Many of you are a registered nurse. Since your graduation 3 years ago, you have worked as a full-time
industrial health nurse for a large manufacturing plant. Although you love your family (spouse and one
preschool-aged child), you love your job as well because a career is very important to you. Recently, you and
your spouse decided to have another baby. At that time, you and your spouse reached a joint decision that if
you had another baby, you would reduce your work time and spend more time at home with the children. Last
week, however, the director of human resources told you that the full-time director of health-care services for
the plant is leaving and that the organization wants to appoint you to the position. You were initially thrilled and
excited; however, you found out several days later that you and your spouse are expecting a baby. Last night,
you spoke with your spouse about your career future. Your spouse is an attorney whose practice has suddenly
gained momentum. Although the two of you have shared child-rearing equally until this point, your spouse is
not sure how much longer this can be done if the law practice continues to expand. If you take the position,
which you would like to do, it would mean full-time work and more management responsibilities. You want the
decision you and your spouse reach to be well-thought-out, as it has far-reaching consequences and concerns
many people.
Writing Pompts
• Use PICO
o Determine what you should do.
o Examine both the individual aspects of decision making and the critical elements in making decisions.
o Plan including a goal, a list of information, and data that you need to gather and areas where you may be
vulnerable to poor decision making.
o Examine the consequences of each alternative available to you.
o Were they the same?
o How did you approach the problem solving differently from others?
o Was a rational systematic problem-solving process used, or was the chosen solution based more on
intuition?
o How many alternatives were generated?
o Did some of the group members identify alternatives that you had not considered?
o Was a goal or objective identified?
o How did your personal values influence your decision?
Sample Solution
