Nursing market cools, new grads have a tough time finding jobs

I think its bigger than just new grad risk and working conditions. While surely that is a factor, but in addition hospitals are first and foremost a business. And the whole face of business has changed worldwide of late. Even when a unit wants to hire you as a new grad, their hands can be tied by financial departments that dictate budgets and hiring freezes mandated by administration.
This has been my personal experience. I was an extern at a unit that took all the steps to hire me, but got stuck at budget. Four months later, looks like it just may happen--thankfully my unit manager fought like crazy for the two of us who externed--but then again, no guarantees.
The world scene has changed drastically in all places of business. It has affected this workforce, too. Yes we are wanted, Yes we are needed, No that does not mean we will be quickly hired. That isn't how it works anymore. Letting new grads and future grads know this fact long before they face it, is a great help. Like anything else, preparation can make all the difference. It is good to see it acknowledged. Its important for other people to know: its not the same for us as for those that finished even a semester before us. Even better to let us know, so it isn't so disillusioning when we hit that longed for finish line, only to find out there are no sign-on bonuses and fanfare welcomes. We worked our butts off to get through nursing school, we can work our butts off to get a job. Its just nice to know that is what we are in for ahead of time.
This is the reality of the job hunt. This is our reality right now. But our patients are still going to be better off with us than without us.

This problem has many sides to it. There's the nurses', the money people at facilities, the instructors, and of course the patients' perspective. The nurses who have experience are burning out more quickly than before, due to short staffing, and new nurses have too little preparation for their work.

Hospitals' administrators basically lie about their status as non profit "businesses", since any cash not spent to run their facilities, is distributed among the executives, who make higher salaries than anyone would imagine (incentive to do more with less). Budgets are not created with overages in mind. Every effort is made to have as little spent to run the place as possible, while keeping the appearance of having "state of the art" equipment, lovely lobbies and decor.

Instructors prepare nurses for a perfect world, in which they'll be able to have plenty of time to perform ideal nursing practises, yet hospitals are so short staffed (not having employed enough nurses to cover for orientation, nurses who leave before a replacement is hired and oriented, days off, sick days, vacations, meetings, on-the-job training etc.). They also have goals of teaching nurses2B, the knowledge of how to do procedures, but not how to organize their work with 8 - 10 patients for whom they're responsible, supervising the nurses' aides and LPNs work, and minimal charting. Am I right? You could add more tasks, I'm sure.

Then there are patients whose discharges and admissions take longer than budgeters who are not nurses anticipated, since its not just a bed assigned to a nurse, but 2 patients who end up occupying that bed when 1 goes home, and another arrives who is acutely ill, and may need to go to the O.R. Teaching needs to be done for the one leaving, and new patients with untreated needs, anxiety and a whole cast of family members who must be acclimated to their situation, and get the patient's doctor's orders carried out. They expect nurses to be at their beck and call, yet another patient assigned to that nurse has needed more time due to unexpected occurrences.

Hmmmmm, it just occurred to me that a nurse or two should help out with others' assignments, meds, IVs, etc. at the beginning of a shift (A.M.s), and care for possibly discharged patients (not more than 2), then admit new ones and be responsible for their care in the afternoon (and evening, along with the helping out they did in the A.M., if it's a 12 hour shift). They could also handle new orders, for the unit and teaching discharged patients, problem solving, etc. Would that work? Oh, the budget.......

Well, for much too long, financial types have been setting staff #s arbitrarily, without regard for real situations, and administrative nurses have been saying "Yes, of course we don't need that position" so their "stock" will rise and their job be secure. They need some negotiation skill education, good old fashioned "assertion training" or whatever gumption is called today.

If administration stodgily sticks to the status quo, it will be necessary to have specially trained mediation nurses consult with both sides, to avoid strikes and enhance working relationships. That should be written into nurses' contracts. You don't have one? How do you know when you're being told to do things that aren't appropriate?

Every time I've seen strikes, nurses say, "It's patient safety about which we're concerned, not money." Yet when push comes to shove, they end up with more money (not that that's bad). Do the patients have more nurses, though, and better and more equipment that works well longer, ergo better safety? One might hope.

When incident reports come up with similar situations time and again, it's usually the spread-too-thin staff that leave the side rails down on the bed of a recently post-op patient whose bedside table isn't where it should be (where it can be reached) or an elderly sundowner with an overinflated sense of what's possible for them to do, or desire to go somewhere. When medication errors occur too frequently, have nurses been given too many patients with myriad meds? Usually. When nurses say they hate to come to work in the morning and are dead tired at the end of their shifts, is it because they had too little to do?

