Aim To develop an understanding of senior nurses’ ranking and perceptions of incident reporting by junior nurses. Background Nurses must be encouraged to report incidents to nursing management. It is important to ascertain how senior nurses perceive their concerns, as it is crucial to ensuring that patient safety is managed. Method Qualitative study. Four focus groups explored senior nurses’ perceptions of risks identified by nurses from a live incident reporting database. Data were analysed using framework analysis. Results Five themes emerged demonstrating the differences in opinions in relation to the classification of events by senior and non‐senior nurses. Senior nurses held the view that some junior nurses use incident reporting to ‘vent frustration.’ Conclusion There is a mismatch between senior nurses’ and junior nurses’ perceptions of safety incidents. Nurses need to develop the writing style and use language that red flags incidents when reporting incidents. Senior nurses need to create a positive culture where risk from incident reporting is used to improve patient safety and subsequently a positive work environment. Implications for Nursing Management Our research identified the need for joint training to promote a shared understanding among nurses as to how incident report should be completed to promote patient safety.