What Moves Your Nursing Resume to the Top of the Pile

You can find nursing jobs all around the country. If you get a nursing degree, you might go anywhere with it. You can work and make a real difference while supporting yourself.

To get that dream job, though, you must write a perfect nursing resume, and that isn’t easy. You can look at ones online and get inspiration, but you may not know what resume qualities hiring managers and hospital administrators want.

We’ll talk about what all the best nursing resumes have right now so you can make sure yours performs well when you start job hunting.

Technical Skills

The best nursing resumes all feature technical skills. If you’re getting into nursing, you must have those, and you should list them all, neglecting nothing.

You might mention that you can use cutting edge technology. Nursing requires the latest tech, so you can say in your resume what you have learned. You should say you can handle basic wound care. You can say you know about IV application.

You might mention you know about checking vital signs. If you have urgent care or emergency care skills, make sure you write those down as well.

Soft Skills

The best nursing resumes also feature so-called soft skills. These include things like active listening and working well with other team members. You can mention leadership since that’s a soft skill the nursing profession requires.

You can mention creativity since that comes in handy with the nursing profession. You can say you know about conflict resolution and time management. Adaptability might factor in as well. You can mention that you know about problem-solving and excellent communication.

Hard Skills

Hard and technical skills share some similarities, but they’re not quite the same. Hard skills might include things like changing wound dressings or giving injections properly. They can include drawing blood and administering pain meds. They usually include various computer skills.

Your Professional Summary

Nurses should also have impressive professional summaries. This paragraph or a couple of paragraphs heads up your resume. You should have it right below your name, physical address, email address, and so forth.

Your professional summary should include any intangibles you feel deserve mentioning, like your passion and why you got into nursing. A hospital admin who does hiring will want that information when you interview, but you should still briefly mention it on your resume.

You should mention if you have proven abilities that nurses need, like learning in a fast-paced environment. You can also discuss collaborating with colleagues and ensuring the best possible patient outcomes by following medically established best practices.

More than anything else, your nursing resume should reflect both professionalism and enthusiasm. Nurses need people skills, and your resume should convey that you have them. That can matter more than work experience if you’re just starting in this industry.

Make sure you also proofread your nursing resume. You can catch any glaring punctuation or spelling errors that way.