Jobs may be in short supply for the undertrained as well as experienced nurses now, or are they not available because some exec preferred more money lining his/her pockets, than optimum care given patients by sufficient, well oriented nursing staff who have greater job satisfaction?

You be the judges.

so we know about the problems that face this profession--they are far and wide. now how do we fix 'em?

i am relieved that i am not the only one who 'hates to go to work in the morning and is dead tired at the end of shift' and yet, in this economic climate--we must be so grateful to feel this way because at least we have jobs... this is a twisted view on working life--no??

A search of this topic would likely reveal that I debunked the so-called nursing shortage not recently, not months before the economic depression (yes, I meant depression), but rather YEARS ago.

This is but another case where our nursing leaders have thrown current and future members of the profession "under the (proverbial) bus".

Yes, these "leaders" in academia, and nurse executives pushed for more education-----but at the same time they came up with every kind of accelerated, BS (and I don't mean Bachelor of Science) program that one could imagine (and a few that no one could imagine) to dramatically expand the nursing ranks. So yes, they were graduating more BSNs, but were they truly prepared?---I would argue that they were NOT prepared for the mountain of student loan debt in their future with no reasonable way of paying it back. And seriously now...what other profession welcomes you to their ranks after answering most of 75 multiple choice questions correctly?

In the name of the nursing shortage we have at once significantly increased the BSN degreed nurse population, yet vastly devalued the degree itself. "Hey unemployed psych. degree holder----I can make you an employed BSN in a year or less!!! Don't have much time?----hey how bout 2 nights a week? Ok Ok, 1 night then, you win. What!!! Not enough??? Ok, how about ALL on line then? Uhhhhh..just make sure you take out plenty of loans. We may be what used to be called a correspondence school, but that doesn't mean we are cheap, yanno. In fact, we marketers..errrr...I mean, educators might come up with a few EXTRA fees for on line learning." Very costly fees.

All right. Enough about the past. How do I see the future? Very bleak I'm afraid. I would under no circumstances incur a significant amount of debt to obtain a nursing degree at this time. Now if you are the type of person who as long as you can remember wanted to be a nurse, then by all means go ahead. You can't live your lives entirely by economic considerations.

Be careful of advanced practice nursing. It is the FUTURE surplus. Proportionately, schools are spitting these folks out in abundance. If you can replace a higher priced Family Practice doc at a lower cost (ie a family practice nurse practitioner, particularly in a rural area) you could be OK. But beware of Nurse Leader masters or even CNSs in some markets because as the bloom will soon be off the rose of Magnet Status due to economic conditions, the need for CNSs will decline. (More precisely, I predict the employment picture for many types of masters prepared nurses will be unfavorable because the increase in supply will far exceed the demand). Again I should say...if being an advanced practice nurse is your dream----go for it!!! But don't get into significant, unforgivable debt to do so in this economic climate.

Geeezzz....I'm glad I won't be in the workforce much longer.

This problem has many sides to it. There's the nurses', the money people at facilities, the instructors, and of course the patients' perspective. The nurses who have experience are burning out more quickly than before, due to short staffing, and new nurses have too little preparation for their work.

Hospitals' administrators basically lie about their status as non profit "businesses", since any cash not spent to run their facilities, is distributed among the executives, who make higher salaries than anyone would imagine (incentive to do more with less). Budgets are not created with overages in mind. Every effort is made to have as little spent to run the place as possible, while keeping the appearance of having "state of the art" equipment, lovely lobbies and decor.

Instructors prepare nurses for a perfect world, in which they'll be able to have plenty of time to perform ideal nursing practises, yet hospitals are so short staffed (not having employed enough nurses to cover for orientation, nurses who leave before a replacement is hired and oriented, days off, sick days, vacations, meetings, on-the-job training etc.). They also have goals of teaching nurses2B, the knowledge of how to do procedures, but not how to organize their work with 8 - 10 patients for whom they're responsible, supervising the nurses' aides and LPNs work, and minimal charting. Am I right? You could add more tasks, I'm sure.

Then there are patients whose discharges and admissions take longer than budgeters who are not nurses anticipated, since its not just a bed assigned to a nurse, but 2 patients who end up occupying that bed when 1 goes home, and another arrives who is acutely ill, and may need to go to the O.R. Teaching needs to be done for the one leaving, and new patients with untreated needs, anxiety and a whole cast of family members who must be acclimated to their situation, and get the patient's doctor's orders carried out. They expect nurses to be at their beck and call, yet another patient assigned to that nurse has needed more time due to unexpected occurrences.

