Resume for second career nurse

amoLucia · Dec 27, 2016

JMHO, but for a resume such as yours, you can't really omit your attorney background. However, to best detail your past without belaboring it you might want to seek out the services of a professional resume service. Pick one that you feel will best highlight your strong background.

I'm sure there are RN, JDs here in the AN community that might be able to help also.

Good luck in your new career future.

Enfermera101 · Dec 27, 2016

why do you want to become a nurse? Sounds like you had a successful law career?

Natalie513 · Dec 28, 2016

Many reasons! Essentially, I hate all tasks that I do for my job. I spend hours every day writing and researching, it's like spending your whole life doing homework. I don't want to sit at a desk all day anymore. The constant arguing is unbearable. As an attorney, you are never "off." Twenty four hours a day i am getting emails and having to be drawn back into work. You can't plan for anything, because people can file things that you have to respond to in 24 hours. Finally, I represent the little guy so it's not very high paying. Nurses where I live make more money than I do. I have kids and want a job where I can provide for my family and still be on a shift so I can work hard when I'm at work, and focus on my family when I'm off.

umbdude, MSN, APRN · Dec 28, 2016

Nursing is also a second career for me. I had pretty extensive experience in my previous career in financial services (started out as entry-level accountant and was a AVP with a top-tier investment firm before nursing school). I'm now graduating from a BSN program and I've eliminated a lot of things that are not relevant to nursing. I do have all the firms I worked for along with job titles on my resume. I also included my degrees (they will show up on background checks). But I did not put any job descriptions from my previous jobs. If the interviewer is interested, I would tell him/her.

tjmnurse · Dec 28, 2016

I used a resume service (Dragon Resume, maybe) for formatting, and I think they were running a deal where they would help with a cover letter too. I had degrees in Finance and worked in lending for almost 10 years before doing ABSN. Basically, I summed up my objective as being a grad nurse seeking an entry-level position or nurse residency. I did list areas of expertise such as budgeting, Microsoft Office Suite, Policy and Procedure development, time management, communication skills, etc. Then, I summed up educational experience by listing it as Bachelor's Degree in Finance, UTK, 2010, then Bachelor's in Nursing, 2016, etc. I listed where I did my clinicals because I got the opportunity to have clinical in 10 or more different units. At the very bottom, I put the jobs that I held and a brief description of what I did in those jobs at financial institutions. I tried to focus on aspects of those jobs that would help me in nursing so documentation skills, computer skills, communication, interaction with people, problem solving, research, etc. I was also a tutor at my nursing school so I listed that as well. Definitely list your previous experience and awards... just keep it short and sweet on the job description details, and play up skills that can be transferred to nursing.

LessValuableNinja · Jan 18, 2017

Many reasons! Essentially, I hate all tasks that I do for my job. I spend hours every day writing and researching, it's like spending your whole life doing homework. I don't want to sit at a desk all day anymore. The constant arguing is unbearable. As an attorney, you are never "off." Twenty four hours a day i am getting emails and having to be drawn back into work. You can't plan for anything, because people can file things that you have to respond to in 24 hours. Finally, I represent the little guy so it's not very high paying. Nurses where I live make more money than I do. I have kids and want a job where I can provide for my family and still be on a shift so I can work hard when I'm at work, and focus on my family when I'm off.

Nursing as an RN is my 4th career, though my first career was also medical. I had a similar reason for going to nursing as you, though my reasons were more based on the logistics of career aspects you listed, rather than financial.

I've thought about the questions you ask, and had many discussion son the subject with some recruiter friends, HR people I know, nurse managers, and so on. My final technique, I feel, did not hurt me at all in the job application process post-BSN. I received a request for interview for every job I applied for online prior to graduation, and (of course) for every job I networked towards. I ended up working where I wanted, right out of school, and had plenty of other options if I'd not gotten my first choice.

