Travel RN-looking for new company.

NedRN · Nov 22, 2016

You ask questions about any issues you've had previously or continue any thing they might say that is confusing or raises a red flag. Compensation obviously. If a recruiter will not tell about real open assignments in your specialty nor the compensation, don't waste any further energy and move on to the next agency. As you clearly know already, it is a lot of work to sign up with an agency just to discover they don't have assignments in your specialty and the pays sucks.

Your primary goal is to find great recruiters that you click with. That is much more important than the agency name. Call lots of them to figure this out as well as those with the least BS and appear trustworthy and will work hard.

Once you have made your first choices, I'd recommend signing up fully with the best three to five. Yes, lots of work but will pay off with more assignment choices and a reality check for best pay in a given location. And a Plan B if your first choice falls through.

PanTravelers has an article on the initial interview you may find helpful (free membership is all you need) but with some travel experience you probably don't need it. More personal than anything else.

Personally I like to find out something about an agency's resources. There are advantages to small, midsize, and large agencies. You may have a preference or even prefer a mix of sizes. No agency will tell you the number of travelers they have on assignment but there is a workaround question they will answer. Ask how many recruiters and other staff work in their office. Multiply that by 10 for the number of travelers!

I'd rank agency size as small with around 80 travelers or fewer. Above around 275 and more is a large agency. You can reasonably also ask questions like length of time in business and recruiter years of experience.

Some of the work of signing up for new agencies can be saved with good organization and a laptop. All your medical stuff, credentials, work history or resume, and references.

Written references are a must! They will not only make signup faster but also make you much more valuable to a new agency and give a lot more control over your career. There are several reference forms you can download for free on PanTravelers and thousands elsewhere online.

Since you managed to read all that, I'll give you a simple answer to one of your questions. It almost always takes a minimum of two weeks from first agency contact to assignment start. Having several agencies signed up saves a lot of time and allows you to start faster at competitive assignments, those in really cool places or those paying above average.