*UNEMPLOYED NURSES*

Nurses Job Hunt

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inforn43

44 Posts

Please have a little heart. I have been on a ton of interviews too. They are soooooo different. I have also done quite a few interviews myself. How many interviews have you been on? Some are extremely casual and some ask you very hard questions. When I interview I try to do a little of both. I am starting to wonder about the whole nursing profession. When there are few jobs it gives HR managers and DNS's that do interviews the right to pick people based on their own preferences. I actually got hired at an assisted living because I came back for my second interview wearing jeans and a sweatshirt.

nurse nosa

9 Posts

Please have a little heart. I have been on a ton of interviews too. They are soooooo different. I have also done quite a few interviews myself. How many interviews have you been on? Some are extremely casual and some ask you very hard questions. When I interview I try to do a little of both. I am starting to wonder about the whole nursing profession. When there are few jobs it gives HR managers and DNS's that do interviews the right to pick people based on their own preferences. I actually got hired at an assisted living because I came back for my second interview wearing jeans and a sweatshirt.

I am getting soo discouraged ughhhhhhh I need to work

SUNGLASSES

19 Posts

Ello~

I'm just curious to know, for those of you who are unemployed nurses, exactly how long have you been looking for work? What are you (LPN,RN,BSN-RN,MSN-NP,etc.) How many previous years of experience do you have? Where are you located? How many applications do you think you have placed? What about interviews? Add anything else that you want! Vent, tell us how you REALLY feel, give your opinions/outlooks on everything.

Hi there. I am an RN who went straight into a specialty office setting after graduation. After happily working there for 4 years I moved to CA where I have no networks. I really wish I had some guidence as I am stuck and do not know what to do now. I'd love to work as an OR nurse or med/surg or really anywhere but for some reason I don't feel confident enough. I am nerveous about the interviews too. Please someone help me, I will really appreciate any advice. I wonder if I should volunteer in a hospital in the Med-surg floor so I can refresh my knowledge and feel ready. Can nurses volunteer?? Plese help me find my next step.

Thank you!

Specializes in Foot care.

I'm unemployed, too, and have had a dismal experince working. Moving to California sounds exciting though, and I hope you find work. From my experience trying to volunteer, nurses are not used as volunteer staff; must be a liability issue. Have you applied to any hospitals? If not, you should. You would, hopefully, at least, have experience interviewing for the kind of position you seek. What about surgical centers? If you lack confidence, how about taking a refresher course? I've seen hospitals advertise for new grads to enter into OR nurse residentcies, have you seen this in CA? It doesn't seem unreasonable to me that you might be considered something of a "new grad plus" (which is good) because you have not worked in a hospital. You're in a gray area; seems to me you have expereince but not the right kind, but that experince must be worth something, would seem to add to your desirability as a candidate.

Good luck, anyway.

rrobinson.rn

3 Posts

My experince has been that degree (ADN, BSN) doesn't matter, it's who you know. I am in an ADN to MSN program and STILL cannot find a freakin job; not even on a basic med surge floor! In my current non nursing position I go to a lot of hospitals and all the nurses say the same thing - it's who you know. They are under staffed and it's because their HR dept are throwing out resumes of perfectly qualified RNs. We all know med surge right out of school so I just don't get it.

Meriwhen, ASN, BSN, MSN, RN

4 Articles; 7,907 Posts

Specializes in Psych ICU, addictions.
I've seen hospitals advertise for new grads to enter into OR nurse residentcies, have you seen this in CA? It doesn't seem unreasonable to me that you might be considered something of a "new grad plus" (which is good) because you have not worked in a hospital.

They have loads of new grad residencies in CA...however, most of them require that the applicant have 12-18 months of RN experience (regardless of setting) or less. If someone spent several years working as a RN in, say, a community clinic, they would not qualify for the new grad program as they have several years of RN experience. Fair? Debatable.

I agree: it does put them in a grey area :/

AlaBro2010

265 Posts

Specializes in Public Health, Women's Health.

I had an interview yesterday and totally blew it. Ive been searching for two months doing at least 25 applications a day. The interview was so awkward, the rest of the time I was praying it would end already! But to me, it means there's hope... Even if just a little. I graduated in July and passed the NCLEX in September.

kcmylorn

991 Posts

I too am out of a job. I have survived on temp positions for the past 4.5 years. It is really draining, mentally and financially. My latest was an nursing agency, Favorite Healthcare who told me that there were no positions avail. I was physically present in the office. The office staff consists of a (2) 20 something year olds and on woman in the back approx 40's age group, who are all NON NURSING. That I am sure of, what their backgrounds are that qualifies them to making decisions about licensed nurses career I don't know- it could be office machines for all I know. When I was about out the door, the older worker stated, "here's something you maybe interested in" It provided me with 40hr/week for 6 weeks, thinning out medical records. Then there was an IV pump training coming up- I was told by these geniuses, It was full time for another 4 weeks. As it turned out- it was anywhere from 5hr to 25 hr per week and involved me driving 80,90, 100 miles each way from my home, first training session started at 7:30 in the morning. I had to fight with them to get copy of my pay stub because one week I was paid $27.00 for 2 hours work @$35.00/hr. I had to ask them because their little feeling were hurt if you were straight out with it, I had to say "does this mean that $35.00/hour for 2 hours equals $27.00 and will I be paid for the additional 7 hours I work that were not included" and had to ask this with a straight face and keeping my hands away from their stupid throats I was told by the blonde, she didn't know and would "circle" back to me later.!

