Why hearing “you are not a team player” isn’t such a bad thing

How many times have you heard those words from someone who has some degree of power over your career?

Did this make you feel less than effective in your ability to be a nurse? How did these words make you feel about where you were in an organization’s structure, especially if you have ambitions to move up the ladder?

Personally, I think that this particular “buzzphrase” has torpedoed the careers of more nurses than I care to imagine.

There is nothing so low, so cruel, so counterproductive as to attempt to destroy the self-esteem, reputation and confidence of a nurse by using such a common put down.

Those who throw out this phrase are usually much less clinically competent and are too often jealous of another nurse’s working relationship with other departments–and especially with his or her reputation and respect among the doctors.

So I have decided, after being told this very thing just one too many times, that I really am NOT a “team player.” I am a team LEADER, as are most RNs with years of bedside experience and advanced certification in their fields. We are nonconformists who can anticipate change before it happens, keep others from dissolving into panic and dysfunction, and think outside of the box.

WE are the “go-to” people when things get hairy. We are the ones who get called to come in and cover the unit when there is no one who is charge capable or when the regular nurse called in sick.

For all of you “non-team players” out there: Keep the faith, keep leading the team and keep your self-confidence! YOU are the ones who make the difference where it counts–with the patients!

It is the team players’ loss if they cannot or will not see the value of you!

To do what nobody else will do, a way that nobody else can do, in spite of all we go through; that is to be a nurse (Rawsi Williams, BSN, RN).