JOB SATISFACTION

Meta-Analysis Of Studies Of Nurses Job Satisfaction

Meta-Analysis Of Studies Of Nurses Job Satisfaction

Introduction

Job satisfaction is an important component of nurse's lives that can impact on patient safety, staff morale, productivity and performance, quality of care, retention and turnover, commitment to the organisation and the profession with additional replacement costs (e.g. agency staff) and further attempts to hire and orientate new staff a. Turnover rates of 35% to 55% in first year of employment have been reported in the US a. In the UK nursing employment fell to 82% 3 years after qualification in a longitudinal study of early career nurses a. The cost of a US graduate nurse who leave nursing within 1 year of qualification has been estimated at $40 K a. It has been shown that when job satisfaction increases turnover decreases (e.g. a). Job satisfaction is dynamic and can vary according to individual characteristics, expectations, style of management, changes to policy and individual lifestyle choices [6-8]. Ensuring that needs of nurses are met is particularly important during early career since what is laid down here could impact dramatically on nurses' contribution in the longer-term.

Discussion

This paper reports on research that investigated how the components of job satisfaction vary during early career in newly qualified UK nurses using an instrument recently developed for nurses in early career that was valid and reliable across specialty and time.

There have been a number of US studies recently which have researched job experience and satisfaction during the early years after qualification [1,2,4,5,9]. These have covered the period up to 18 months after qualification and some are longitudinal [2,4,9]. Graduate nurses were found to lack confidence in skill performance and had concerns with peer and preceptor relationships, dependence (on others) and becoming an independent practitioner, the work environment, organizational and priority ...