Fired from my first RN job after only 2 weeks.

[Mountainrnbsn]

I am a new grad who graduated this summer with my BSN. I was let go from my first nursing job only after 2 weeks. I graduated with honors and had my capstone in a busy Emergency Department. I started my first nursing job on a busy orthopedic floor at a trauma 1 center. It wasn't what I was passionate about but wanted to give it my all. My real passion is ED, but I knew that I needed to get ICU experience before I get to the ED. The orthopedic floor would help me get my foot in the door for a trauma 1 ICU. I was hired along with 5 other new grads. Are orientation was only 5 weeks long but the director told us that if we needed longer that it would be okay. All other new grad started out with taking care of one patient at a time while my preceptor gave me 5 my first day. I found it difficult to find a routine and I was penalized for even asking questions or not knowing the answer to question. One of nurses on the floor noticed that I was being criticized more than the other new grads and that I should request another preceptor. Director told me it wasn't possible and the next thing I know the education department is following me around. They suggested that I spend another week on days, (I was hired on nights) and that I go down to two patients. I agreed, thinking it well help me develop a routine so I can provide safe care for my patients. The whole orthopedic unit moved from 20 bed unit to a 40 bed unit and nurses were taking on 8 patients at a time. They pulled me into the office last week and gave me some recommendation which I truly took to heart and made myself a whole new brain sheet and even came in an hour early to prep for the day with permission from the director. Yesterday they pulled me into the office and said that I have two choices, either I was going to be terminated or I could send her my letter of my resignation. The director told me that didn't have time to teach new grads how to real nurses and that I would never make it any hospital. She said I would be better off in longterm care where there is less critical thinking. She said I shouldn't bother applying to new grad programs because I would fail at those too. I don't feel like 5 weeks of orientation is enough to provide safe care for patients especially for new grads. I don't want to believe her but I feel like a failure and wasted my time becoming a nurse. I really am passionate about being in the ED nurse one day. I was an EMT/firefighter for 6 years before I went to nursing school. I'm not sure where I should go from here. I also moved to the city for this job. Any advice would be appreciated.

[Yep, Me]

I can believe

[Yep, Me]

There's lots of places where the Charge or DON exercise "displacement". Seriously, thank your lucky stars, say a prayer, take a deep breath, & apply for somewhere that cares about their nurses. Do a "shadow" shift before making a decision. Don't tell _anyone_ you are just taking this job to get experience for another! We work as a team & it's hard to build a team when you know the players are just going to leave. We depend on each other so very much. Get in there & support the new team. Keep an eye out for an opening to another unit, if: 1. You know what the climate is there & 2. You have enough experience (2 years or more) so you feel comfortable in your own job. I've worked a lot of places: been floor & admin: I would never even hire someone who was "getting experience here before I go elsewhere". I want someone to get on our team. & who knows?: you may love your new team & never want to move out from there. Support of your team is a jewel that can never be undervalued.

[Been there,done that, ASN, RN]

"I was an EMT/firefighter for 6 years before I went to nursing school."

You have front line skills .. that management is too stupid to use. You landed in the wrong place.

It would be an honor to work with you. Move on and best wishes.

[RosesrReder, BSN, MSN, RN]

That sets off the biggest red flag, for me, as those types of conversations are rarely one-way. Someone who blabs to you about your preceptor will blab to your preceptor about you. When you move on to the next place, remember that you love your job and everyone you work with is exceptionally wonderful. Never speak a word otherwise.

This is the best advice ever.

[jodispamodi]

Sometimes getting fired is a wake up call for what needs to be worked on. So, first of all dont listen to your manager, thats purely her opinion and doesnt carry much weight. Think about where you may have struggled in your last position, time management, assessment, meds, etc and work on a game plan to help you get in sync in a new job, work out a way to be organized and stay organized, do it the same way every time. Being organized helps your time management which gives you more time for assessing and critical thinking. You cannot critically think if you are overwhelmed. Best of luck.

[TriathleteRN]

Your views certainly seem to have changed from last November when you were concerned about a 6 week orientation being enough for an experienced nurse in a new specialty. Did you end up taking this job?

Thank you so much for calling out those that are so superior to others and must let us all know how wonderful they are. Wanderlust, maybe you shouldn't be so quick to judge. I hope you are never offered a preceptor position because most new grads would just never return to work after having to work a shift with you. I've had the misfortune to work with such managers the "do as I say, not as do type." They never have any management skills or ability to teach, and if those under them don't quit, they usually go outta their way to sabotage the leader.

[Briiroma1]

from what you are explaining it sounds pretty much ridiculous what they did. when I worked in the ED at a level 3 trauma, the new grads or if the nurses were precept. would NEVER speak bad about the girls/guys they had and only gave them one to three beds at a time, that is until they got the hang of it and the charge nurse/precept. thought they were okay with adding more. count that as a blessing that you are out of there, clearly management is stressed and cant even control what they are doing and CLEARLY think its okay that people are talking about others. 8 beds is outrageous especially on a ortho floor (I work in an ortho office with head surgeons) we had that discussion about nurses to 7beds being ridiculous but 8, no I wouldn't be able to do it.

once you are on your own, bullying (that I found) was fair game and that's why I left. I believe in karma. I just couldn't be involved, even as a tech. we all got it.

again count your blessings and look elsewhere. you have the whole world to see. if you have to, travel. :)

think of it as "one door closes, another opens" and normally that door that opens is one of the best. it keeps getting better.

