Need help with my RN resume- little experience outside of clinical

MaxAttack, BSN, RN · Dec 16, 2009

I'm honestly not sure if serving would help you or not, but my suggestion:

You would really want to expand more on your experience, especially since this is an area that you want to draw attention to due to your lack of experience as a nurse. It's very vague as is; "Olive Garden" - A potential employer won't know if you were a server or a dishwasher. List your job title followed by what you did, skills and achievements. You want it to seem like that job gave you experience that would be valuable to a potential employer.

Here's something I pulled off Yahoo Answers (with a little modification):

High End Food and Beverage - Waiter - Focused on unique customer experience and retention and sustaining a positive drive to ensure management objectives are met and exceeded
Skillsets further developed- Rapidly assimilating information, anticipating customer concerns, maintaining a safe and hygienic working environment, extensive development of customer relations and interface communications, dispute resolution, and financial management all in a high-paced and high-stress environment

Either way, it wouldn't hurt. I'd put it in. I'm sure you can find a hundred examples on Google if you need them. Good luck!!

ok2bme · Dec 16, 2009

psh..little experience outside of clinical? your internship mentoring teenagers and your missionary experience in india is very impressive and relevant! and where are the details about the nursery you worked? i think you should focus on those three things and remove starbucks and olive garden from your resume altogether. best wishes! you have unique qualifications so have confidence!

Jules A, MSN · Dec 17, 2009

I agree that you should add specifics about your time with Olive Garden and Starbucks. For a new grad I think your resume is awesome, I'd hire you in a minute. Best of luck.

caliotter3 · Dec 17, 2009

I have read on resume advice columns that you should remove the comment about references and the objective. Employers know that your objective is an RN job. Make certain that you change that sentence if you decide to apply for positions that are not in peds or L&D.

CloudySue · Dec 17, 2009

I waited tables for longer than I care to admit. However, I think it was the best training I could have had for keeping up with the the rapid pace and split-second prioritizing skills and decision-making that day-to-day nursing requires. Immediately after I began nursing, I felt like I was back to my waitressing days. I use a lot of the same parts of my brain. It feels like old times, really! Just recently, I described to a friend that nursing could be considered "Extreme Waitressing". Instead of losing tips for poor performance, you lose people. So include your restaurant experience, and especially those skills learned that MaxAttack suggested! (BTW, the "wow" factor for any volunteer experience in a third world nation is probably worth YEARS of regular experience on a dime-a-dozen resume.)

jjjoy, LPN · Dec 17, 2009

Honestly, if you worked busy shifts, I think server experience could be considered a positive thing. It involves dealing with non-stop competing demands in an ever-changing environment. It involves being on your feet and thinking on your feet for hours on end. It involves interacting professionally with people of all types and often getting the brunt of customer disatisfaction even if there's nothing you can do about it. All those skills can benefit a nurse.

You might want to consider adding a few descriptions of your server work... not to explain what the job is, we all know that, but what transferable skills and experience that job provided you with... such as handling up to 6 tables of 6 during dinner rush (multi-tasking) or showing new servers the ropes (training) or ensuring that all items are up to standard before serving them (quality control). That last one sounds kind of dumb, but being conscious that server responsibility isn't just mindlessly delivering food to a table suggests that you recognize that nursing isn't just mindlessly following orders.

Your inspiring past volunteer/community service shows a long-time interest & motivation in working to meet people's needs and certainly should be included, but they were several years ago and short-term experiences. Perhaps that's why I don't think you should just brush over your more recent work experience.

Regardless of what you do with your resume, have confidence that your previous experience is worthwhile and not something to try to brush under the rug as irrelevant or trivial.

86toronado, BSN, RN · Dec 18, 2009

I think if you don't have medical experience to put on your resume, foodservice is probably the next best thing. If presented in the right light, it can be used to show many different qualities that hiring managers look for in an RN:

1- The ability to multitask

2- Prioritizing

3- The ability to deal with multiple distractions, and still et your work done

4-Time management

5- Customer service

I worked in foodservice for ten years before coming to healthcare, and I honestly believe that experience is the reason why I haven't experienced any of the new grad stress that my fellow graduates did. I've worked in way more stressful, demanding positions than this.

So yes, include your experience, talk about it in your interviews, flaunt it!

njgrl622 · Feb 10, 2012

I know this is an older thread....BUT you've just helped me sooo much with my resume! After working in a restaurant for the last 10 years, while raising my kids, I was unsure HOW to put that experience on my resume so it would apply to nursing!

Thanks again!!:)