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between groups. There was a difference between the comments of the clerks and

emergency nurses as opposed to the palliative care and renal nurses in their perceptions of the required personal disposition. This difference possibly reflected the more volatile setting of emergency departments as opposed to the more stable palliative and renal settings. Whereas, the palliative care and renal nurses spoke of the need for empathy and compassion, this was less prominent from participants from the two emergency

department groups. The following comment from a renal nurse explained why

compassion and empathy were considered important in the context of a renal setting; “…to understand the paths some of these people are on and

that are now placed on them and the future maybe what they thought it was going to be. So having that empathy and understanding that goes with that.” [RN3].

In the following comment, a palliative care nurse explained that she believed that her own capacity for compassion was central to her role;

“A lot of compassion, I have a lot of compassion for people in that area”. [PN3].

In contrast, the emergency nurses and clerks spoke of the importance of being emotionally resilient and being able to brush off difficult encounters. In the following comment, a clerk described how some clerks took abuse from clients personally and were unable to shrug off such experiences;

“…you know they take it on board and to them it becomes personal whereas…you shouldn‟t be taking it personally at all in a department like that…and some people just don‟t have that ability to be able to shrug it off…”[EC2].

Similarly the following comment from an emergency nurse emphasised the importance of emotional stability and a non-reactive approach to abuse;

“You need…people who‟ve got calm demeanours...and lots of things just can pass them over and they don‟t react to lots of triggers…I‟ve been asked to go to the ED department to sort things out and people will say awful things to you. And my way of dealing with that is, oh yeah, everybody calls me that and I just move on.” [EN1].

Another notable difference between groups in terms of dispositional differences was the focus on the process driven and repetitive nature of work in renal wards as

opposed to the dynamic and unpredictable situation that exists in emergency

departments. Renal nurses spoke of the requirement for a tolerance of the same work and clients on a day-to-day basis as important to their ongoing viability in their role. The following comments were both in response to a question asking what factors contributed to nurses leaving renal care;

“The repetitiveness of learning the machines, having the same patients, the same chronic patients.” [RN4].

“They just get sick of the whingeing of the patients because it‟s not like they walk in and say oh, I‟ve got a headache, here‟s a pill, it‟s better. It‟s every part of their body will ache or they‟ve got this problem. It‟s just so ongoing and it‟s every system of their body, not just the renal disease… It‟s so chronic and it is boring after a while” [RN5].

In contrast, emergency nurses spoke of the need to be able to respond to a fast- paced work situation with shifting priorities. In the following comment a nurse reflected on the ability of emergency nurses being unfazed by multiple demands;

“I‟ve seen people they‟re still triaging patients through and there‟s somebody over there cursing, swearing, carrying on and somebody at the desk saying I want to go home…they‟re still dealing with the ambulance drivers over here and all this is going on………” [EN1].

Similarly, this nurse explained the need to be able to change focus and deal with a lack of routine;

“…you know it‟s going to be a fast and possibly stressful place and you must have your wits about…but generally people that work here I reckon are type 1: short-term, fast movers, assertive …It‟s organised chaos is what it is…and it involves a lot of pattern recognition of how things are going to pan out and if you don‟t have the background for the particular

things that are going on and you don‟t recognise where to intervene or what to do then it can be stressful because it‟s not predictable and not predictable is stressful to some people…” [EN4].

The above evidence describes the need for some variation in dispositional qualities across groups. However, there was not compelling evidence of the importance of specific personality requirements from any of the groups. Indeed, one palliative care nurse gave a view that a range of personality types co-existed in palliative care;

“…I suppose the characteristics of the … nurses, doctors is as varied as can be. You get some who are extremely, you know the shy, quiet, retiring person and you get those who are loud and outgoing and life of the party type people and sort of everything in between.” [PN4].

Previous research has suggested that higher levels of personality dimensions such as extraversion, conscientiousness, and agreeableness may result in an easier compliance with display rules leading to a lower requirement for surface acting and subsequently more positive wellbeing outcomes (Bono & Vey, 2007; Diefendorff et al., 2005; Tan et al., 2003). The current research has not uncovered any evidence of the requirement for specific personality dimensions for more successful interactions with clients or in the conduct of emotional labour generally or in any particular group. However, this may simply reflect a lack of awareness or focus on specific components of personality dimensions such as those described in the five-factor model (e.g. McCrae & Costa, 2003). Pro-active engagement with clients would appear to be an important aspect of nursing roles and there is ample evidence of nurses leading the interactions with clients and engaging at an emotional level in the current research. This appeared to be less the case for the clerical employees. The current research does not contradict

previous findings but from the participants‟ descriptions, personality or individual differences were not prominent as contributing factors to the success of emotional management in these groups.