Discouraged new CNA in philly

Yourapple82 · Feb 5, 2012

I live in FL and it's not hard to get a CNA job in a LTC facility. However, the hospitals are somewhat different depending on where you are. I work for ORHS, they use CNA's but they want experience. When I first moved to FL all I had was nursing home experience and ORHS wouldn't touch me. After months I was hired by FL Hospital who trained me and after one year ORHS extended the offer :-) Keep Trying, if anything you may have to go with a nursing agency who will be able to get you working. Agency work will also give you the opportunity to figure out what you like as well give you some experience to put on your resume. The need for nurses increases every year and there are nursing jobs no matter where you go! Keep trying! I left the hospital to do office work and with my 5 years experience it took me over 6 months to get back into the hospital this year! Anything worth having takes time!

student forever · Feb 7, 2012

What is ORHS?

nguyency77, CNA · Feb 7, 2012

Keep trying! I applied to a lot of major hospitals and some assisted living places, but I really think a lot of them were put off by my age, and probably by my physical size (they probably had doubts about my lifting ability because I'm pretty small, etc).

Before you keep trying though, look back and try to find the common thread: why are these places rejecting you? Lack of experience? Did they think you were too pushy? Maybe there were typo's on your resume. It really could be anything.

I looked for almost 2 months after I finished school and finally landed in skilled nursing, which is pretty much a short-term rehab unit at my facility. The pay is pretty good, considering my lack of experience. I was offered an interview as soon as I told them I was looking for work. I've been there 4 months now.

CNA1991, CNA · Feb 8, 2012

You face a problem that most CNAs face when first getting out of school, finding their first Job. I remember, it took me three months to find a job and I was one of the last people to find a job in my class. I remember, I was working at Walmart for a time after I graduated and looking for my first job and then I ran into one of my classmates and I was so embarrased that I haven't found a job. I eventually found a great job in a place I would have never expected and I have a couple of pieces of advice for you that could land you your first job and I will also tell you how I got my first job:

First off, Hospitals are not really good places to start off when applying. I am not saying rule them out completely, it's just much harder to find a job in a hospital with no experience AND in a big city. Rural areas and small facilities are more open to hiring new CNAs but it's still rare, yes, it happens sometimes but those people use have "Ins" or are in low population areas. When I first started applying to jobs when I was a new CNA, I pretty much only applied to LTC facilities (hospitals in my area NEVER hire new grads of any type, so I didn't even bother) and pretty much sent my resume to every place in my city and didn't recieve a single call back. I didn't know at the time that hospitals and LTC facilities weren't the only places a CNA could work until I met a woman who told me about the home health company I work for now. A good amount of people don't know about in-home health care and I never expected to be working in home health care but that's what happened to come my way.

My second piece of advice is market yourself. Remember that women I mentioned earlier who ended up leading me to the job I had now? Guess where I met her: Walmart. I was discouraged when everyone seemed to be getting jobs and I wasn't, so I started to tell people of my woes of having certification and not having a job. I would ask people in scrubs what they did on the off chance they might be able to help me out, hell, I would tell people not even in scrubs of my woes until someday, someone listined. I met a women who was a CNA and she reffered me to my job and I was hired two weeks later. I never thought that I would find a job the way I did but it worked. Someone who was in the field reccomended me and it made all the difference.

My third piece of advice is just keep trying! Take anything you can get! Pretty much everyone hates their first job in healthcare but they do it for the experience until they can find something better. look online, other cities, privitely, newspaper, anywhere you can think of! There could be positions you could have never known that a CNA could do. Yes, of coorifice everyone wants to work for hospitals (and yes, hospitals are aware of this) but don't limit your options because of what you want. Go for anything that will come your way first then you will have the experience to go from there. I love my job but even I would rather work in a hospital. You have to just spam out your application and follow up until something gives, don't limit yourself. Good luck!

Lovecats85 · Feb 9, 2012

It took me about 4months to get my first CNA job. It was not a nursing home but more of assisted living. I loved that job. Some were complete bed rest but the majority were up and about. I worked very hard and one of the nurses that worked there help me get a full time job in the hospital. So then I became a PCT. It is pretty much the same as CNA but we also put in orders, do blood draws and EKGS.

Don't give up or lose faith! I got my first call when I least expected it. I worked hard and my charge nurse seen that and help me get my hospital job. If you really want this then you will wait. Keep applying everywhere! I applied in person and online also. In the meantime keep applying and go to school so you can do nursing school. Please do not give up my friend. I promise they will call.

fuzzywuzzy, CNA · Feb 10, 2012

I think it just depends on how saturated your area is with CNAs, and there's also an element of chance. One day they might reject you because they just hired someone, and then a couple weeks later someone might quit, which you obviously don't know about, so you don't apply again but someone else happens to turn in an application that day and bam, they're hired. These places tend to get a lot of applications and I don't think they bother to look at most of the "older" ones. They just look at the most recent batch of apps that they haven't looked at yet, pull all of the ones that fit the shift and hours they're looking for, and call them.

I also think too many new CNAs get wrapped up in thinking that getting the job is all about dazzling the employer, and then they take it personally when they don't get hired. If you were applying for some high-ranking corporate job, your education and previous experience matter, and people WILL get picked over others based on that. But CNAs don't *make* money for the company; they *cost* money. And the person doing the hiring doesn't really care how awesome you are. You're getting upset because you're not getting hired even though your instructor said you're going to be good, but to the employer, it's just not that personal. Now, if you've NEVER EVER had a job before, they might ignore you, but if you've done cashiering or waitressing or something like that, it's as good as anything.

brinkofgreatness · Feb 11, 2012

Thanks you guys for the encouarging words & advice , over the past couple of days ive been applying & i actually ended up getting a interview , so ill tell you guys how that goes when its time. once again thanks everyone!

brinkofgreatness · Feb 11, 2012

i understand what your saying , but i believe i was getting upset cause i thought it would come easy , but everything in life doesnt come easy which i had to realize so now when i get the rejection emails and no phone calls back i just keep a positive attitude cause i know that one day something will come thru for me. i even realized that people with cna experience will always get picked before me but hopefully all my job experience will one day have the HR person say "hey he doesnt have healthcare experience but he has been working since he was young, lets give him a shot"