career questiosn

[allthesmallthings]

I am a new grad (6 months on my first job) and starting to look around at other job opportunities. 4 questions:

1) How do I look around for another job without attracting negative attention to myself at my current job? I'm not interested in leaving my current job for at least six months to eighteen months, but I do want to know what's out there, how responsive employers would be to me with at least one year of experience under my belt, how many interviews I could get, etc. When I first looked for a job, after graduation and before I got my license, I only got a couple of interested call-backs and one interview (in another state, the interview which ended up as the job I have now). I want to know how much better my options would be, applying with both my license and a year of experience. However, how do I look around and put in inquiries/applications to check how the fish are biting, without my current job finding out? When I do eventually transfer jobs, I don't want to be without a job while I look for a new one, but I don't know what the protocol/penalties are for looking for a new job while still on the old one.

2) What's the feeling towards nurses who switch jobs within the hospital, or within the hospital system? I work in a hospital system consisting of about four different hospital locations. When I interviewed for the job, the supervisor said that her reservation about hiring me was that I might stay a year, then get lonely for my old home in Georgia and leave. I'm not sure that I want to go back to Georgia yet, or at least not for a year and a half (I get a financial bonus if I stay on the job two years); but if I switch jobs within the hospital, or to another hospital within the system, is it still viewed the same way as if I had just abandoned ship? Not to sound codependent, but I know that job turnover is inconvenient for managers, and that one way to get ahead in your career is not to tick off management, or at least to be able to see things from management's perspective.

3) Do nurses get annual raises? I'm looking into retirement funds, and sites keep talking about how annual raises increase your salary. Do these raises apply to the nursing industry, too? After, say, ten years or so, will I top-out my salary based on years experience, or will it continue to grow up until retirement?

4) Certification: what is it?? How, and how much, does it affect your salary? Is it worth getting for the financial aspects? Is it worth getting just for the educational aspects, to keep myself in school mode? How long does it take? Can I do the learning online? Can I do the test online? Does it really make you feel more knowledgeable, confident? Does it really impress employers/potential employers when put on your resume? Should I get certified in more than one specialty?

Responses appreciated! It's still hard to believe I'm "out there" in the "real world," with an actual career!

[aura_of_laura]

1) Don't do your job-searching at work. Don't tell your coworkers about it. The penalty for discussing your search is losing the trust of your manager and coworkers - it makes you seem less invested in the hospital and the unit, like you're just biding your time until something better comes along. We're ALL just biding out time 'til something better comes along, of course, but you can't just say that. It's bad for morale and unit cohesion.

2) Some hospitals require your current nurse manager to release you from your current unit before you can transfer internally. If you work on a chronically short-staffed unit and are a good employee, it can be tough to transfer internally. If you move to another unit now, your time with the company still goes back to your date of hire.

3) Depends on your place of employment. Many hospitals in my city have been "frozen," which means that while your employment offer may say 3% + per year, they may not be paying out for an indefinite period of time.

4) Certifications are great. They look good on your resume, and can give you a salary boost (sometimes). However, you usually have to have two years experience in the field of certification - this makes it time consuming to be certified in multiple fields. There are many study groups for different certifications, you can find out more through relevant professional organization local chapters. You have to re-test every so often, too. The tests are usually a few hundred dollars - sometimes employers will cover it if you pass, sometimes it's out of your own pocket.

[MissIt]

I switched jobs within a hospital (med onc floor to radiation oncology clinic). In our hospital, people seemed to switch around a lot! Noone was negative about it, in fact my old coworkers would come and check in on me from time to time and I felt good to know who I would call if a patient came down from the floor and needed something. I think some of it will depend on the culture of the place where you are working. I do agree with not talking too much about it to people at work, though. What if your nurse manager was thinking about you for some kind of special project or committee or something and then didn't pick you because they knew you wanted to leave?

Many certifications take a couple of years of full time employment to be eligible. You can look up the eligibility requirements online.

[llg, PhD, RN]

The link below takes you to the American Nurse's Credentialling Center. Follow the links on that home page to learn more about their certifications (eligibility, etc.) They are not the only organization to offer specialty certifications, but they are one of the major organizations that does so. Several specialty organizations offer certifications in their specialty that are similar to the certifications offered by the ANA. The major organizations work together on this so that their standards and procedures are similar.

http://www.nursecredentialing.org/default.aspx

[KateRN1]

1. I wouldn't bother trying to look around now, the job market is ever-changing and what you find now may not be available in six months or a year (or even next week). Wait until you're ready to leave before you begin actively searching. If you're interested in moving to a different area of your current hospital, it doesn't hurt to make friends with nurses who work in different areas so you can get some first-hand information on how those areas function.

2. Depends on your hospital system and your manager. Some managers will lie through their teeth to keep a good employee on their floor. I know a manager who told another manager that an employee was lazy and had a bad attitude, just because she didn't want the other manager to want her great nurse.

3. Annual raises again depend on your facility. Some places have a freeze in effect, others it's a percentage of your current wage, like 3% or so depending on performance. Every hospital I've ever worked at had a ceiling for wages, so it's possible to go as high as you can go and never see another raise, although that generally happens later in your career, around the 15-20 year mark. Save now for retirement when you have no obligations other than yourself.

4. Certifications are great, they are used to show that you are expecially knowledgable in a particular area, like med-surg, oncology, etc. You will have to meet the minimum practice and education requirements for the particular cert you're interested in, most are a minimum of 2 years full time experience. See the link above for more information on the types of certs availab.e.