Getting Your First Job - RESUME BUILDERS

I've been in nursing leadership positions for many years and a member of allnurses for many years. I have seen students and new grads ask similar questions for many years. Here is the best advice I can give:

1. Having some experience in health care can give you some advantage -- but it's not worth it if it is going to interfer with your school work. Having a strong record as a student and participating in school activities etc. shows that you are focused on learning how to be a good nurse instead of "sliding by" because you are too busy with your home life, social life, and job to give your nursing education much time and attention.

2. Quality is usually more important than quantity on a resume. Employers are usually looking to hire a high-quality person who is able to committ to them and who can be depended upon to do high-quality work. I am much more impressed by a short resume that shows a high level of achievement, the ability to make a committment, and leadership potential -- than I am with a long resume full of superficial involvement in a wide variety of things.

3. Work experience, volunteer activities, etc. are much more helpful when they are closely related to the type of work you are applying for. For example, I work for a children's hospital. When we see the resume of someone who has a lot experience in health care totally unrelated to the care of children, it makes us wonder a little if they really have an interest in peds or not: will they leave us to go back to working with adults? When we see a history of experience working with children (even if it is not in health care), that suggests a long-term interest in children and that the applicant probably has realistic expectations of what working with children is actually like.

I'm not suggesting that anyone omit previous experience from a resume. Any type of experience (work, volunteer, school, etc.) can provide valuable learning experiences. The important thing is to be aware of what you learn from each experience and be able to articulate that learning when you apply for a job. For example, being the manager or team leader of a business can be great experience as it teaches you to lead a team as well as meeting the needs of the customer. Having been given extra responsibilities at your previous jobs shows that your employer felt that you were reliable and mature enough to handle it. That says good things about you.

But I would not recommend ... padding your resume with a lot superficial involvement in activities from which you learn little and/or are unrelated to the type of work you want to do after graduation. If you choose to participate in an activity -- do it well ... perform a service you can be proud of ... learn a valuable lesson or skill ... etc. and be able to justify its inclusion on your resume.

Does that make sense?

llg