Incivility In The Workplace: A Case Study

Once the policy has been executed and training has started, communicating aspects about the code of conduct can have a significant impact on the ethical culture. Many of these communications come through the human resources department, but the voice of the executive management team is critical in these communications.

Safety is an important factor and is a high priority in healthcare. Kelly, Fenwick, Brekke, and Novaco (2015) shared that workplace violence impairs the staff perceptions of safety. However, both patients and staff are affected by workplace violence in many ways, from physical to emotional aspects. There are many reasons why violence occurs, that will be explained later in this paper. The purpose of this paper is to explain the reason and importance of the chosen phenomenon of interest. Moreover, primary and opposing philosophic viewpoints will be discussed, as well as ways of recognizing and utilizing them in nursing. The ways of knowing patterns in nursing and the utilization of these patterns will be explained, pertaining to nursing care.

At the same time, workplace incivility happens between colleagues and between manager and subordinates, it is happening almost every day in healthcare settings such as in hospital and clinics where workers are directly uncivil to disrespect each other. For instance, when a nurse is deviant or does not follow the supervisor intensely because of differences in opinion or an act of retaliation when the manager is being rude, treating their staff with rough words, discourtesy, and lack respect to his staff, there are also times when the uncivil behavior is not intentional or

The QSEN competences which are affected are the focus on patient safety and teamwork and collaboration. QSEN defines teamwork and collaboration as the “ability to function effectively within nursing and inter-professional teams, fostering open communication, mutual respect, and shared decision making to achieve quality patient care.” (Pre-Licensure KSA 's). QSEN defines patient safety as “Minimizes risk of harm to patients and providers through both system effectiveness and individual performance” (Pre-Licensure KSA’s). Failure to work with and collaborate with each other can break down morale and communication which in turn can negatively affect the patient. It is important to continue research and studying this topic, because the lasting effects of lateral violence can affect the health of the nurse and the patient long term and affect the revenue and budget of the hospital.

Incivility refers to actions that are rude or offensive and includes belittling, bullying, and violence. These behaviors may lead to disharmony, disruption of learning, termination of work, and unsafe environments. Suggested causes include the stress of working in life-and-death situations, long hours, and fatigue (Rose, 2015).

In 3 articles, survivors of healthcare worker directed violence admitted to knowingly spending less time with their patients after the attack.(8, 12, 16) Quality of care is also reduced as survivors admit to being fearful of their patients as well as being reluctant to care for specific patients or any patients at all.(8, 17, 19, 25) After an incident of workplace violence, survivors stated that they have decreased communication with their patients, patient families, and coworkers.(12, 27) Survivors also admitted to having reduced interest in being a part of patient care, as well as being in their current position.(8, 12, 14, 19) One article found that physiotherapists often reduced their expectations for their patients after experiencing an incidence of workplace violence from a patient.(8) Survivors also found that they had reduced empathy and gave reduced emotional support to patients and their families after returning to work.(15) After an attack by a patient, survivors admitted to lacking concentration that led to missed medication administration, increased falls, and increased errors in administration of care.(10, 15, 17, 27)

Horizontal violence is not a topic that medical faculties discuss on a day-to-day basis, but it is an enormous problem within the health care system. In this research the author looks at bulling from a registered nurse (r.n.) aspect .The effects on patient centered care can be detrimental for patients and r.n.’s. The work place needs to be a safe place for not only the patients but also the employees. With the rise of new graduate nurses who are employed by the medical facilities, they too are starting to face horizontal violence within the first year on the job, which leads to retention of nurses in the medical field. Horizontal violence will continue to arise if nurses do not stand up to bullying and empower victims to speak up on

Incivility is an umbrella term used to describe any type of negative behavior directed towards another individual that may impact the way that they behave and/or feel. While incidences of incivility may be visible in most professional careers, it’s significance in nursing has prompted a provisional statement from the American Nurses Association. “The nurse creates an ethical environment and culture of civility and kindness. Disregard for the effects of one’s actions on others, bullying, harassment, intimidation, manipulation, threats, or violence are always morally unacceptable behaviors” (American Nurses Association, 2015, p. 4). Dumont, Meisinger, Whitacre, & Corbin (2012)

Horizontal violence is characterized by the presence of series of undermining incidents overtime, as opposed to one isolated conflict in the workplace (Jackson, Flirtko, & Edenborough, 2007). I believe that being a nurse is one of the most rewarding careers. At the same time it is very challenging work physically and emotionally. When faced with horizontal violence in a workplace; it makes it very difficult for the nurses to provide a focused patient care especially working under mostly male physicians and being looked down upon at times. Cherished nursing characteristics, such as sensitivity and caring are viewed as less important or even negative when compared to those of medical practitioners, who often are seen as the central culture in health care (Woelfle & McCaffrey).

