Nurse retention strategies: advice from experienced registered nurses

• Published in: Journal of health organization and management 2007, Vol.21 (3), p.307-319
• Main Authors: Dietrich Leurer, Marie, Donnelly, Glenn, Domm, Elizabeth
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Age; Age groups; Aging; Attitude of Health Personnel; Canada; Early retirement; Employee attitudes; Health administration; Health care expenditures; Human resources; Humans; Industrialized nations; Interviews as Topic; Job Satisfaction; Middle Aged; Nurses; Nursing; Nursing Staff, Hospital - organization & administration; Personnel Loyalty; Productivity; Professional attitudes; Qualitative research; Recruitment; Retention; Saskatchewan; Shortages; Tenure; Terminations; Workforce
• ISSN: 1477-7266; 1758-7247
• DOI: 10.1108/14777260710751762

Purpose - The purpose of the paper is to explore the insights of experienced nurses regarding initiatives they believe would effectively retain nurses like themselves in the nursing profession.Design methodology approach - As part of a qualitative investigation into the perceptions of nurses regarding issues affecting their profession, experienced nurses were asked to describe what retention strategies they would recommend to policy-makers. A total of 16 semi-structured interviews were conducted with long-term nurses in a health region in western Canada.Findings - The paper found that seven retention strategies were commonly mentioned by the participants. The qualitative mode of inquiry allowed the nurses to convey the context, attitudes and feelings behind their recommendations.Research limitations implications - The work environments and accompanying retention policies experienced by nurses vary widely according to the specific employment context. As is typical with qualitative research, the findings of this study cannot be considered as generalizable to all nurses in all health care settings.Practical implications - The results of this paper provide a deeper understanding of the attitudes, emotions and contextual issues behind the nurse retention strategies seen as most appropriate by the target audience of long-term nurses.Originality value - While there is much literature advocating the implementation of nurse retention strategies, very little evidence has been presented from a qualitative lens. It is necessary to directly listen to the voices of those impacted by policies in order to better appreciate how such policies are perceived from a bottom-up perspective.