In an interview I encountered an older(50 something) "nursing recruiter " from Bayada. I had been working a 2 year contract for a outpatient clinic ina military clinic that the company I worked for did not get awarded the new contract. As a result, all the contractor employees received a "WARN" letter: which is as follows and is straight off the Us Department of Labor' website:

Quote

Plant Closings & Layoffs

Such occurrences may be subject to the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN). WARN offers employees early warning of impending layoffs or plant closings. The Employment and Training Administration (ETA) provides information to the public on WARN, though neither ETA nor the Department of Labor has administrative responsibility for the statute, which is enforced through private action in the federal courts. "Summary of the Major Laws of the Department of Labor"

I am bolding this so everyone on this site will see/read the stupidity( beyond stupidity) of a Human Resources' "nursing recruiter". This brainless hussy, screw up asked "what I was disciplined for" !!

This woman works in Human resources, was totally serious, is in New Jersey and I have to wonder if she isn't related to "Snookie (jersey shore) and is SUPPOSED to know this stuff- it's part of the Dept of Labor laws and policies, Isn't that a course in Human Resource Management? And what is even more alarming and frightening, these human resources are destroying Licensed nurses career; Careers that people have went to school for taking coursework HR can't even pronounce and passed licensing exams for. I applied to Bayada for a full time position( I have 30 years in acute care RN bedside nursing- med/surg to telemetry) and was offered a stinken per diem position. This dumb individual has a job and I am unemployed?

I was recently offered and accepted a job offer for a major insurance company doing medicare advantage Utilization reviews. I needed to have all my new hire paperwork faxed in 24 hours(11/16) which it was and drug screen completed by 48 hr(11/17) which it was. I was supposed to start 11/30. On 11/29 I received a call from the recruiter my start date was to be pushed back to 12/03/2012 because my background check was "not back yet from one of the counties I have lived in" I have lived in the same county for 50 something years! This is another recruiter lie. I wonder what her hold up is Background checks take 3-5 business days! They are not a new bill in Congress.

This is what is running and controlling the Nursing Profession! And, yes, they are contributing to the negligence and harm of patients! When they fail to hire nurses because they don't know their HR coursework, for these positions they are subjecting patients to unsafe staffing conditions.

I had an agency recruiter ask me "did I have any IV experience?"( a RN of 30 yrs hospital experience.) what does that little twit thinks hospital RN's do- apply their lipstick all day like they do on TV. From the same agency I had a recruiter tell me- that "Joint Commission mandated what recent experience means". Me knowing quite well Joint Commission has nothing to do with this "recent experience requirement", I wrote Joint Commission an email asking them. The response I received and happily forwarded to the agency recruiter twit is That the Joint commission only requires the nurse to be qualified and competent to practice. These time mandates are set up"arbitrarily" by the facilities and these agencies filled with closet geniuses from the HR pool

Joint Commission Response:

Quote

Thank you for your inquiry.

The Joint Commission standards do not specify the amount of total, or recent, experience that a nurse must have for a position. The standards simply state that the person must be qualified and competent to perform the assigned duties. At times the customer of the staffing agency, or the staffing agency itself, will arbitrarily define a minimum of experience but that would be there own decision to do so.

Please feel free to contact me with any further questions or discussion for clarification purposes.

Disclaimer:

Please understand that full compliance with the intent of the standards can only be assessed during on-site survey.

The information transmitted is intended only for the person or entity to which it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged material. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. If you received this in error, please immediately contact the sender and delete the material from any computer.

Merlin Wessels

Joint Commission
Standards Interpretation Group

Please take a few minutes to complete a short survey by clicking on the link below. Thank you.

Pat Adamski, RN, MS, MBA
Director, Standards Interpretation Group

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/W2SVBGG - Survey Link

I know I can't take anymore. Let someone else do nursing and put up with this crap.

kcmylorn

991 Posts

My experince has been that degree (ADN, BSN) doesn't matter, it's who you know. I am in an ADN to MSN program and STILL cannot find a freakin job; not even on a basic med surge floor! In my current non nursing position I go to a lot of hospitals and all the nurses say the same thing - it's who you know. They are under staffed and it's because their HR dept are throwing out resumes of perfectly qualified RNs. We all know med surge right out of school so I just don't get it.

I too have heard this. This is a real shame.

kcmylorn

991 Posts

These are definated causes for alarm and concern. I sincerely hope that some with more power and in a position to be able to, begins to look into them and do something about it. This is totally unfair and destructive to the Nursing profession and any nurse who is looking for employment.

It is appauling that some one in an HR dept can be so unaware of their own coursework but can influence another profession to the degree they have- therby ruining nursing careers due to their lack of command of their own information and then throwing resumes in the trash. Maybe we nurses should all go into HR- it sounds like a really easy way to make a living and you do't have to be too bright to do it.

elprup, BSN, RN

1,005 Posts

Sad and frustrated here as well. Hoping things will change...

inforn43

44 Posts

I hope things go better for you. I am still not working either. I don't know how we are going to pay the bills anymore.

Sad and frustrated here as well. Hoping things will change...
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