Nurse manager selection process (Part 1). Survey of selection process (Part 2)

The Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre developed as a result of the merger of the five adult hospitals in Halifax, Nova Scotia. The merge involved 7000 staff members, 2700 of whom were nursing staff. Although mergers are becoming relatively common amongst health care organizations, there is a paucity of information in the literature to describe such an enormous human resource effort. This two-part article describes the hiring process for the selection and placement of 52 nurse managers over a concentrated time period of six weeks. Issues identified and resolved included: unionized and non unionized head nurses, the role of nurse managers, varying educational preparations, the time frame and organization of the process itself, options for unsuccessful incumbents, and multi unit and multi site management. The second part of the article reports on the results of a survey which was carried out to obtain feedback from the applicants and the interview panel members. The survey was conducted within eight weeks of the conclusion of the hiring process. Overall the process was deemed successful, albeit stressful. Some of the problems encountered are discussed.