The Ambitious Nurse | RN, Nursing Career, Nursing Job Opportunities
Are you feeling stuck in your current clinical environment? Maybe you want a change because you're too exhausted, burned out, or ready for different leadership. Do you want to make a change in your clinical career, but you're not sure what to do next?
You're in the right place. This podcast will help you get the clarity you need to grow so you can have the flexibility and autonomy you want while leveraging your voice and expertise.
I'm Bonnie Meadows a Board Certified Clinical Nurse Specialist, Influential Leader, Career Coach & Well-Being Coach. Since being in the nursing & healthcare profession since 2004, I have found myself ready to make the next step but felt stuck.
I got to a place where I dreaded going to work. I felt burnt out and unmotivated. I knew deep down I always wanted something else. But I had no clue how to even with the hope of a graduate degree to advance me.
I finally realized that growing in nursing is about the journey and not the destination. I finally stopped looking for a specific job to fill my cup.
I developed a framework I frequently implemented to get the clarity I needed for my career and catapulted me into areas of nursing and healthcare I never imagined. I am sharing it all with you.
If you are ready to find career strategies crafted as an experienced nurse using your gifts and abilities,
A guide to help you get clear on your next career steps,
Contentment and joy in your work-this podcast is for you!!
So get ready to kick off those Crocs, pop in those earbuds, and let's chat!!
The Ambitious Nurse | RN, Nursing Career, Nursing Job Opportunities
31// How to Showcase Your Nursing Talents and Achievements Effortlessly
Have you ever wondered how to confidently showcase your skills and experiences to propel your nursing career?
Listen in to get practical advice that inspires nurses to overcome their uneasiness to speak about themselves.
In this episode, Bonnie emphasizes the importance of always being prepared to present your best self. She discusses the necessity of maintaining a record of accomplishments and strategically showcasing your work to build relationships and enhance your professional presence.
With actionable insights on crafting resumes, CVs, and other professional presentations, Bonnie provides the tools you need to be known for the areas you want to grow in, steering away from those you don't.
Don't miss out on these invaluable tips to maximize your career potential!
Outline:
05:28 Lessons from Public Speaking
07:32 The Value of Showcasing Your Work
08:39 How to Showcase Your Work Effectively
15:48 Creating a Strong Elevator Pitch
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The higher we go in our careers, it becomes more and more important to showcase our work in different ways, in different avenues, in different conversations. That's why we talk about creating an elevator pitch and making sure that you can succinctly talk about who you are, what you do. Sometimes it's even the nuances of sliding into a conversation that you're having with someone, a project that you're working on or results that you've gotten, or you know difficulties that you faced working with something or someone, or sometimes it's just your casual conversation and opinion on something within the nursing profession, the healthcare industry. And so during this particular podcast I want to talk through just kind of give a high level of what it means to showcase your work and the importance of showcasing your work when you are working towards career growth as an ambitious nurse. Are you feeling stuck in your current clinical environment? Do you want to make a change in your nursing career but not sure what to do next, exhausted, burnt out and maybe even ready for different leadership?
Speaker 1:I'm Bonnie Meadows, a board-certified clinical nurse specialist, influential leader, career coach and well-being coach. Being in the nursing and healthcare profession since 2004, I have felt stuck and unsure about what was next for me. I wanted to be fulfilled in my purpose to have a voice at the table and to be a resource for others. I kept telling myself I wanted more, but didn't have the direction I needed, until I found clarity and career growth strategies for experienced nurses like me. In this podcast, you will find simple tactical steps that allow you to gain the clarity you need, solutions for how to grow even without supportive leadership, and guidelines for setting boundaries at work, so that you can grow purposefully in your career as a nurse with a graduate degree who makes a huge impact in the profession. So get ready to trade your scrubs for yoga pants, pop in those earbuds and let's chat. I want to invite you to continue the conversation about the tips that I share on the podcast. Connect and ask any questions you have about your career growth with the Ambitious Nurse Insider Newsletter. Become an insider and get weekly emails from me with tips and tools on how to grow your nursing career, as well as be in the know of any special offerings before anyone else. Also, that is where I share links, so if I've seen something on a website or I'm referring to something, that's where you'll find that reference. I usually send it out in my Ambitious Nurse Insider newsletter. Sign up using the URL bitlylink slash B-I-T-L-Y. Dot link slash ambitiousnurseinsidercom. You can also find the link in the show notes below. And PS, you will get a special gift when you sign up for the newsletter, so look forward to seeing you there.
Speaker 1:In 2015,. I was at a conference and this was my very first podium presentation. I was presenting with a colleague of mine. This conference was in the neighborhood of where I worked, and where I work is for a very large organization. It was actually the State Nurses Association Conference. Me and a friend of mine. We applied to be presenters. Actually, we thought we had worked on a project together and so we had applied to be poster presenters at the conference, and I had presented before with a poster presentation, but this was my first time doing an actual podium presentation.
