Traveling with less than 2 years

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Has anyone here traveled with less than 2 years RN experience? What is it like? Are you able

to find jobs? I have 16 months experience and spoke to a recruiter who basically said I wouldn't have a problem finding jobs. My experiences are in telemetry, IMC, and cardioThoracic (it's 1 big unit). I'm aware most hospitals prefer to hire nurses with 2+ years, but is it possible for someone to work with only 16 months of experience.

Specializes in Hematology/Oncology.
Has anyone here traveled with less than 2 years RN experience? What is it like? Are you able

to find jobs? I have 16 months experience and spoke to a recruiter who basically said I wouldn't have a problem finding jobs. My experiences are in telemetry, IMC, and cardioThoracic (it's 1 big unit). I'm aware most hospitals prefer to hire nurses with 2+ years, but is it possible for someone to work with only 16 months of experience.

I got a job at 1 year with stanford for travel. Iowa would have taken me but they needed an earlier start date. My buddy has 1 year with Tele experience and got a job at a conversion.

Do you care where you go or do you plan on shotgunning your resume?

It is certainly possible to travel with less experience, but why do that to yourself? No learning curve left where you are?

Also, when you stop traveling, what will you have to show that you are not going to quickly bail on a permanent job? That is especially pertinent if you want to switch specialties and/or work at a popular hospital.

WhAt does "at a conversion" mean? I do have a résumé, but I don't know what shotgunning means, sorry lol. I have a few place in Texas that I have in mind. Another question, did your buddy have trouble finding assignment after his first (since he still didn't have 2 years of total experience, I'm assuming). Sorry if I'm not making any sense. Thank you for your reply.

Ned those things have crossed my mind and to be honest, I'm not sure. I'm asking because my partner is taking a job that requires us to move every few months. A permanent position would be a little hard to maintain. This is my second hospital since graduation, my first job, I stayed a year, my current one I have 6 months. I've seen your posts on AN and know you have quite a bit of knowledge about traveling. Anything pointers would help. Thank you.

WhAt does "at a conversion" mean? I do have a résumé, but I don't know what shotgunning means, sorry lol.

Forums are very cool places to learn about new topics. For best results, it is best to lurk for a while and read a lot of threads. Many questions will be answered before you even know you have a focused question. Every topic, profession, and specialty has slang or lingo that is best learned in context. In this case, "conversion" would be clear if you had read a few more threads. There are tons of reasons why hospitals need travelers and recently one of them have been support needed to change staff over from one brand of clinical software (often Meditech) to another brand of software such as Epic. Or "conversion" for concise communication between travelers (and agencies).

"Shotgunning a resume" is a colorful turn of phrase that I've never heard before but it is pretty clear in context. I'll give you a hint: Shotguns are often called "scatterguns". Get it?

Ned those things have crossed my mind and to be honest, I'm not sure. I'm asking because my partner is taking a job that requires us to move every few months. A permanent position would be a little hard to maintain. This is my second hospital since graduation, my first job, I stayed a year, my current one I have 6 months. I've seen your posts on AN and know you have quite a bit of knowledge about traveling. Anything pointers would help. Thank you.

The "why" a question is asked is often more important than the simplest answer. For best results on forums, some background on why a question is asked saves everyone a lot of time and energy. If not supplied, the ensuing conversation can get contentious as everyone is not on the same page. This particular question is asked weekly, and usually because the asker wants the exciting life of a traveler as soon as possible, and usually it is ill advised to start too soon even when possible.

In your case, you really have to move often. The word "move" is an important one. If your partner is switching jobs every few months, he is moving. If he is taking temporary contracts away from a permanent home, he is not moving. The difference is very important for a travel nurse. If he is moving, your travel assignment is actually to your new home and is not travel for business. No tax breaks on housing, or M&IE. All your earnings will be taxable.

So there is little advantage to being a traveler if this is the case. Staff pay and benefits are usually better when you consider sick pay, holidays, vacations, retirement, education, scheduling, and health insurance. So you may do better taking staff positions if they will have you and I think they will despite your record. The benefit of travel assignments are that you have a built in excuse for frequent job changes.

I would suggest you explore both possibilities with each move. The reason is that one of the reasons for hospitals to need travelers is short term needs such as pregnancy or "conversions" and they will not seek out a staff nurse replacement. So if you only look at perm jobs, you may miss such opportunities.

A third possibility that may combine the best of both in some localities is local agency per diem shifts, especially if you already have your own health insurance. The ultimate in flexibility. Similar to staff jobs, you can utilize the full period during which your partner will be in a location. A travel job may lose a month or two at each end.

Good luck!

We do have a taxed home, when I said move, I didn't mean completely (sell our house, sell our belongings). It's more of like "hey this store is opening and you have to help get it running for a few months." Type of business. In any case, I'm not worried about the stipend and pay (at least not on my first assignment). What I'm more concerned about is actually getting the job, despite being shy of 2 full years of nursing experience. How likely is it that a manager would hire a travel nurse with minimal.

I started last year with 1.5 years under my belt. I did not have strong MS experience and find it is a struggle for me even on night shift and is more stressful than it should be so I may get out after this contract and get some more experience under my belt first. It's possible, just depends how much you're willing to wing it.

Well, you've been hired twice now with less experience. An agency told you it wouldn't be a problem. What else are you looking for here? The only way to find out if a particular manager will hire you is to apply. Of course you will not be competitive if the manager has profiles with more experience to choose from. So you likely won't get the more desirable assignments. But you will find work. There are more job orders than travelers.

We do have a taxed home, when I said move, I didn't mean completely (sell our house, sell our belongings). It's more of like "hey this store is opening and you have to help get it running for a few months." Type of business. In any case, I'm not worried about the stipend and pay (at least not on my first assignment). What I'm more concerned about is actually getting the job, despite being shy of 2 full years of nursing experience. How likely is it that a manager would hire a travel nurse with minimal.

I didn't even have 18 months of experience when i got hired for my assignment. It honestly took about 3 days to get a job and this is with no travel experience and not even 2 years of experience as an RN. Personally, I don't think that had I stayed at my old job for an additional 6 months that it would've made much difference at all and I'm glad I took the plunge when I did. Why?

1. I get to see how another hospital and management does things.

2. I had already begun to plateau at my old job and didn't know what I didn't know and WOULDN'T have known because I was already considered a "senior" on my unit, charge nurse level, precepting, etc. There was no one there often to teach me new things and I was already teaching others.

3. Because YOLO. lol Honestly, I needed to take that risk so that I could come to the realization of what I wanted to do and staying at my old job would've just limited by perception of nursing.

For me, the hardest part is the patient load and the turn over rate of patients. I get to see first hand what nurses talk about when they mention HCA facilities. But honestly, even if I had 2 full years, I would've hated it. 6 patients with 4 discharges and 2-3 more admissions on a busy day shift with management, social work, meetings, huddle, family, phone calls, noise noise noise wouldn't work for me anywhere. Ever! And the patient population is MUCH nicer here than what I'm use to at my inner city level 1 teaching hospital home base. But I wouldn't have known that if I didn't travel.

But, I think if you're flexible, open to learning, ask questions, willing to take a little slack, acknowledge that you don't know everything and sell yourself well in your interview you'll be fine.

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I echo with that of Soliloquy. I am amidst my first contract in TX, with 13m prior experience. I know when to ask questions and how to walk with confidence. I learned quickly my key contact persons and resources available.

Thank you all for your input!

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