There is no nursing shortage. For over 30 years, there have been complaints of an inadequate supply of RNs; still, here we are, same story, all while we continue ignoring talent willing to work. Nearly 14% of currently licensed RNs are over the age of 65. These nurses have experience, they are not looking for the next promotion, their self-esteem is in tack, and they’re available, so why aren’t we talking to them?
Time liquidity
Ask anyone considering or planning on retirement, and you’ll soon discover that a top priority is to be able to do as they want, when they want. In our earlier decades, the when of doing things is limited to that time remaining when not doing other stuff we have to do. To begin with, you have to eliminate 40 hours or about 25% of your time because you’re working, 30% for sleeping, and soon your day — week — a month are gone leaving precious little do-what-you-want time. I want more time to research and write, fun-to-do but pays poorly, such as what you’re reading, still constrained time is always more valuable; used more cautiously, purposefully, intently. Not working may not produce more additional “do-what-you-want time” as you might think.
As we age, it becomes more necessary to manage our energy more than our time. I have discovered that older employees can accomplish more in six hours than we used to in eight. We know who we are and not, and we’re way cool with it. In the end, we want to get things done — complete the job completely.
In Cleveland, Ohio, an innovative company started a six-month test they call 100/80/100. Advanced RV will keep their employees at 100% of their current salary while reducing their work hours to 4 days a week (80% of typical full-time hours), providing they keep 100% of their recent output. The experiment concludes later this year; the important lesson is that the investigation continues.
What options do we have whereby skilled nurses can continue to work part-time, with greater flexibility, and within a time frame they can manage?
Imagining the variable-time shift.
Be flexible, show up, work two, four, or six hours, and sign out.
In 2004, I designed my first artificial intelligence (AI) program to smooth out complicated product purchasing in a medical device company. Given the technology of the time, this was quite an accomplishment. We had to understand what we wanted to do and represent it in concrete tactical steps or actions necessary to achieve that outcome. In the end, I had a detailed set of requirements to meet, and we met them, and it worked. It is now time for such a project for nursing.
This kind of process engineering is in no way trivial, nor is it the most complicated process one could imagine. We would need to understand what conditions to attract nurses over the age of 65 to continue serving the medical needs of our community. We would need to identify necessary clinical requirements, the times of those needs, their variability and intensity, and more. Then there are the requirements for nurses who want to continue working, their needs, and preferences. Then we would need to implement, followed by A/B testing and iteration. When nursing scarcity, irrespective of cost, continues, such developmental innovation will become necessary, but why wait?
In today’s computer world, this is a straightforward matching process. Starting with a list of qualified nurses with varified skills, those available on certain days, between certain hours, under certain conditions, who would gladly work, are identified and contacted. As time goes on, those most likely to accept the shift will be given priority over those who do not, and additional learning applied to future requests. Designing workflow heuristics takes time and is more unique to individual enterprises than one might imagine. Still, this will happen. Hospitals in competitive labor communities will not want to be second.
The selectively retired, or any under-employed nurse needing more flexibility, is a source of talent-energy in which we need to engage. The benefits to the nurse open to partial work are many, remaining up-to-date on clinical options as they and their family age, exercise, cognitive stimulation, and simply staying active. Expanding to infinite time variability trusted flexible access to nursing skills across multiple clinical and time domains. Now there is much more here to such a program, but the constraint is not technological; it’s a constraint on will and creativity.
Special thanks to a fantastic group of RNs that led to this piece:
Vivian Derr, Patty Dupont-Tyler, Jane Herin, Susan Johnson, Sarah Koshi, Phyllis Turner, Debbie Vojtech