Speaker 1:I will say one thing about me I actually don't mind public speaking. I enjoy public speaking. Now, do I want to throw up and run away right before I do it? Yes, but when I get up there, I just really enjoy just talking to people, encouraging people, motivating people. That's why I like doing this podcast, because it is my goal that you are being motivated, that you are being encouraged, that you are being educated and that you feel like you want to take the next step, Like I want to help you. It is my mission to help you to get the courage and to build the confidence to take the next step in your career. And if you don't know what that next step is, I am really good at helping people to figure out what that next step is. So that's just my plug. To just go ahead and click the link below in the podcast show notes, I have one-on-one coaching that's available Now.
Speaker 1:My first time presenting was in 2008 at the Institute of Healthcare Improvement, which is also known as IHI. When I did this, there were a few lessons that I learned. Not at the poster presentation, at the well for the podium presentation, where I was a speaker, I found out I was pretty good at it, figured out how to throw a few jokes in there that people would laugh at. I like to speak in front of others, but I have introverted exhaustion afterwards and, of course, as I just said before, I have the introverted mind beforehand of I just want to crawl under a rock and not do anything, but then I pretty much just say all right, I have no other choice but to do it. So let's go.
Speaker 1:You never know who's in the audience, because the conference was in my area of where I worked, in the city of where I worked or in a nearby town of where I worked, and it was a state nurses association. So if you are an RN, you could pay and come to the conference, like it would be valuable to you to come to the conference. And so there were some pretty big people in the room, or pretty, I would say, influential people in the room in which I was speaking, and we weren't the main speaker, we were a breakout session. I had former bosses in there, like assistant vice president, vice president, I had a former dean in the room. I had other influential people in the room. I didn't find this out until after I finished speaking. Usually, when someone from our organization is presenting, then whoever is at the conference, we usually try to support one another. I knew there were going to be some people in the room that I knew, but it wasn't until after I was finished with the presentation that I found out all of those influential people were in the room. So the lesson I learned is you never know who's in the audience, learners. You never know who's in the audience, and it's impactful in showcasing your work and your professional presence, and it allowed leaders to see me in a different light.
Speaker 1:And so today I want to share with you the importance of showcasing your work as a nurse. Many times we are very reliant on our clinical skills, and for many jobs that is very important. But as many of us are shifting into advanced clinical roles or advanced leadership roles, you need more than just the clinical work that you do. So they want to know that you can critically think in clinical roles and they want to know that you can critically think in leadership roles. So, of course, clinical roles is how are you using your skills, how are you interacting with teams, this, that and the other and then it's almost the same type of questions within a leadership role, but then they get a little bit more nuanced. Especially, how are you leading others, conflict management, all of those things. So it's important to know your key points and be able to showcase your work.
Speaker 1:So showcasing your work includes keeping a list of your accomplishments, projects you've been involved in or led, education you may have taught or developed, or curriculum that you've developed. It also includes having a short elevator speech for networking. Now, I'm not going into elevator speeches here, but if that is something that you would like for me to cover in this podcast, please feel free to send me an email and just say, hey, I would love for you to cover this in the podcast. Or leave me a review, leave me a five-star review and just say, hey, this podcast is great, would love for you to cover this particular topic. Hey, this podcast is great, would love for you to cover this particular topic. So, even if it's not elevator pitches, then let me know of some other topics that you would love for me to cover Showcasing your work, and here's your why. So we've talked about a little bit of what it is, but showcasing your work gets you in front of people you may not have been able to see before.
Speaker 1:The higher you go in your career growth, it's less and less about your resume. Your resume is important, your CV is important, that paperwork is important, but it's more and more about who you know, relationships you build. That makes your barrier to entry a little bit lower, let's just say that. And you want to be able to help yourself along the way and not fully rely on your resume to carry you up the ladder or broader in your impact. You don't want your resume and your CV to have to do all the work. You want people to be able to bring you top of mind or recommend you or sponsor you for certain things to your work. It allows others to see where you may be the subject matter expert.
Speaker 1:So that works both ways. It works in a way of when you're talking about your work and what you're involved in and easily weaving it into a conversation, then people will then know what you are a subject matter expert in, and it doesn't have to be deep, but you just have to know your industry and what are the current things that are going on in your industry. The other side to that is if there's something that people call on you for a lot and you really don't want to be known for that thing, then it might be time for you to help shift the narrative, and that's what showcasing your work does. It helps you to shift your narrative into this other sector for people to say, oh, I didn't realize they did that, I didn't realize he did that, or I didn't realize she did that or was involved in that. So people have this perception of who you are subject matter in one on one side, perception of who you are subject matter in in one on one side but they can also, on that on the flip side, have an opinion of what you are as a subject matter expert and it might not be something that you want to be known as the expert in.
