Interprofessional Relations in Nursing Assignment

Assignment Task

The workplace can be a difficult place for both very experienced and less experienced nurses, regardless of the clinical environment. Nurses navigate their way in the workplace through a series of complex negotiations with each other. They develop skills to assess the potential success of interaction before approaching another nurse. Some develop resilience to conflict in their workplace, accepting it as part of working life.

Safe Work Australia defines workplace bullying as, ‘repeated and unreasonable behaviour directed towards a worker or a group of workers that create a risk to health and safety’ (2013, p. 4).

Workplace bullying may also be referred to as horizontal or lateral violence, incivility or workplace harassment. It affects patient outcomes, the quality of patient care, organisational finances and organisational culture. The forces of incivility, bullying, and horizontal violence worsen staff shortfall issues by seemingly pushing nurses out of the profession.

This article provides an outline of the reasons for the prevalence of incivility and the impact of this negative behavior on the staff, patients, organisation, and nursing profession as a whole

Effects of staff incivility

What are the effects of staff incivility?

• Effects on staff: distress, anxiety, panic attacks, sleep disturbance, physical illness, reduced work performance, loss of self-esteem, feelings of isolation, deteriorating relationships with colleagues, family, and friends, depression and thoughts of suicide, etc
• Effects on patients: disgruntled, hostile, and preoccupied staff, which inevitably leads to a decrease in patient satisfaction, errors, and potential for lawsuits.
• Effects on organisation: damaging the reputation of the organisation, high staff turnover with associated recruitment and training costs, low morale and motivation, increased absenteeism, fatigue, burnout, increased incivility, lost productivity, and costly workers compensation claims or legal action.
• Effects on the nursing profession: reflect negatively on the nursing profession and are in conflict with the NMBA (2006) practice standards that state that registered nurses should ‘accept individuals/groups regardless of race, culture, religion, age, gender, sexual preference, physical or mental state and ensures that personal values and attitudes are not imposed on others (2006, p.2).

Conflict resolution

Conflict is inevitable wherever there are people with differing backgrounds, needs, values, and priorities. Unresolved conflicts waste time and energy and reduce productivity. In contrast, when conflicts are resolved, strengthen relationships and improve the performance of everyone.

The key to managing conflict successfully is tailoring your response to fit each conflict situation instead of just relying on one particular technique. Each technique represents a different way to achieve the outcome you want and to help the other person achieve at least part of the outcome that he or she wants.

How can you resolve this conflict?

Most people would take one of these five routes below in approaching conflict. Suppose the charge nurse on your unit has posted the vacation schedule for the month of December. You, as a recent graduate, have requested to be off during the week of Christmas. You notice on the schedule that none of the recent graduates has received the Christmas holidays off. You feel that this is unfair because you will not have an opportunity to be with your family during the Christmas holidays.

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