Hmmmmm, it just occurred to me that a nurse or two should help out with others' assignments, meds, IVs, etc. at the beginning of a shift (A.M.s), and care for possibly discharged patients (not more than 2), then admit new ones and be responsible for their care in the afternoon (and evening, along with the helping out they did in the A.M., if it's a 12 hour shift). They could also handle new orders, for the unit and teaching discharged patients, problem solving, etc. Would that work? Oh, the budget.......
Well, for much too long, financial types have been setting staff #s arbitrarily, without regard for real situations, and administrative nurses have been saying "Yes, of course we don't need that position" so their "stock" will rise and their job be secure. They need some negotiation skill education, good old fashioned "assertion training" or whatever gumption is called today.

If administration stodgily sticks to the status quo, it will be necessary to have specially trained mediation nurses consult with both sides, to avoid strikes and enhance working relationships. That should be written into nurses' contracts. You don't have one? How do you know when you're being told to do things that aren't appropriate?

Every time I've seen strikes, nurses say, "It's patient safety about which we're concerned, not money." Yet when push comes to shove, they end up with more money (not that that's bad). Do the patients have more nurses, though, and better and more equipment that works well longer, ergo better safety? One might hope.

When incident reports come up with similar situations time and again, it's usually the spread-too-thin staff that leave the side rails down on the bed of a recently post-op patient whose bedside table isn't where it should be (where it can be reached) or an elderly sundowner with an overinflated sense of what's possible for them to do, or desire to go somewhere. When medication errors occur too frequently, have nurses been given too many patients with myriad meds? Usually. When nurses say they hate to come to work in the morning and are dead tired at the end of their shifts, is it because they had too little to do?

Jobs may be in short supply for the undertrained as well as experienced nurses now, or are they not available because some exec preferred more money lining his/her pockets, than optimum care given patients by sufficient, well oriented nursing staff who have greater job satisfaction?

You be the judges. Then do what has to be done. Get help, you'll need it!

I'd be careful about applying here in the Midwest, especially here in Iowa. We are also on a hiring freeze and a lot of my friends who graduated last year and this past December are still looking for nursing work. One nurse that quit for a while and thought she would go back into it with no problem is actually working as a waitress right now because she can't find anything and she has 8 years experience! It's getting bad and I hope it gets better soon.

Talk about a crunch. I just passed the PN after 4 unsuccessful bouts on the RN. So here I am all bright eyed and bushy tailed to get a nursing job. Well the local hospital is not hiring LPNs and I put 4 apps in at 4 different nursing homes 2 weeks ago. Called all of them today. The first one I work with because I incepted a training program for them for CNAs. The DON told me I would have to get a state license for this state although my license is compact and this state participates. After explaining to him I did not he still told me to be a resident here to get the license. I just let him talk. When I asked him about starting work he told me he would call me next week. On the next LTC. Well they are in the middle of state certification and would call me next week. Did I mention this was a Board Member of the non-profit I work for? On to LTC #3. She is in the middle of a billing week and she will call me next week. But oh, the ad said they were in desperate need of nurses, RN an LPN. On to the 4th LTC. We will call you next week. Shortage? Yeah, right. I am going to write the First Lady. I am told her husband loves nurses. Maybe he will give me a job.

[quote=keigei;3553317]Talk about a crunch. I just passed the PN after 4 unsuccessful bouts on the RN. So here I am all bright eyed and bushy tailed to get a nursing job. Well the local hospital is not hiring LPNs and I put 4 apps in at 4 different nursing homes 2 weeks ago. Called all of them today. The first one I work with because I incepted a training program for them for CNAs. The DON told me I would have to get a state license for this state although my license is compact and this state participates. After explaining to him I did not he still told me to be a resident here to get the license. I just let him talk. When I asked him about starting work he told me he would call me next week. On the next LTC. Well they are in the middle of state certification and would call me next week. Did I mention this was a Board Member of the non-profit I work for? On to LTC #3. She is in the middle of a billing week and she will call me next week. But oh, the ad said they were in desperate need of nurses, RN an LPN. On to the 4th LTC. We will call you next week. Shortage? Yeah, right. I am going to write the First Lady. I am told her husband loves nurses. Maybe he will give me a job.[/QUOTE

Just so I understand, is the first LTC holding it against you because you don't have their actual state license, but have a compact license and they're a compact state? Is this something that they can do in a time like this? Or does the person that you spoke to just lack understanding in terms of compact licensure?

Nope, but you can bet your bottom dollar that they're lobbying their congresspeople to allow them import nurses because they have such a hard time finding the experienced nurses that they need.

Well, if that's the concern then they need to consider a graduated pay structure or vacation allowance that encourages people to stay until whatever time the hospital considers that they've attained their return on training investment.