A Whole New World
This week marks my one-year anniversary with my new company, and more notably, leaving bedside nursing. In general, this year has been one of the most trans formative years of my life. I have spent countless hours working on myself, personally and professionally. I share some insight into my personal growth & life in some of my previous blog posts [1]. In addition to my personal growth, I also wanted to take the time to reflect on what this year has been like for me professionally- to explore the challenges, pleasures, growth, and overall, experience of this totally new career path.
Quite honestly, I am suffering from a moderate case of writer’s block. I am finding it somewhat difficult to reflect, process, and share my experience, both mentally and verbally[2]. So please, bear with me. However, here is my best attempt to give you a glimpse into my whole new world and how I got here[3].
A quick Table of Contents:
1. Bye Bedside? What Now?
2. Professional Dating: From Courting to Exclusivity
3. What Exactly is it that I am supposed to do?
4. Wanderlust minus the lust
5. The good, The Bad, and The Great
6. Would I do it Again?
1. Bye Bedside? What Now?
It was around February 2018, when I decided I wanted to leave clinical nursing. I had multiple reasons[4]. It wasn’t an easy decision by any means, but once I made it, the next question was naturally, ‘well, what now?’ Luckily for me, I have had the privilege of meeting many a nurse who work in non-traditional roles. Nurses who are entrepreneurs, politicians, lobbyists, or work for different industries such as pharma/medical device companies, private insurance companies, or governing regulatory bodies such as CMS. I knew there were countless opportunities, I just had to find the right one for me.
Obviously, given the vast amount of career opportunities and career paths nurses can take, the question of ‘what do I want to do’ can quickly become overwhelming and daunting. To anyone, looking to transition out of bedside (or make a career change in general), I recommend shifting the conversation from the singular question of What Now(?) to the following three questions:
a. What is my end goal?
b. What skills do I need to achieve my end goal?
c. What skills do I currently possess?
When I looked at those three questions for myself this is what I derived:
What is my end goal?
What is my end goal?
- From the very first year I worked as a nurse, I knew our health care system needed major changes (that will definitely be a future blog post). I also knew that the people who created our health care laws had no idea what health care workers or patients needed[5]. I also told myself, I didn’t want to just spend my days verbally complaining out it. I wanted to be able to do something about it- through advocacy or holding office, lobbying, whatever. One day, I wanted to help change health care policy. That is and was my end goal.
What skills do I need to achieve my end goal?
I needed to understand our health care system better. Working as a nurse afforded me an insightful view into the world of health care, but at the end of the day, it was microscopic. I need to learn many a thing, before I am ready for a career involving policy change. Including: how hospitals operate- what drives their decisions, motives. I need to understand insurance companies, the pharmaceutical/medical device industries, and finally our health care governing bodies. I also need to be able to hold myself professionally in the world outside of medicine. Those skills included but were not limited to: engaging professionally through various platforms (emails, meetings, presentations), learning to navigate traditional workplace relationships/hierarchies not typically found in bedside nursing, and many technical skills such as excel (my worst enemy).
What skills do I currently possess?
What skills do I currently possess?
I can say this with confidence- any nurse is equipped with a hundred different transferable skills that would make him/her successful in any number of careers. I would recommend identifying a few of your top skills and focusing on finding positions that heavily rely on them. For example, I think some of my top skills/qualities are: people person, highly adaptable/not averse to change, and finally works well under pressure/deadlines. The position I am in currently, extensively requires all three of those.
If you have answered these three questions, I believe you are ready to start dating.
2. Professional Dating: From Courting to Exclusivity
Now that you have identified what skills you need, and what skills you already have- you can begin to search for jobs that will marry both. I began my search on classic job search engines like ‘Linkedin’, ‘Indeed’, and ‘Monster’. Honestly, I applied for so many different types of positions- some I that I had absolutely no idea what the work entailed, but the job was in an industry that I knew would help me. Or job descriptions whose skills I knew I wanted, but in an industry that wasn’t exactly partial to my end goal. I applied to jobs that had NOTHING to do with nursing, as long as I thought had a decent amount of relatable skills. I applied and I applied, if I was on tinder instead of a job search- I probably would have swiped on 25+ dudes. I recognized it was a numbers game, and I was ready to play it.
