Greytrunk,
I felt I had to respond to this one.
Do you think it could be possible that your sexist attitude is
percieved by some of your staff?  Just something to think about.....
Skip Brown gives wonderful leadership and team building seminars.  You
can reach him through the NSH.  
I am in a similar situation with multiple sites and a large staff.  It
is a difficult job.  Management seminars are a trememdous help.  Keep
trying to empower all the members of your staff.  Find out who the
natural leaders are and get their buy-in.  It has always helped me to
keep my two main functions in mind.  1.  Quality patient care.   2. 
Helping people succeed.
Good luck.
Jan Mahoney
Omaha, NE

>>>  03/10/2003 4:37:20 PM >>>
I want to thank everyone for the wonderful advice that you are sending
me.  I 
did want to clarify some things though---

I am the supervisor in a lab that is contracted by the hospital.  There
are 4 
hospitals in the system.  I am the supervisor for all the histology
labs at 
each of the hospital, so I do travel from site to site, granted 2 of
the 
sites have limited histology, but the other 2 are full service
histology 
departments.  I only have this problem at one of the sites, the other
sites 
are working fine.  The other full service histology department works 
wonderful, could be because they are all men at that site.

I do not single people out at staff meetings to point out errors, I do
this 
in private, however, when a mistake is made by multiple people I bring
it up 
as a QA issue to the department without mentioning names.

I do have the support of the Medical Director, but is is also
contracted by 
the hospitals.  So we have 3 entities, here -- the hospital , the lab,
and 
the Pathology group.  I also have the support of my supervisor, who
happens 
to be the VP.  He is having one on one meetings with the most current
people 
with complaints.  I have tried team building skills, but they don't
want to 
do it, again--it is childish.  I have convinced him to bring in an
outside 
agency that specializes in team building.

There are clear expectations, but they forget.  Or thought someone else
was 
going to do the task. I have let them give their input, in which they 
suggested I let them do what they are best at.  This didn't work
because when 
someone was on vacation and another person had to fill in they were
lowe had 
someone good  and fast at embedd150 blocks per hour, but when she was
on 
vacation they were embedding 20 blocks an hour.  So I did away with 
that--besides their job description says they can do everything in the

department.

As far as raises--everyone gets the same 4%.  Raises are not merit
based, 
although I am told that will be changing.

The ages range from 20 -60.  All are certified.  I have about 30
employees 
total, including Lab Assistants.

Again, thatnks for all your help.  I hope this helps you when you are 
offering advice.