Dear colleague and fellow caregiver,
My name is Kate Alden and I am a night shift nurse at Nationwide Children’s Hospital. I have spent the last sixteen years caring for children with cancer and disorders of the blood and bone marrow. For much of that time I was also a clinical leader, a position I accepted because I hoped it was a way to influence management’s treatment of my coworkers, to amplify our voices and ensure that our loyalty to the mission of the hospital was returned to us as individuals. I came to understand that I alone can’t change the executive view of NCH’s “human resources,” stepped down, and joined the effort of bedside leaders across the hospital to unionize our nursing staff. I am writing today to explain why unionizing will be beneficial to you, your patients, and your coworkers.
There are practical benefits to unionizing any workforce, including nurses. Across the board, unionized workers are better-compensated, in wages and benefits, than their nonunion counterparts. I know it’s uncomfortable to ask a nonprofit company for more pay, but the increases in base pay, shift differential and charge pay – just since organization efforts began – demonstrate that NCH can afford more competitive wages. These changes show the power of joining together, a power that will only grow when we are officially organized with the ability to negotiate an enforceable contract. The small increases the hospital has made are not enforceable, and could be retracted or phased out unilaterally. You saw the first step of that when the target for merit raises declined this year.
Patients also benefit from choosing a unionized hospital. Unionized nurses report greater engagement and satisfaction with their work and that results in better retention. Several studies unanimously show better patient outcomes in unionized hospitals, presumably for that reason. That alone is enough for me to push for unionizing, and to wonder why management opposes us.
Hospitals need the fresh perspective of newly-trained nurses but they need seasoned expert nurses too. Engagement and retention ensures that new nurses are trained by colleagues with broad knowledge and deep understanding of clinical care. NCH fails its new workers by not giving its seasoned nurses incentives to stay – or to precept. I’m training a new nurse now and while I love being near her energy and eagerness to learn, it’s bittersweet because I know it’s likely that I will see her leave for a workplace that values her more. That’s why I became one of the nurse organizers: to work for her, for our patients – and for you – to make NCH a better place for all of us.
Kate
