Ethical Journey of a Staff Nurse: Challenges and Experiences

This report chronicles the ethical journey of a staff nurse, detailing experiences from early career to leadership positions. The narrative begins with the author's initial interest in nursing, progressing through their diploma and subsequent hospital employment. It highlights the evolution of nurses' roles and the development of multidisciplinary team approaches. The report addresses workplace challenges, including harassment and discrimination, and details career progression through various roles, including Charge Nurse, Head Nurse, Clinic Manager, and Director of Clinic Operations. Ethical issues such as patient data confidentiality and pressure to compromise ethical standards are discussed. The report concludes by emphasizing the importance of ethical practices, the challenges faced in healthcare settings, and the impact of ethical dilemmas on personal and professional growth, and includes references to supporting literature.

Global local challenges in Ethics,
Responsibility and
Sustainability
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Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
Main body........................................................................................................................................3
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7
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INTRODUCTION
Global local challenges in accountability and ethics effect workers’ life in which they
have to deal with many issues which also have impact on their professional as well as personal
career growth. Global local challenges in sustainability also affect business and ethical journey
of individual. The present report is based on challenges faced by person who start their career as
staff nurse (Kumaran and Carney, 2014). Furthermore, it explains experiences that impact
negatively as well as positively on job role and responsibilities. This report justifies the whole
ethical journey of person from first memories to last date and also define some business and
ethics general definition.
Main body
Ethics is branch of philosophy that includes defending, systematizing and suggesting
concepts of right and inappropriate conduct (Pasztor, 2015). In simple words, ethics is the system
of moral principles that affect how individual lead lives and make their decision. It is concerned
with what is good for person as well as community, it described as moral philosophy. (Martin,
2019) Furthermore, business ethics is consisting with general ethics, it is the study of proper
business practices and policies regarding controversial topic including insider trading and
discrimination.
Ethical journey as Staff Nurse-
After completing my high school graduation in August 1990, I decided to became a nurse
because of a personal interest. I started my education in nursing to become a specialist in this
role. After 3 years, I have completed my nursing diploma and decided to join a reputed hospital.
In early days of my career learning, nurses were not valued by patients as they were seen
basically as assistants/servant to physicians (Hsu and Kernohan, 2016). Patients were showing
more respect to physicians and consider them the most knowledgeable and trust worthy. During
this period, I focused on improving my knowledge and skills. As nurses, we were working hard,
effective and very efficient in order to prove to our patients and community that we can induce
difference through excellent nursing care, interventions and evidence based practice.
For example, to make appropriate nursing care plan by providing multidisciplinary team
approach. This process was accomplished through consulting and communicating with other
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staff nurses on the unit, social workers, dietitians, pharmacists, and other specialities as needed.
The Multidisciplinary Team Approach that was led by nurses, was very effective and efficient in
providing comprehensive care to our patients. Later, we could see the effect on our patients and
their families. Their approach turned from ignoring nurses to be more respected, we builded a
strong trusted relationship with our patients. They valued our opinion and people were referring
their relative to our hospital as they trusted physicians and nursing team equally, we were
considered as a whole entity. However, harassment and discrimination were the worst experience
which I have experienced while working as a staff nurse. Harassment was mainly related to
offensive jokes, name-calling, intimidation, insults, and many more. While discrimination
occurred due to certain prejudices and because my Head Nurse was treating me unfavourably
because of religion and less seniority never based on clinical performance and outcomes. Due to
the lack of support at workplace, I preferred to seek opportunity outside my country. In 2000, I
decided to move on and travel to GCC country as staff nurse and within a year I was promoted to
Charge Nurse then Head Nurse.
Ethical journey as a Head Nurse -
In 2002, when I came across degree of bachelor' of science in nursing, I was at a stage in
my life that I have an extensive knowledge about this profession. I applied in Oncology inpatient
unit for a clinical administrative position, where I got selected by the management team, they
have offered me the job role of Inpatient Unit Manager based on my experience and
performance. This selection was the best career opportunity that put me forward towards my
career professional growth. However, working in Saudi Arabia was very challenging for a young
female aged as 26 years old. Saudi Arabia in general is very conservative country and have
several restrictions.
