RN Fellowship SICU interview. No floor experience. Help!

[NewNurseinTraining, BSN]

Hi there!

The hospital I've been working at for 2 years has an RN fellowship program ( a 6-month program for BSNs who wish to change their scope of practice). I have a total of 4 years of RN experience: 2 years in the Operating Room and 2 years in Triage Nursing (working mostly remote for neurology). I applied for the Neurology ICU, Surgery ICU, and PACU route. I was an offered an interview for Surgery ICU.

I've always wanted to be a floor nurse but when I initially applied after the OR, it seemed like I got skipped over after they learned I only had OR experience. I feel like the Fellowship would be a perfect opportunity to become a floor nurse. However, now that I have the interview, I'm afraid that others in the interview pool who already have floor nursing experience would look like stronger candidates. Any tips on how to make me look more marketable/a better candidate?

So far, I have the following:

-Experience in the OR side of things. In a sense I know the "inside scoop". Which should help a lot during hand off and recovery.

-A lot of autonomy. My triage role wasn't supposed to be remote. But a day after my start date, they cancelled my orientation and sent everyone home to work remote during COVID. Since then, I pretty much trained myself with some guidance and hit the ground running. Eventually, I ended up being top performer/ each week. So what I lack in floor nurse experience, I make up for with fast learning?

-Great team player. Which is imperative everywhere! In the OR I worked with anesthesia, physicians, scrub techs, pharmacy, PACU, nurses from different departments in order to have a successful case and advocate for you patient. In triage, I delegate tasks and work with providers

Also any helpful interview tips? It will be a virtual interview ?

Thank you and happy holidays everyone!

[badtz_maru, MSN, RN]

Happy New Year!

Wow, can you expand on the remote triage role to us here? Sounds intriguing ? 

Side note for your interview - you can explain the services you worked in while in the OR (such as general, thoracic, ENT, etc). Also explain why you want to leave the OR and have direct care (unit nursing) experience. 

Good luck!