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20 Great Tips for Finding a Job in Nursing
Last year, "Rachel" graduated from her nursing program and immediately began complaining about how hard it was to find a job in nursing. Six months later, she had landed a position as a school nurse, while friends with other career goals were still looking. Reality had slapped her in the face: In this economy, jobs in all career fields are scarce, but jobs in nursing are more plentiful than on many other career paths.
Indeed, for the past decade, every study has reached the same conclusion: Nursing is expected to continue adding jobs at an impressive rate, especially as the population grows older and people live long enough to encounter more physical ailments. And what variety there is for those wanting to be a nurse! There are positions in burn care, ambulatory care, emergency rooms, developmental disabilities, home care, geriatrics, medical telemetry, intensive care, mother / baby care, oncology, pediatrics, operating room, psychiatric nursing, recovery room, psychiatric nursing, rehabilitation, school nursing, hospital floor nurse, and more.
People armed with a nursing degree still have more doors open to them than others in different industries.
Still, landing that interview is never a sure thing. It's always smart to add a few strategies to your job-search toolbox, to help you find the right nursing job faster. Strategies like the following simple tips:
- Begin your job hunt while still in nursing school. That means start working on your resume and talking with whoever does the hiring at hospitals, clinics and other medical services where you might consider working.
- Be willing to work as a PRN until you find a regular full-time position. Remember that most nursing positions are filled in-house, so the key is to get your foot in the door.
- Take occasional road trips to nearby cities, visiting the local hospitals, clinics and doctors' offices. Ask about any available positions and also how often new positions become available (If, for instance, every month, then re-visit a month later). You can also leave resumes at each place you visit.
- Ask friends or family members to introduce you to their supervisor. It really is often who you know that determines whether you get the job or not.
- Contact contract employment and recruitment agencies. By aligning yourself with a recruiter, you get immediate access to jobs that aren't advertised to the general pubic. Plus, a recruiting agency lets you apply to positions at many medical facilities at the same time with just one resume submission. The agency then shops your resume to all available openings.
- Become a master Internet job-searcher. Searching for nursing or nurse on job boards such as careerbuilder.com or monster.com and even Craigslist often unearths hundreds of nursing positions. However, be ready for the fact that hundreds of other nurses are looking at those same ads.
- Speaking of the Internet, learn to use social networking sites in your job hunt. Sites such as Facebook or My Space make it easy to keep branching out your contacts further and further. Eventually, it's likely you'll find the occasional nurse who can perhaps help you connect with her own employer.
- Colleges and nursing schools often have their own databases of open positions, so be sure to scan through those.
- Learn to network in the real world as well as on "networking" Internet sites. Networking in the professional sense means letting family, friends and acquaintances know you're looking for a nursing position. Get leads from them and ask to speak with anyone to whom they refer you. Then, even if those people don't have a job to offer you, ask them for more leads, and keep working outward until you land a position.
- Expand your vision and be willing to accept overlooked nursing positions such as jobs at schools, health insurance companies, the Health Department, at retirement homes and nursing homes, in HOSPICE, in traveling nurse programs, and in mentorship programs.
- When you're on the Internet, look for nursing-specific job sites. For instance, a couple of popular ones are Nursing Jobs, Nursing Exams and Jobs and Nurse Options.
- Don't forget to look at newspaper classifieds. So many people are doing their job-hunting online now that it's just possible that they'll overlook the old faithful newspaper ads--leaving the position open for you!
- Create a video resume and email it to potential employers. This is an especially good idea for nurses, because personality plays such an important part in how you interact with patients.
- Develop a longterm plan. Use your current nursing job to meet key contact people who will might help you to continue moving up the ladder, until you achieve your dream position.
- Join professional associations for nurses and those in the medical profession. These are the people who are often aware of where the open positions are.
- Stay connected with fellow graduates of your nursing class and other recent alumni. Many good tips have come from fellow classmates who know about hospitals and facilities too far for you to travel there to job hunt.
- Keep and show a positive attitude even if a hospital or medical facility doesn't need you at that time. It's just possible that a nurse might quit next week. If you've left a good impression with the person doing the hiring, you could still get a call.
- Start your own business. Before you object, yes, it's possible to have a nursing business. You could be hired by someone to be a personal nurse to someone unable to care for him or herself. Or to give health-related demonstrations at community events.
- Volunteer. Places such as homeless shelters or non-profit hospitals can put your healthcare talents to good use. All the while, you can remind them frequently that you're interested in any paid position that might become available.
- When you finally land an interview, close the deal! To do this, you need to make sure that you're personable and come across as knowledgeable. You should have done research about the employer ahead of time so you can intersperse what you know about them into the conversation. This shows them interest on your part. Dress professionally and no matter what they ask, always bring your answer around to how your background and experience will benefit them.
It's a great career path you've chosen for yourself--and one with great potential. Don't give up after the first few rejections. Because in a career field expanding as much as nursing is, if you show a little patience and if you have the talent for the work, you'll get that dream job soon enough.