InGNA: workforce advocacy.

Today, I was told of a young woman who, after only 3 years of nursing, quit because of the treatment she received from her co-workers. They were reluctant to answer questions, short with their answers, and acted as if it were a bother to help her in any way. She's considering another career because of this behavior.

Horizontal violence is the new term for bullying, backstabbing, the dreaded "eating our young," etc. What makes people in a caring profession prone to horizontal violence? Why, when we see this unacceptable behavior, do we not point it out to the "abuser"? This is one of many issues facing nurses in the workplace today.

Issues such as healthy work environments, safe patient handling, safe staffing, only to name a few, will be upcoming topics on our new "Communities of Practice" (CoP) on workforce advocacy.

Although it is in its infancy, there are already several great dialogues regarding workforce issues.

We encourage you to join in and address these and/ or other issues you may be facing in your workplace. We also welcome your comments on policies that have been put in place in your workplace to address these issues and whether they have worked. I look forward to great discussions with you in the near future.

Peters is GNA Director of Workforce Advocacy.

GNA's online Communities of Practice (COP) are a "members only" benefit. If you are a GNA member this discussion forum on workforce advocacy along with other discussion threads between members on multiple topics of interest to the RN community can be accessed from the GNA website www.georgianurses.org.