Nurses’ resignation is one of the biggest problems that modern medical institutions face. According to Heidari et al. (2017) turnover rate in hospitals reaches approximately 14% for bedside nurses and 24% for medical surgical nurses over one year time period. Due to that fact, more than 57 countries experience serious workforce shortages (Trybou et al., 2014). Therefore, health facilities should adopt the strategies that would allow them to improve the work environment and, thus, increase the employee retention rate.
The first action plan that can be implemented in hospitals should seek to reduce the workload of medical staff, including nurses. According to Qureshi et al. (2019), nursing staff worked overtime for around 20.1 million hours in Canada. The literature suggests that a similar tendency is evident in other countries as well (De Simone et al., 2018). The scholars state that working overtime not only negatively affects employees’ satisfaction but also leads to the worse provision of care to patients (Mousazadeh et al., 2018). Hence, burnout is one of the major reasons that cause of turnover (Montañez, 2019). As a result, fewer people are attracted to the nursing sphere due to the reason mentioned above.
The second strategy should address the recognition and compensation of the workers. Managers should seek to balance intrinsic (intangible) as well as extrinsic (tangible) rewards as they can significantly increase employee satisfaction levels (Riasat et al., 2016). However, each person’s value system needs to be addressed separately as bonuses and awards may have different importance for various people. Intangible rewards include nurses’ sense of achievement, feeling recognized and respected by coworkers and managers, and being praised for hard work. Extrinsic rewards include gaining medals, certificates, trophies as well as financial bonuses. Especially, it is important to set compensation payments for working overtime with a transparent and fair system. That, yet again, would help increase work satisfaction among healthcare workers and, thus, reduce turnover intentions. In addition, adequate intrinsic and extrinsic rewards can increase nurses’ sense of belonging and loyalty to the workplace (Dinah et al., 2016).
References
De Simone, S., Planta, A., & Cicotto, G. (2018). The role of job satisfaction, work engagement, self-efficacy and agentic capacities on nurses’ turnover intention and patient satisfaction. Applied Nursing Research, 39, 130-140.
Dinah, T., Dishon, W., & Henry, M. (2016). Influence of intrinsic rewards on organizational performance in sugar companies of Western Kenya. International Journal of Science and Technology, 6(10).
Heidari, M., Seifi, B., & Gharebagh, Z. (2017). Nursing staff retention: Effective factors. Annals of Tropical Medicine and Public Health, 10(6), 1467-1673.
Montañez, R. (2019). Burnout is sabotaging employee retention: Three things you must know to help. Forbes.
Mousazadeh, S., Yektatalab, S., Momennasab, M., & Parvizy, S. (2018). Job satisfaction and related factors among Iranian intensive care unit nurses. BMC research notes, 11(1), 1-5.
Qureshi, S. M., Purdy, N., Mohani, A., & Neumann, W. P. (2019). Predicting the effect of nurse–patient ratio on nurse workload and care quality using discrete event simulation. Journal of nursing management, 27(5), 971-980.
Riasat, F., Aslam, S., & Nisar, Q. A. (2016). Do intrinsic and extrinsic rewards influence the job satisfaction and job performance? Mediating role of reward system. Journal of Management Info, 11(1), 16-34.
Trybou, J., De Pourcq, K., Paeshuyse, M., & Gemmel, P. (2014). The importance of social exchange to nurses and nurse assistants: Impact on retention factors. Journal of Nursing Management, 22(5), 563-571.