Randy’s Career Tips

While travel nursing can lure you into infinite and vast opportunities of free luxury accommodations, exotic destinations, and incidental leisure vacations, the stark reality is that many nurses have shied away from the travel nursing profession because of bad experiences with unkind recruiters, inadequate housing, poor benefits, lack of compensation, and other such nightmares. When thinking of getting into travel nursing, choosing the right placement agency is one of the most important considerations to make. Different nurses will have different priorities when it comes to choosing a travel nursing placement agency. Some have salary as their priority while others are more interested in the location and destination, while still others give emphasis on career flexibility and customer service. In any case, choosing the right agency will depend on four criteria: salary, benefits, service, and travel opportunity.

Salary

Some agencies are more generous in terms of salary than others but this doesn’t mean they are generally better. Agencies may base salaries on a number of factors including location availability, cost of living, and need-to-fill assignments. Some of the agencies that offer high compensation will expect more from their travel nurses such as filling in assignments in understaffed facilities or in facilities where there are extreme patient needs. If you are easily attracted to high salaries, be on the lookout for the potentially high workload it could bring which, if too much, may not be worth it at all in the end. The location will also factor into the amount of your salary. For example, New York or the California Bay Area may offer more lucrative pay rates but the cost of living in these places is also significantly higher. When choosing a placement agency based on salary, you have to consider the ratio of salary dollars and cos (more…)

If you are a fresh graduate looking for your first job, the times could not have been tougher. The global economic downturn and its impact on the job market is for all to see. While companies across sectors across the globe are cutting jobs to control costs, there has been little or no hiring in companies. Some companies that are still hiring are doing it only on strict need basis. Thus, for graduates looking for fresher jobs, it has become very tough to land a job to launch their career. Barring a few, engineering colleges and B-schools across the country are finding it tough to place students. The placement cells in colleges and university campuses are working overtime to invite companies and arrange jobs for the passing out batch.

People who are already employed are hanging on to their jobs and attrition levels are at an all-time low leading to no fresh hiring. There may have been no increments or promotions but people are getting a pay cheque at the end of the month which is enough to make them stick to their job. That brings us to the topic of fresher jobs rather the lack of it in market today. With this gloomy scenario in the job market, what is it that a fresher needs to do to ensure that he gets a job. What is the change in attitude or mindset that is required to prepare a fresher for the prevalent market conditions?

Some sectors used to hire in hordes before the economic slowdown derailed the markets. The Information Technology sector that used to hire freshers in bulk from campuses has given a miss to campus placements this time or has hired very less number of freshers. To cruise through this tough time, frshers need to be all the more aggressive and prove their worth to the recruiter in any chance of interaction that they may get with the recruiter. It is important to highlight your strong points and all that distinguishes you (more…)