What Perioperative and Emerging Workforce Nurses Want in a Manager

Abstract

The world is experiencing a critical shortage of RNs. As the number of nurses decreases, it is unclear how already vulnerable specialty areas, such as perioperative nursing, will be affected by the emerging workforce's career decisions. This descriptive, comparative study explores perioperative nurses' and nursing students' perceptions of the top 10 characteristics desired in a manager. Even with 70% congruency, significant differences were found in how nurses and students ranked the traits they valued. This study highlights the traits managers need to transform new graduate nurses into satisfied, productive members of the perioperative team.

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“…Implications for nursing leadership include the issues of workforce planning and role modeling within our profession. Thompson, Wieck, and Warner (2003) by this study's authors. The list of traits received validation from a national sample of nurse administrators and leaders (n = 42) and were grouped into four subscales: attitudes, intrinsic qualities, acquired skills, and personal.…”

“…The list of traits received validation from a national sample of nurse administrators and leaders (n = 42) and were grouped into four subscales: attitudes, intrinsic qualities, acquired skills, and personal. Thompson et al (2003) tested the survey on five different groups of students. Differences among the groups were examined using a Kruskall-Wallis test, which revealed no difference in 53 of the 56 traits.…”

“…The authors emphasized that "there is no way to categorically determine that the instrument measures reliability within an age cohort; therefore, readers are cautioned about making an assumption of reliability for this instrument" (p. 253). Thompson et al (2003) provided surveys to a convenience sample of peri operative nurses (n = 50) attending an Association of Perioperative Registered Nurses (AORN) meeting (11=50), and a convenience sample of bachelor nursing students (n = 33) and associate's degree students (n = 24). The return rate for the perioperative nurses was 70% (n = 35) as opposed to 100% for students (n = 57).…”

“…Thompson et al (2003) also used a Spearman rank correlation to determine whether a relationship existed between rank and the group to which respondents belonged. A 70% congruency rate existed between the two groups when comparing the top 10 traits.…”

“…Further adding to the nursing shortage is that a number of new nurses leave positions at higher rates than experienced nurses (Thompson, Wieck, & Warner, 2003).…”