What keywords and skills should your Nursing Studentresume include?
How do you decide what skills to include on your Nursing Student resume? Don’t just list everything you can think of, there’s an art to choosing the most effective skills and presenting them correctly. These are the 4 steps to follow when adding skills to your Nursing Student resume
5 important steps to follow when adding skills to your nursing student resume
- Begin by carefully reading the job description and writing down all of the skills it mentions.
- Write down all of your own skills, these could be hard skills like knowing a language or soft skills like working well in groups.
- See which skills match up (they don’t necessarily have to be exact matches)
- Think about how you can SHOW that you have these skills by giving examples instead of simply saying that you have them.
- Refrain from using intensifiers. Intensifiers are words like very and really. These words are not appropriate for a resume and come across as immature, unprofessional, and desperate sounding. Plain statements are powerful sounding on their own. Example: A very collaborative nurse with really good communication skills. Compared to: A collaborative nurse who is a seasoned communicator. Word choice is more important that using intensifiers.
When it comes to sales, there are specific skills that make for a great salesperson - these have to do mainly with communicating with customers and transforming leads into high-value customers.
Best skills for a Nursing Student resume
Critical thinking
Arguably the most difficult skill to learn and assess is critical thinking. Nursing students struggle to piece all their knowledge together in a way that allows them to provide effective and efficient care to all their patients through a long entire shift.
Critical thinking is ultimately what makes a nurse a nurse. Without critical thinking, nurses would simply be task doers. Because critical thinking is a difficult yet vital task to nursing, any way you can show it must be placed in your resume.
Teamwork
The healthcare system is complex. Nurses are forced to work with other nurses, patients, family members, physicians, care assistants, social workers, students, and many other disciplines. If you can work well with others, you will be a liability, not an asset. Therefore, letting the hiring manager know that you’re a team player by giving specific examples is highly valuable.
Positive attitude
The healthcare environment is stressful and demanding. Change seems constant. Individuals with a poor attitude can really bring down a team and create a tumultuous environment to work in. Manager often find people with a poor attitude working against them and hard to get rid of because nobody else wants to hire them. On the contrary, a positive attitude can do wonders to improve staff morale.
Work ethic
Nurses are present to serve patients by helping them with anything from a complex procedure to getting them a glass of water. Being willing to work hard day in and day out is not for the faint of heart. Finding ways to go beyond expectations for patients and colleagues alike is valuable and hard to find. List these experiences in your nursing student resume to get a hiring manager's attention.
Nursing skills
The ability of a nursing student to pick up on a skill quickly shows aptitude well beyond average. When it comes to nursing skills, if you can become the expert that everyone goes to, you are an asset to the unit and coveted amongst nurse managers. Highlight the ability to learn and adapt quickly in your nursing student resume.
Top 5 Skills On Resumes vs Job Offers
| Skill | In resumes | In job offers |
|---|
| microsoft office | 16.30% | 3.80% |
| home health | 10.87% | 7.90% |
| certified nursing assistant | 8.48% | 26.70% |
| medical terminology | 6.74% | 7.10% |
| patient care | 6.09% | 74.00% |
Source: enhancv.com
Show them you’re a nurse who impacts patients!
Hospitals and healthcare facilities are being rated now more than ever and the experience of patients is directly tied to reimbursement rates. Simply put, the patient experience matters to healthcare organizations. Nurses are at the front line of the patient experience so be sure to highlight how you’ve made the patient experience a fantastic one. This can also be a great area to mention other customer service or support experience.
All nursing students are not the same - show them you’re unique!
There is no one-size-fits-all approach to patients. This means that it takes all kinds of nurses to care for a wide variety of patients any healthcare organization should expect to see.
Rather than making yourself seem like a generalist, mention specific skills that you bring to the role that others won’t likely have. What are you known for? What are your strengths? What are you naturally better at than your classmates or in your friend group? These are the types of things that you need to highlight specifically. Go beyond generalizations and add specifics.
Example (weak): Nursing student with strong leadership skills.
Example (strong): Nursing student who is passionate about leadership and is a member of A+ Nursing Leadership Organization.
The strong example here shows a few things. First, this candidate is passionate about leadership. Strong leadership would be assumed or implied. Next, this candidate took the initiative to invest their time and money to join a professional nursing leadership organization. This part reaffirms the first part of the statement (passion for leadership) and builds a case that this nursing student has proved the statement in a way by acting on his passion in a legitimate way.
Building a high-quality, well-written nursing student resume is not the standard but it is attainable. This guide will give you all the tips and tricks that you will need to put forth the best resume possible!
How to get a referral on LinkedIn for the nursing role you want
Relying on nothing but your resume can leave you with less than a
2% chance of getting an interview. As you can see, it’s important to give yourself the best shot possible at getting hired. This includes leveraging personal connections to get referred to a job.
So before you start applying for a new student nursing role, check your 1st and 2nd degree contacts in both LinkedIn and in any other relevant groups you may belong to. If you don’t have strong connections in the industry you’re looking to establish yourself in, start making them now!
Check out our
guide on getting referrals for any job you’re applying for.
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