Are you currently facing a nursing shortage for your clinic or hospital? You aren’t alone! Did you know that in 2021, Registered Nurses (RNs) were among the top 5 most in-demand jobs in the American workforce? Nursing jobs in northern Virginia were no exception to this rule. Finding the right candidate to meet your specific requirements can seem daunting and never ending. If you are like any other healthcare organization, you want the best of the best. With so many jobs and so few candidates, you need to up your strategy to find the right candidates. But how do you attract the best of the best? In this blog post, we’ll review some key strategies for attracting just the right person to fill your nursing jobs in northern Virginia.
Necessary Characteristics for Nurses
Knowing the characteristics of the right nursing candidate can offer perspective and direction. Our nursing coordinators have looked at their favorite and most successful nurses over the past ten years to compile this list of the top characteristics they each possessed.
- Great Communication: Your nursing staff is the face of your organization, often the first and last person a patient has contact with. Patients need to feel cared for and safe. A good nurse will ensure this with good communication skills at every step of the healthcare journey. They should be able to speak to families, patients, and clinic or hospital staff with ease and comfort, always maintaining a professional yet personable demeanor throughout.
- Compassion and Empathy: One of the most important qualities in any nursing job in northern Virginia (anywhere really!) is the ability to convey compassion and empathy for patients and their families. Feeling safe is key to health and recovery for patients and their families.
- Great Problem Solver: Healthcare is often a puzzle, with the nursing staff and doctors working together to piece together the puzzle pieces. Doctors can’t be with the patients to the extent that nurses can. Nurses are the eyes and ears of doctors and need to have the ability to think outside the box and apply critical thinking skills.
- Detail Oriented: Attention to detail is vital for RN jobs in northern Virginia. Remembering and noting even the tiniest detail can make all the difference in a patient’s recovery and health.
- Teamwork: Being a team player is another quality necessary in a good nurse. Healthcare, good healthcare, is a very team-oriented field. From administrators to nurses, an atmosphere of teamwork is crucial for a smooth process.
Attracting Candidates for Your Nursing Jobs in Northern Virginia
Now that we’ve discussed the right person for your nursing jobs, you need to focus on being the right company. Providing a good working environment and perks will help you to attract the best nursing candidates from all over the country. Here are some of the ways to make your organization attractive to nurses:
1. Advertise Locally
This can be enticing to nurses in your area. This means no uprooting entire families, packing up and moving across the country, and settling into a new city and state. Local candidates will also be more committed to the community.
2. Highlight Advancement Possibilities
Good nurses in Fairfax county are always looking for ways to improve their skills and advance in the healthcare industry. Highlighting the ways you can help with advancement can go a long way in finding the right person. Offering ongoing continuing education opportunities can help both the nurse and the organization.
3. Focus on Work/Life Balance
Focusing on a good work-life balance helps attract good nurses and keep them mentally healthy. Consider offering an on-site gym, monthly massage visits, break room snacks, time off for family events, etc. There are so many ways to promote a healthy work/life balance, be creative!
4. Offer a Competitive Salary
This is self-explanatory. No one wants to feel lowballed or underappreciated. In today’s marketing, offering a competitive salary can differentiate retention and turnover IF you win the employee in the first place.
5. Be Flexible with Schedules
This plays into the desirable work/life balance. Employees want to feel you care about what they care about. If you offer flexible scheduling and time off, your team will realize you care about what is important to them.
6. Encourage a “Work Community”
Make your nursing staff feel a part of your work community. This can be anything from work parties to getting together away from the office. We, as humans, like to feel a part of a greater community. This can make your employees feel welcome and want to stay for years to come!
7. Advocate for Workplace Safety
Workplace safety is becoming an ever-increasing need in our society. Focus team meetings on workplace safety and maintaining a no-workplace harassment policy. Make reporting these issues easy and non-judgemental.
Find the Right Nursing Candidate Today!
We hope you’ve found this blog post helpful. These are some of the key points we look for when finding candidates for our nursing jobs in northern Virginia. At Nextaff, we do the hard work for you. We’ve dedicated our time and resources to bring you the top nursing professionals from all over the country. If you’re tired of doing all this yourself, we can help you find just the right people for your nursing jobs in northern Virginia. Call Nextaff today!