Rudeness is indeed a growing problem and it is only getting worst. As you mentioned, rudeness comes in a variety of ways, such as, annoying behavior, intolerable actions, sarcastic and degrading remarks, shouting and even the use of swearwords. "Rudeness breeds more rudeness and metastasizes into social ugliness" (Hama, 2011). Rudeness can become a domino effect where people feed off that negative energy and retaliate rather than be an employee or customer. I personally been on the receiving end of rudeness as an employee and as a customer and I sometimes been a victim of feeding into the negativity. My biggest pet peeves is respect me as long as I am respecting you. I do not care if you do not like be because of my race, gender, height, or nail color, but as long as I am treating you like a human being, I deserve to be treated in that same manner.

According to Purpora and Blegen, approximately 60% of actual errors in patient care result from poor and ineffective communication (para. 3). Horizontal violence causes a decrease in effective communication between caregivers which places the patient’s safety in jeopardy. Horizontal violence decreases staff morale which leaves room for error in the workplace (Longo & Smith, 2011).

Kellie Stephens provides exemplary training and development programs. She and the company’s goals are to provide in-house training seminars with up-to-date sexual harassment and safety procedures. She also understands the need for management training including people skills which include “communities of practices”, “snack and chat”, and consistent implementation of PAC policies. Communities of practice continue growing in its efforts with different departments coming on board with the program. Snack and chat gives employees the opportunity to discuss and be heard about their ideas with which to continue PAC’s performance. The managers including Dick Remington and Gary Stephens are not accepting of the proper procedures with which PAC’s Code of Ethics consist of. These are a few to the many who are accepting of the proper training procedures. Training can always use improvements with learning how to learn in mind. Each individual person learns differently. Developing action plans for managers and employees who have completed training which provides continued efforts for encouragement and feedback. Individuals who display success with learning techniques and reach desired goals within the action plan will become the coaches and role models for new trainees. With simple in-house developments on training, we as a company can continue to succeed with the goals of

Avoidance results in resolution being delayed rather than resolving the issue in a timely manner (Eason & Brown, 1999). The ill feelings between PCTs and nurses were created by avoiding talking about the problem for a long time. Avoidance resulted in a snowball effect of increasing resentment and anger between the two groups.

Workplace violence is the main issue in the United States expressed influencing a large number of American consistently. Working environment violence is any demonstration or danger of physical savagery, provocation, terrorizing, or other undermining problematic conduct that happens at the work site. It ranges from dangers and verbal mishandle to physical ambushes and even murder. It can influence and include workers, customers, nurses, patient, clients, and guests. Workplace violence can be discovered anywhere in every field we may accept the fact that it can happen in our workplace too, but the fewer people speak which is encouraging these criminals to prepare of making more atrocity. The occupational safety and health organization (OSHA) have created rules and suggestions to decrease laborer presentation to this deplorable scourge but still many people are being victimized their hands are tied up mouths are taped out to face the reality of what they are living through (OSHA 2015). OSHA’s paradigm incorporates the following elements: management commitment and employee involvement, hazard analysis or assessment, hazard controls, employee training, and recordkeeping and evaluation (McPhaul, London, & Lipscomb, 2013). As mentioned, these elements are basic guidelines in constructing a program, but more specific measures are needed to address specific precursors that contribute to the occurrence of violence and bullying. This would assist in forming the best strategies to remedy workplace violence and incivility.

The incident in question has placed me in a unique opportunity; as the facilitator of this situation would be best to approach this in a manner that would best benefit the organization, including my department. Although I am already conflicting within with personal and professional points of views, addressing the situation will become a challenge. Despite who initiated this situation or who escalated the situation, resolution must be determined in the best interest of communication within our environment.