep things friendly. Liz, what particular examples of Amy speaking disparagingly of women in business are you referring to?
I have been a nurse for over 40 years and have heard this comment many times – “Nurses eat their young”. I have never seen it.
BTW was at a party with a house full of strangers two nights ago and the 5 nurses there found each other quickly ;-) bizarre. We were all of a certain age, when there weren’t as many career options for women.
Amy Schley
One of my axioms: Anyone who thinks the world would be better if it was run by women has never been in an organization run by women.
I think nurses find each other so quickly because we don’t have to worry about grossing each other out. I mean, if your party guests are eating pesto and work in IT you can’t really talk about c diff…
This seems a weak argument. It is disparaging to women to suggest they are not innately better than men?
It’s certainly not paraging!
How about we stop the chat about gender and focus upon pure ability?
Of course there are going to be examples on both sides- women that are great leaders, and women that are manipulative b’s. It really speaks to the importance of the tone that the leadership at the top sets. When my mom was a nurse, the Director of Nursing set a very high bar that encouraged healthy competition and excellence; but cattiness and pettiness was not tolerated. The goal of the competition was awesome patient care. That tone trickles down. Unfortunately, and I can only speak from nursing, I think there are a lot of managers at the unit level that are just trying to get by, so the catty culture goes unchecked.
Might I suggest that being catty with women while arguing that cattiness among women is not a problem is perhaps not the most effective strategy.
What? No! Why are you ruining things, Soto? What’s with these suggestions? An English for the supine course? Be a man & get the popcorn!