Resignation from a job

Nurses General Nursing

Published

Currently I work for a children's hospital in a offsite location. I work Prn and I float to different locations. I have been with this department almost 5 years and it was basically my first nursing job (I worked LTC 7mo before this job). I am trying to transfer into the main hospital but I know that sometimes it can take awhile to get in. I also do more community type nursing instead of clinical nursing so I know that will be against me. Since I am prn I do not want to quit since my ultimate goal is to work in that hospital. However I have been applying to other hospitals in the area for a part time position I could do while waiting to transfer and will allow me to gain more clinic experience. My dilemma is that I don't want to be one of those people that quit mid orientation, or right after. So I'm wondering everyone's thoughts? Am I a horrible person to try to get a job I know I don't intend to keep? I feel like I should not tell the hiring manager that I don't plan to stay but that feels wrong to me. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Swellz

746 Posts

Specializes in oncology, MS/tele/stepdown.

Did you only just start trying to transfer? If so, I would wait awhile and see if you can get in at the children's hospital. If not or you want to make this transition now, I'd commit to another hospital and stay on at the children's clinic PRN. If they didn't have to train you I'd feel another way about it, but you're changing specialties here, so my thought is that if they are committing to you (via an orientation), you should commit to them.

Davey Do

10,476 Posts

Specializes in Psych (25 years), Medical (15 years).
My dilemma is that I don't want to be one of those people that quit mid orientation, or right after.

Your sense of integrity is admirable, PS.

I say do what you need to earn an income and work toward being in a place where you know you'll want to stay.

My history speaks for itself. I've worked in places for as short as 8 weeks and I've been in my present position for nearly 16 years.

You gotta do what you gotta do to get by.

Good luck and welcome to AN.com, PS!

KelRN215, BSN, RN

1 Article; 7,349 Posts

Specializes in Pedi.

You should most definitely NOT tell the hiring manager you don't intend to stay. If you were a hiring manager, would you hire someone who came to an interview and said "I only want to work here so I can get hospital experience which will help me get an inpatient position at the Children's Hospital?" No, you wouldn't.

I also don't think it's a great idea to apply to a job that you think you may leave during orientation or shortly thereafter. It won't help you if you do that and could end up getting you blacklisted from that hospital/hospital system. Most hospitals expect to get a return on their investment after they train you. If the transfer to the main hospital is already in progress, I'd wait.

PS1234

2 Posts

Thanks for replying! I'm just curious if anyone knows anything I can do to gain more experience besides reviewing my notes and stuff that wouldn't involve me committing to an additional job. I'm just worried that HR will see that yes I have experience but almost none of it is in inpatient. Maybe I'm overthinking it a little. Thanks again

KelRN215, BSN, RN

1 Article; 7,349 Posts

Specializes in Pedi.
Thanks for replying! I'm just curious if anyone knows anything I can do to gain more experience besides reviewing my notes and stuff that wouldn't involve me committing to an additional job. I'm just worried that HR will see that yes I have experience but almost none of it is in inpatient. Maybe I'm overthinking it a little. Thanks again

You're still an internal applicant. Keep your eyes open for random opportunities. When I worked in the hospital, it seems like at any given time 5 nurses were pregnant and their maternity leaves always ended up overlapping. More than once when that happened, the floor put out a bulletin to internal nurses to see if anyone wanted to work on our floor to cover these maternity leaves if their department would allow it. One of my colleagues who'd worked for the hospital's community health clinic came over this way and ended up staying for several years before going back to a normal schedule position.

llg, PhD, RN

13,469 Posts

Specializes in Nursing Professional Development.

I also work for a children's hospital that has "outlying facilities" that do outpatient care, etc. In that sense, it sounds similar to your employer. Our main hospital inpatient units rarely hire staff from even our own outpatient facilities unless they also have previous inpatient experience. Inpatient experience is inpatient experience -- and if you don't have it, it doesn't matter much if you have outpatient peds experience.

Talk to the hospital's Nurse Recruiter and confirm that your chances of getting hired into an inpatient unit are slim before deciding ... but if what you (and I) suspect is true -- that your chances are slim without some inpatient experience -- then commit yourself to getting that experience somewhere else. Take what you can get and stop seeking a job at the main hospital for a while. Once you have some inpatient experience, then start looking at the peds hospital again with your now-strengthened resume.

Don't tell the Nurse Manager of the adult hospital that you don't intend to stay. But commit to staying there long enough to not feel guilty or slimey about it. That's the price you will probably have to pay for changing specialties (from outpatient to inpatient.)

JKL33

6,777 Posts

If you do actually confirm that your company wouldn't consider you a viable candidate without inpatient experience, I would seek that type of experience elsewhere - - and TBH I'm pretty sure that the other company's willingness to give me a chance would affect my opinions about where I do and don't need to work, especially if big hospital is hiring new grads while declining to invest in a current employee. $.02

I also work for a children's hospital that has "outlying facilities" that do outpatient care, etc. In that sense, it sounds similar to your employer. Our main hospital inpatient units rarely hire staff from even our own outpatient facilities unless they also have previous inpatient experience. Inpatient experience is inpatient experience -- and if you don't have it, it doesn't matter much if you have outpatient peds experience.

Talk to the hospital's Nurse Recruiter and confirm that your chances of getting hired into an inpatient unit are slim before deciding ... but if what you (and I) suspect is true -- that your chances are slim without some inpatient experience -- then commit yourself to getting that experience somewhere else. Take what you can get and stop seeking a job at the main hospital for a while. Once you have some inpatient experience, then start looking at the peds hospital again with your now-strengthened resume.

Don't tell the Nurse Manager of the adult hospital that you don't intend to stay. But commit to staying there long enough to not feel guilty or slimey about it. That's the price you will probably have to pay for changing specialties (from outpatient to inpatient.)

From my experience I beg to differ. I worked only outpatient but applied to the hospital's ICU as an internal transfer and got the job. A couple of the ICU staff worked with me outpatient as per diem staff and told me to go for it.

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