Speaker 1:Not that it's a bad area, but again it goes back to that conversation that I talk about and that area that I mentioned regarding your growth and what area do you want to water or plant a seed so that it can grow, and what area are you just like, yeah, that can grow weeds and that can just fall by the wayside, because I don't plan to grow in that way. I don't feel led to grow in that way, so that's not the route that I want to go. That's not. I'm not watering that. If it is an area where you want to dig deeper in expanding your work, lean in to speaking up about it more. It gives others a small taste of what you do and why you do it.
Speaker 1:So how do you showcase your work? There are a few ways. We know most of those ways, so I'll go ahead and say them. One is your resume, the other is a curriculum vitae. If you've done a lot of presentations, poster presentations, podium presentations or publications then that's when you need more so of a curriculum vitae just to showcase, like, what is your actual work. Do you include work into the curriculum vitae? Yes, but it just helps. It's expected that the curriculum vitae is going to be longer. It's expected that the resume is going to be shorter, because it's just a showcase of your work experience. On your resume you have your example under each job, a description, highlight specific outcomes or impact that you've made while working there, and even on your CV. When you're talking about just your jobs that you've worked, you may want to also just kind of pull out and highlight these particular things that you've led or co-led in the area in which you want to get the job, or that highlight your leadership experience. Did you co-lead in setting up a vaccine clinic, or did you develop the education on the vaccine clinic? Or did you set up new processes that lead to better communication, like a communication sheet? Or you set up an algorithm for something? Did you implement a process for just-in-time education? Did you develop a process to reduce readmissions? All of those things can be included in your resume and on your CV you can include poster presentations and articles and such on your resume. But that makes it longer. And again, the expectation is that a resume is one, maybe two pages. The expectation is that your CV is longer.
Speaker 1:The other way to showcase your work is in a portfolio. Portfolio pretty much just takes your work to the next level. So your resume is just quick, down and dirty. Cv you give a little bit more information, especially if you're writing articles, doing postal presentations In a portfolio, especially if it's electronic. Most people do it in like OneNote or you can do something like Evernote or you can actually have a binder and it includes the actual work that you have done. So if you did develop education, then in that portfolio there's a place for you to place the actual education that you developed. It's almost like they're previewing your work with a portfolio. So it's a little bit more in-depth, a little bit more nuanced and if you'd like more information about that, just let me know. I will probably do a podcast episode about the difference between a CV, a resume and a portfolio and what to include in all three, because I've actually done a presentation on that before.
Speaker 1:And then, last but not least, is an elevator pitch and with the elevator pitch you're really just giving that high level. This is what I do and why I do it in less than two to three minutes. Yes, you can do it. Who I am, what I do, why I do it in less than three minutes and with an elevator pitch it's very nuanced because you have to be thinking about who am I talking to, what do I need them to know? So it can't be a blanket. Oh, this is always my elevator pitch. Many times it has to be like you can have a basis of one, but then you also need to be ready to switch depending on who you're talking to. Ready to switch depending on who you're talking to. Your elevator pitch for your C&E is going to be different if you're talking to the CEO of your company or the COO of your company. Those are two different things. Or an elevator pitch to the president of the American Nurses Association is different than an elevator pitch the president of your state nurses association. Because in their mind, you want to. You want to pique their interest and help them to understand how you can help them to understand how you can help them. Like, if you're wanting to stay in touch, then you have to, strategically, on your feet, think about what is my elevator pitch for them, to understand how I can help them.
Speaker 1:It's about growth, it's about being ambitious, and so those are the main ways in which you can showcase your work.
Speaker 1:As a nurse, there are so many people who are applying for jobs away from the bedside or and they may be clinical jobs, but they're just away from the bedside because more people are getting master's degrees, more people are getting doctorate degrees, so the conversation, the competition, is a little bit stiffer, and so, yes, your resume has to do the talking for you, but as you go higher, your networking and your elevator pitches and you being able to verbalize your work becomes more and more important, and so you showcase your work, as we wrap up, by making sure you have a clear and concise resume, a clear and concise CV portfolio, if you like, depending on how much you want to impress people when you go to the interview.
Speaker 1:Portfolios really can only be shown when you're at an interview, or you can send it to them by way of email beforehand. Developing a clear and concise basis of an elevator pitch and then thinking of ways to nuance it, depending on who you're talking to. Please feel free to let me know if you have any questions about anything or want to go deeper on any subjects. I'm here for you until next time. See you later. I hope you enjoyed today's episode. If so, would you take 30 seconds and share it with another nurse who may be unsure of where to go next in their career or maybe need some career clarity? Also, please leave a quick review for the show on Apple Podcast. It brings me so much joy and so much encouragement to know this podcast is helping you. Now go get the career you want and not the one you settle for, and I'll meet you back here next Thursday for another episode. See you soon.