[Semper_Gumby]

I only had 2 weeks of training as a new grad. I think new grads are spoiled nowadays with such legnthy orientations and want their hand held and caudling the entire time. I know I sound mean, but I repeatedly see new grads like you, where your not prepared by the end of orientation, need to extend orientation etc. etc. Nursing is hard, especially acute care, some people just don't cut it. Some new grads don't ever catch on and are so slow about eveything, not just slow with tasks, but slow comprehending and prioririzing and want to take the long methodical way to do everything-ot look like a deer in the head lights when you explain the simplest things. That's great if you have 1 patient, but it will never work on a busy unit. You're not a nursing student anymore!!

And I don't believe you had 5 patients on your first day! Maybe the nurse had you take report on them and you helped, but no way she had you do all the assessments, med administration and care under her license without at least seeing you do an assessment first.

You had two weeks of orientation as a new grad? Well, I had two shifts more than you and you know what?

It wasn't enough.

Two weeks is nowhere near enough time for a new graduate nurse to both learn their new job and specialty, practice critical thinking, hone assessment and time management skills, etc. while putting all these pieces together, especially in a specialty area. I was in newborn nursery, which has generally pretty stable patients, but again, it was not enough time. It was, in fact, dangerous. I was terrified before coming in for every shift because I recognized just how much I didn't know and I was scared a baby might have a less than optimal outcome due to my lack of experience and knowledge.

I didn't want to be "coddled." I just wanted to be prepared. If you were not in a constant state of anxiety and worry that what you didn't know in those early days could potentially lead to patient harm, I wonder about your level of self-awareness. There's no new nurse scarier than one who thinks she knows it all (and one was hired a few months after me and had us all worried there for a while till she realized she didn't know it all). In sum, you were not a safe nurse when you started practicing and your facility was putting patients at risk. Oh, and as for your questioning the OP's experience? Believe it or not, there's still facilities that will chew up and spit out nurses. Sounds like yours was one of them.

OP, my second nursing job oriented me for a month and a half (twelve preceptors in this time), led me to believe all was going well, and then pulled me into the office to blindside me with unkind remarks about my assessment and critical thinking skills. They made a show of giving me time to correct my mistakes, but in reality it was less than a shift's worth of time before they terminated me. It was humiliating and hurtful but I picked myself up, relocated and found another job for which I'm much better suited. I spent some time analyzing the whole experience and what I could have done differently and I feel I came in much better prepared for my current position (in a hospital twice the size of the previous one, which was already quite large). I also learned some valuable lessons about human nature which I will carry for the rest of my career.

Spend some time in thought about all that happened and what you could have done differently but absolutely do not take the remarks of your management to heart. Those comments were vicious and uncalled for. Yes, the transition from student to nurse can be a challenge but the fact that she is not interested in investing in her staff is probably part of the reason she can't keep them (that's part of why my first job had such intense turnover that the majority of us had less than five years' experience). Shake it off and move on to better and brighter things. You can and will make this transition successfully; don't let the cruel remarks shake your confidence and cause you to doubt yourself. You're intelligent and capable. You've got this.

[Road2CNO]

"I'm sorry for your experience. While I suppose it's possible it happened exactly as you describe, I suspect that if we spoke to your preceptor, your manager, and the education department, we may hear a very different story. And somewhere in the middle lies the truth."

What an AWFUL thing to say!! I'm sorry but nurses do tend to "eat their young" for some unknown reason. Orientation is meant to ease you into the job, shadowing, then taking 1 patient adding as you go along until you are taking on a whole team with basically a resource person. I'm not sure how they could let you go in only 2 weeks as a new grad, that's hardly enough time to judge whether someone is going to cut it or not. Yes, there may be more to the story, but I'm pretty sure you came here for support and guidance, not ridicule. Look for jobs and highlight your experience with your capstone, you will find where you are meant to be. We don't always end up where we think we are meant to be, sometimes we find our passion elsewhere.

[pmabraham, BSN, RN]

Good day, Mountainrnbsn:

A number of new grads in our geographic area where hired straight to the ED, ICU, NICU, etc. Orientation in our area varies, but most hospitals in the area do anywhere from six to eight weeks. I started out with 1 patient day shift on orientation and worked up towards five.

Don't loose heart.

Thank you.

[Been there,done that, ASN, RN]

No need to panic. I was fired from a job after 2 weeks. .. because I did not smile enough. I left that BS off of my resume. I now work from home.. making 6 figures. You are going to be okay.

[PennyLane90]

Wow, really tough break. I 'm not surprised though. Schools, especially bsn programs, don't prepare gns for the real world. Like you I wanted to specialize in a particular field, my case L&D. I started in postpartum. On my first day my preceptor told me to "Forget what you learned in school. You need to learn the hospital's way. All the time I agonized about writing perfect care plans and nursing dx seemed a huge waste of time. All I needed to know was the appropriate preprinted care plan and dc plan to include in my charting. Now anyone who's worked postpartum knows everything moves very fast with adms and dcs happening throughout the shift. You have seven moms and seven babies, 14 pts total, and even if babies are with their moms, you're still responsible for them. Even though you're new, you're expected to keep up. No excuses. I'm including a link to an article I think applies to your situation. Bullying in Nursing: Why Nurses 'Eat their Young' and What to Do About It It's an unfair but common problem.

When I became a preceptor, I would meet with my manager every wk to update the progress on our gns. One of the biggest issues was how unprepared they were to work on a busy unit. A lot of our more experienced nurses didn't have much patience, because being short staffed, and what seems like endless adms, dcs. ect, they expected instant help. You want to be able to give the care you were taught and spend time, but it's not possible on high volume units.

I advise to work on a med/surg or internal med unit. Stay for at least a yr. It's not glamorous but you'll learn so much. If you're feeling overwhelmed, lost, speak up before you're to far behind. If you have a free moment, watch other nurses do procedures you're not comfortable doing. Learn the hoptial and unit's way of doing things. ASK questions. Hope this helped a little. Good Luck👍