For example, gender segregation, women are not allowed to drive, female are obliged to
wear “Abaya” when they are not at workplace, and many more. however, harassment was the
main ethical issue that made me chose to move to another country with in GCC (United Arab of
Emirates), where my career shifted from inpatient care to outpatient care settings.
Ethical journey as Clinic Manager-
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In 2007, I joined the new institution in a position of clinic manager, but on the other hand
I experienced many challenges and issues that affected me personally as well as professionally.
For example, working at global level culture differences and language differences, as
manager in a private business I had to face few ethical issues. Some people were putting pressure
on me to provide personal data of patients that is totally against ethical practices of nursing. As a
manager, I need to work ethically and follow all the legal procedure that is beneficial for me as
well as my patients. I’m accountable and responsible to ensure patient’s confidentiality remains
intact and be the role model for my staff.
Ethical journey as Director of Clinic Operations-
In 2012, after serving good practices while performing my duties as clinic manager, I was
promoted to a Director of Clinic Operations which was one of the another and most beneficial
career opportunity I have encountered. But unfortunately, I also faced few ethical issue.
For example, some people pressured me to leak the personal information of workers which
impact on their security and safety. I do consider this period as the worst experience, since if I
will not provide the requested information it could impacts on my job negatively and I might lose
this job. But I did not do any such activity because I knew my responsibilities and always try to
fulfil it effectively. I also had experienced good business ethical practices such as support by
senior in workplace. Management focused on staff well fare and mental health, they provided
full support. Additionally, I had great experience with my company as they were offering equal
opportunities for career growth, they do not make any differences based on age, gender or skin
color. All the workers are working collaboratively in an environment to support a “Culture of
Safety”.
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CONCLUSION
From above, it has been summarized that working in a healthcare settings a person could
face several business ethical issues and could be as well pressurized by high power individuals.
Doing job effectively is one of the biggest challenge faced during my career path. In above
report, it has been concluded that while working in different positions, challenges faced can
make a person get stronger, more knowledgeable and experienced. Lastly, harassment is one of
the major issue in business which could affect the growth of person personally and
professionally.
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REFERENCES
Duska, R (2000) 'Business Ethics: Oxymoron or Good Business?' Business Ethics Quarterly, Vol.
10, No. 1, Globalization and the Ethics of Business (January 2000), pp. 111-129.
Gabrielsson, S., Sävenstedt, S. and Olsson, M., 2016. Taking personal responsibility: Nurses'
and assistant nurses' experiences of good nursing practice in psychiatric inpatient
care. International journal of mental health nursing. 25(5). pp.434-443.
Hsu, M.Y. and Kernohan, G., 2016. Dimensions of hospital nurses’ quality of working
life. Journal of advanced nursing. 54(1). pp.120-131.
Illes, K. and Vogell, C., (2018). Corporate values from a personal perspective. Social
Responsibility Journal. 14(2). pp.351-367.
Kumaran, S. and Carney, M., 2014. Role transition from student nurse to staff nurse: Facilitating
the transition period. Nurse education in practice. 14(6). pp.605-611.
Martin, M.A., 2019. Servant Leadership Characteristics and Empathic Care: Developing a
Culture of Empathy in the Healthcare Setting (Doctoral dissertation, Antioch
University).
Pasztor, J., 2015. What is Ethics, Anyway?. Journal of financial service professionals, 69(6).
Pearson, R. (2017). Business ethics as communication ethics: Public relations practice and the
idea of dialogue. In Public relations theory (pp. 111-131). Routledge.
Scheyvens, R., Banks, G. and Hughes, E., (2016). The private sector and the SDGs: The need to
move beyond ‘business as usual’. Sustainable Development. 24(6). pp.371-382.
Trevino, L. K., & Nelson, K. A. (2016). Managing business ethics: Straight talk about how to do
it right. John Wiley & Sons.
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