My recommendations:

1) Explain your career change. If applying for residencies/internships (which are desirable, if you haven't been educated on residencies/internships yet), you will often have an essay required or optional that gives you the opportunity to explain this. Several of mine had a question similar to, "Why did you choose nursing as a school, and why do you want to work here?" Or some version of it. If that is not an option, your cover letter is an appropriate place. Just in case they completely ignore your cover letter, it's worth a (variable recommendations based on who you talk to on length) 2-line objective that may in some clever or non-clever way indicate you really want to be there and incidentally used to do other things.

2) Once you have nursing or medical experience, list it first. It should be chronological. I've used "Nursing Experience" and "Patient Care Experience" as headings, depending on the position/what I'm putting in the resume. It's fine to list a nurse externship and/or clinical rotations for your first positions after school. In fact, some residencies required you to list every single clinical rotation, where done, and for how long. I tried to keep it brief, but also highlighted unique things about my program that gave me an edge in the interview selection process. Think about things that may give you an edge over other new graduate applicants that you did in school/clinically. There are different opinions on this, but your school things generally go away from your resume (or are severely shortened under "education" rather than experience) after your first position, unless you did something a whole bunch that is VERY relevant to the position you're applying to after your first.

3) List "irrelevant" positions separately, but make them relevant. Consolidate positions/experience that are not medical/nursing. If my resume were simply an updated resume from what I used to do, it would have been way too long once I added in the nursie stuff. Each of my careers became one position with some brief highlights, so rather than 10 positions or whatever, I consolidated into 3. I place these under a different heading, below "Nursing Experience" positions. An appropriate heading to help make positions relevant might be, "Experience as a Team Member and Leader." Or anything you think might make the hiring manager find you original/creative in your application of non-nursing experience to the new position with your resume, yet still professional. You can also choose language in your job description and/or accomplishments (depending on how you format) that tell a story that is applicable to your new career/desired position. I've received very positive comments on this approach. How you list things will likely evolve based on the positions you apply for, and as you gain experience that's more relevant.

4) I did not list awards / that sort of thing separately, but this was a spacing thing. I was trying to keep it brief. However, I did briefly make accomplishment statements under the career-consolidated-into-single-position positions. I think it's helpful to let hiring managers know you're a hard worker and like to do things well. An example statement might be, "Effectively led team of 12 legal professionals in order to achieve whatever, leading to 3 team and 2 individual excellence awards." That tells me as a hiring manager that, unless you're lying, you probably work well with others and get schtik done. I do not believe there is anything wrong with listing awards separately, based on many conversations, and have done that in the past. However, it sounds like you may have difficulty with resume length like I did, because of doing other exciting and/or not wonderful things for a while.

5) The dean of my undergrad program was a lawyer (and nurse). No one hated her. I know other nurses who became lawyers, though I honestly don't know anyone who did it the other way around. With that said, I've noticed that nurses love to network with the RN/JDs I do know, because they like to pick their brains about things. In the Army, we called what nurses on the floor do, "Barracks lawyering." Everyone has an opinion about what's legally advisable in certain situations or what's appropriate, what creates liability, and so on. Yet, most people are really talking out their backside and don't have much of a clue. Having legal experience is likely to make people want to associate with you and ask you questions based on your previous background. Which, while annoying at times, does connect people to you. I don't think it'll hurt you at all that you've been/are a lawyer.

6) Your school has (or will have, if different school than pre-req school) a career office, or something that does career things but has a different name. Use it. They will offer resume review and advice, along with general placement/application/etc advice. In addition to this, some of your instructors, particularly clinical instructors, will have recently been (or may currently be, if part time instructors) nurse hiring managers. Ask them to review/comment/advise. In addition to whatever advice you get from the career office, they can tell you what they always looked for, things that they didn't like in resumes, generally advise, and so on. It's good to get different opinions/advice. However, if anyone under #6 disagrees with me, they are wrong and should be flogged.

Natalie513 · Jan 19, 2017

Wow, thank you all for the tips! I really appreciate it!

JD2RN · May 7, 2017

Hi Natalie, I am another attorney pursuing nursing. Feel free to PM if you want to chat!

Heylove, BSN, RN, EMT-B · Jun 13, 2017

How interesting! I am a new RN, working on my BSN and then thinking of going to law school. Trying to decide if nursing really was for me or not...