The Challenge of Change: Informatics in Nursing

The current nursing field is dominated by the both the staffs which are considered to be medical
specialized, and the leaders from four distinct age class or more precisely generational cohorts.
This generational cohorts is believed to come as a result of differences in the attitude towards the
workforce, individual habit, different beliefs and the expectations an individuals has after the
entire workforce based on a given age bracket. The four generations will be highlighted and two
of them be discussed in detail in the paragraphs below.
According to zemke’s Generation at work, Generational cohorts is clearly described as a
collection of people who are linked by a number of life events such as date of birth, life history,
and various life personalities according to their experiences. According to him, Generational
group neither has a specific beginning nor end but their typical life span is known to be 15 to 20
years. Both political and social history may help in defining the work ethics and attitude of
generational cohorts and eventually shape up their values towards professional
aspiration.(Zemke R. 2000).
The classification of the four distinct generation in the current nursing workforce include the
Veteran, the Baby boomers, the x generation and the most considered recent one the
Milennials popularly known as the Y generation. .(Zemke R. 2000).

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With generation Y being the most current one that is people born between1980-2000, today’s
nursing workforce is carried majorly by the practitioners of this generation Y mostly. Living in
this age bracket I am therefore considered part and parcel of this Y generation.
The major generalized characteristics of people living in this generation age or the Y generation
are often distinct and considered more unique from the other three groups even though
sometimes compared with the Veterans in terms of their values. These characteristics can either
be of negative values or positive elaborated as follow:
A technologically informed. People born within this age bracket are the first generation to exist
in a constantly connected world more commonly referred to as the digital natives. It is
considered to embrace the use of technological knowledge as compared to other generations. The
computer adaptation is faster in this generation and the use of internet services is always carries
the day here.
Most educated generation. In most western countries, this generation is holds a bachelor degree
masters and all the professions of higher learning as compared to in other group in the
generational cohorts list. More millennial women are outperforming men in class work as
compared to the previous generations hence increasing the number (Sherman R. 2006).

The largest generation. In many countries according to the census statistics from various parts
of the continents, The Y generation has the largest number. By 2015, the millennial surpass the
previous generation X in various western countries such as US and UK. This has not the case in
this westernized countries only but even in the rest of the world.
The global citizenship is another distinctive role of this generation. They are seen to be more
global minded than patriotic. This the generation attention is captured by the global development

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and give all the respect and values diversity hence makes the world a global village (Filipczak,
B. 2000).
The older generation of generation is the Generation x, a generation of people born between
1960s to 1970s. They are also believed to have inherited some specific traits different from the
immediate successor generation Y. The general characteristics of this group are discussed below:
Independence. This generations was mostly characterized with a lot of divorce were taking
place all over the world. Many wives and husband in this generation were forced to depend on
themselves due to such separation mostly in western countries hence brought about self-
dependence (Raines, C. 2000)
Ethnic diversity. Generation x was also considered ethnical based group where workers in this
generation found themselves in small groups of people mostly referred to as clan in most of the
black continent countries. This ethnicity carried with it all the traditionally base practices that
distinguishes one community from another.
Most productive. All the specialization that existed during this generation yielded a reward as
expected. Workers here performed their role with a lot of passion and the end results in every
field in the generation always turned out to be of high quality and end result also positive hence
considered more productive than the other generations.
Adaptability is also another trait of the generation x. they were more permanent than
immigrants in their respect work place as compared to the current generation. This generation
over stay in the respective environment and outdo all their potentiality for a better output
(Sherman R. 2006).

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To bridge the gap between the Generation x and Y, a generational inventory of their nurses work
should be conducted by their leaders to check closely on nursing team work, age profile and all
the general issues related to team work.
Coaching and workers motivation will play a vital role in this bridging as every distinct group
have had different work experience in different settings. Even though different traits are
exhibited by different groups, this coaching and motivation will help the groups coexist together
by adapting each other’s trait.
Communication utilization is another important bridging factor. With this, different generations
is needed to communicate for them to coexist. Using a common unifying factor such as
communication language, these distinct groups can easily relate to one another without any
difficulty.

References

1. Sherman, R. (2006). Leading a multigenerational nursing workforce: Issues, challenges
   and strategies. Online Journal of Issues in Nursing, 11(2).

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2. Zemke, R., Raines, C., & Filipczak, B. (2000). Generations at work: Managing the clash
   of Veterans, Boomers, Xers, and Nexters in your workplace (p. 280). New York, NY:
   Amacom.