Employment Proposition...Would this change hurt my chances?

[UCDSICURN]

Afternoon all,

I just wanted to present to the forum an employment proposition that has been presented to me. Currently, I work in a level 1 trauma center, university hospital, in the vascular/trauma sicu. It's an extremely busy unit and has a great reputation within the hospital. I've been there for nearly 2 years now. Prior to working there, I worked in a small community hospital's ICU which did get it's fair share of some very sick medical patients, mainly sepsis and medical cardiac. This same unit now wants me to come back as their charge nurse for the night shift which is extremely green to say the least. New ICU nurses with a mix of new graduates. This new position, should i accept it, would allow me to teach a lot of new graduates, assist the manager in policy and protocol development (to get them out of the stone age), and have the bonus of being in a leadership position within the unit and the hospital. It would also allow me to brush up on medically managed cardiac patients and would allow me to take the sub-cert for the CCRN (which i have).

Based on my goals of heading to CRNA school in the next 1.5 to 2 years do you all think this would hinder or help or not matter at all. I'm really looking for some guidance on this one as I don't want to shoot myself on the foot and ruin my chances for admission.

On a more personal note, i think i would like the new challenge of teaching the new graduates and helping advance this particular ICU's standards of care.

Any and all comments, suggestions, feedback, flames or whatever would be most appreciated.

D.C.

[gaspassah]

seems to me taking a leadership role within the unit is a plus as long as you are not removed from the direct patient care. i think any good leadership role says alot about you as a person.

d

[MaleAPRN]

Just wanted to put my 0.02 cents in...

I personally don't think that taking this new management position will hinder your acceptance into CRNA school. It depends on when you plan to apply to CRNA school of course. Now, it may affect your chances of getting in if let's say, you apply to CRNA school 6 months or so thereafter. It would then seem to the selection committee that you are "wishy washy" and don't know what you really want to be. If you plan to apply in say, 2 or so years down the road, then I don't think you'll be thought of as, "not really knowing what you want in your career."

Take me for example. I was (still am) an ER NP for 2 years and later decided to pursue a career as a CRNA (I'll be graduating next year). When I was interviewed, the first question that I was asked was, "You're already an advance practice nurse...why do you want to become a CRNA?" I simply told them in all honesty, that I wanted to do something different and more challenging, and that furthering my career as a CRNA will only add to my knowledge of taking care of acutely ill patients. And, by looking at my resume that they all had while they interviewed me, they also made comments on the many "hats" that I wore during my career as a nurse (i.e, department educator, charge nurse, ACLS instructor, acute care transport nurse, etc), and why I was doing so many things all at once. I made sure that I told them that diversifying my skills was my way of keeping up with the ever changing pace of acute care nursing. And that, I still kept my focus...towards taking care of acute care patients.

I'm not 100% sure if you won't be or will be accepted inspite of taking on a management role in your department. But, the timing of applying to CRNA school and when you take the job is crucial. If you take the job and apply to CRNA school in less than a year, you'd be making a bad impresion to your upper management folks (some will probably say, "oh, the heck with them, you don't owe them anything...do what's best for you") and you don't want to burn your bridges. And, you'll definitely look uncommitted to some of the folks that will interview you for CRNA school if you did apply (less than a year of taking on a new management job).

My advice is...if you are planning to apply to CRNA school sometime in the next few months or a year, then pass on the promotion. If you have at least 2 years before applying, then by all means go for it.

Goodluck on whatever you decide to do.

[ArkyCCRN]

I just wanted to give you something to consider as well.. if I were you I would talk to some of the schools I am interested in and see if taking the management position would lessen your chances of being accepted due to not EXACTLY delivering patient care (unless you will be taking patient's along with your charge nurse role). I would hate to see someone commit to something like this with a goal of becoming a CRNA and then have to work a year longer because their experience was too long ago or didn't fit the school's description of "one year critical care experience".