ems personalities

[medic993]

how do people deal with the lies and backstabbing people do in this field now. when i first started out people were very caring and considerate of the fellow ems workers. Now it is " i will step on your head " to move one more wrung up that ladder anyone have any great ideas. please share. need help

[Yummymedic05]

I'm not sure if it's the profession or the people. I know other professions are the exact same way. Brotherhood one moment, backstabbing the next. I learned extremely early on to just do my job and stay out of the gossip/shit stirring. If you are there to work, why worry about what others are saying/doing?

[spenac]

Spend so much time together it is just to easy to gossip. One thing leads to another and :pottytrain5: happens.

[Chief1C]

It's the people more than the profession. Individual egos and attitudes. We have this sort of thing, I was a captain for a while. Seeing the folks who cared more about the numbers than the patients. They'd be all buddy buddy one minute, and be kissing someones ass the next. I'd say, don't try and kiss my ass, just do your job, thats all I want to do. The numbers matter when your working out the business end, but they have no business coming up in the back of the rig. I finally resigned because they were draining the spirit out of me. I just signed onto a second company. I came out and plainly said, I'm not here to step on toes, or climb the political ladder, I just wanna do my thing and go home.

[Asysin2leads]

This issue has come up before, and its one of the points in EMS that needs vast improvement, and that is the overall professionalism and maturity level of the service.

EMS is a young service and it has its own growing pains, and like insecure high schoolers, we tend to follow the "gossip and backstab your way to acceptance" model. I

I realized this is how it works at an early stage in my career, so I followed the good advice that the WOPR computer laid down in the classic movie "Wargames": The only winning move is not to play. Don't consider the people at work your friends, consider them your colleagues. If you are friends with them, great, if not, oh friggin' well. Do your job, take some vitals, treat some patient, stock, restock, and keep it clean, watch some TV, get your paycheck, then go home, where your social and personal life should begin, not end. Now, if the powers at be only selects "the cool kids" for advancement, this can be a problem, but at the end of the day, if you truly have the knowledge and skills needed for advancement, and you are not moved on, you work for some lousy people and its time to work some place else.

[ohemt648]

^ ^

Well said As. If more people would do this the world would be such a better place :wink:

Take care and be safe

648

[riskynremtp]

I agree. Well said As. That is the only way to look at this job, and it's people. I go back to an old saying my late grandpa once told me, "you can help a dog over the fence, and he'll turn around and bite you"

[Dustdevil]

I realized this is how it works at an early stage in my career, so I followed the good advice that the WOPR computer laid down in the classic movie "Wargames": The only winning move is not to play. Don't consider the people at work your friends, consider them your colleagues. If you are friends with them, great, if not, oh friggin' well. Do your job, take some vitals, treat some patient, stock, restock, and keep it clean, watch some TV, get your paycheck, then go home, where your social and personal life should begin, not end.

Wonderfully astute and classic advice. :thumbright:

To the original poster, I am curious. Is this a problem you percieve to be unique to rural EMS, or did you just post this in the wrong forum?

[TFMP]

The backstabbing, etc., is not just restricted to EMS - and I hate to post what I am about to post, but I have to........ EMS used to be more of a male oriented profession - more and more women are now getting into EMS - it is a known fact that when we women get togeter and work together, we tend to gossip and nitpick and (some) do what they have to do to get where they want to be. I think that has some to do with it. I'm not saying that is entirely why though. I work for a smaller ambulance company and there is a lot of politics that is going on wiht it -- I try to avoid being dragged into the gossip, etc. because by listening to it you are only encouraging it more. If you see a problem, you should bring it up to the lead paramedic or whoever is in charge of the department. We all are there to do a job - and that job is to help someone who needs are help - if we all turn on each other, how are we going to work together as a team, which is so very important in our line of work.

[Mark111]

I concer that most people should not throw stones at glass houses