I had a couple of matches, and I dated four different companies[6]. My current company and I, eventually moved from dating to exclusivity- but it wasn’t an easy or short process. The interview process took over a month and included seven different rounds of interviews with various members of the management team. Real talk, without the coaching and guidance of my non-medical friends /family, I am not sure I would have succeeded in attaining the job. They guided me in everything, from what to wear, how to be more confident, expressing my professional goals, and so, so much more. Use your resources!!
I am sure my company had their reasons for choosing me, I obviously can’t speak to them. But for me, it was a no brainer to choose my company. First and foremost, I grew fond of my boss quickly and greatly. My boss is one of those women, who seeks to uplift her team. She holds them to high standards but is willing to educate and guide in the most non-demeaning and empowering way. I knew I was going to learn and thrive working for her, and that was a huge plus for me. I, also, loved the overall culture and objective of the company. The icing on the cake, I was honest with them about my career goals (eventually pursue a career in health care policy) and from the get go they were incredibly supportive. Of course, it was a great financial opportunity as well- so all in all, it felt like I landed a jackpot.
My recommendation to anyone currently searching for jobs- treat it like you would dating for a life partner. You wouldn’t (or shouldn’t) choose someone just for the hell of it or out of desperation. We all know the job search/interview process, just like dating, can be extremely difficult and draining, but don’t settle. Hold out for the right fit for you.
2 3. What Exactly is it that I am supposed to do?
OK, so real talk. I knew I loved my boss, my company- their goals and my goals aligned, etc. etc. But honestly, for the first three months, I really didn’t know exactly what I was supposed to do or why I was hired. Not that the job description wasn’t explained to me, because it was. It sounded good on paper, but I wasn’t exactly sure what that meant in real time or how to deliver on it. It took a full three months to even understand what my job is[7].
Even once, I finally figured out what exactly my role was- it took at least another six months, to mature into my role! Initially, I felt a level of discomfort in almost any every situation, and within every job requirement. Hosting/conducting/participating in a meeting[8]? Writing a professional email- especially when you have to address an uncomfortable/negative concern[9]? Delivering a professional presentation to your management team? Honestly, all forms of professional communication were relatively foreign, new, and supremely challenging for me[10]. These were skills, I had to work on, and develop.
My words of advice are: recognize and accept that the first six to twelve months are going to be uncomfortable. They are going to require you to challenge yourself, to evolve in ways you may not naturally want to, but at the end, it will ultimately make you better. Even if I don’t naturally communicate professionally (and truth be told, I am not really a fan of professional communication), I am happy and grateful to be learning and developing this new and much needed skill set. Don’t let what you don’t know, deter you. Use it to drive you. True story: I made such a pretty decent size blunder within the company (not with any clients) that a new HR policy had to be made. Believe me, the learning process is not always pretty. But, I truly believe as nurses, we have one of the most difficult, challenging jobs out there. If we can do that, we can do anything!
4. Wanderlust minus the lust
I may not have known exactly what my job was initially, but I did know, it required travel. Lots of it. It was emphasized time and time again during the interview process, that my job would be 80% travel- would I be OK with? I didn’t bat an eyelash at this fact. I loved travelling. 80% travel didn’t sound like a bad thing, it sounded like a nice perk.
Fast forward, six months into my job, and I finally understood the true meaning of 80% travel. Up until this time, I always thought, I was a fan of travel. All types of travel- leisure, work, voluntary, etc. I quickly learned that this is not true of myself. I am not a huge fan of work travel, because I quickly learned, that work travel is not anything like leisure travel.
Prior to my current job, I always thought people who travelled for work had this glamorous work life consisting of travelling to cool cities, eating at the hottest spots, entertaining clients over drinks…you get the gist. I quickly learned that every once in a while, it is that glamorous, but on the regular-it is honestly a grind.
A more realistic picture looks something like this: Flying/driving hours to make meetings that sometimes last thirty minutes. Going to middle of nowhere places, sometimes for a couple days at a time. Missing workouts and/or eating unhealthy restaurant food due to circumstance/travel exhaustion/ or convenience. As a woman, if you are in a foreign or what looks like an unsafe area, you are often resigned to spend the evening in your hotel (I am not someone who cares to chill at a bar, so that means I am basically left to spend the evening in a gym or in my room).
More notably, life on the road can be lonely. I often travel alone based on what I am doing, and there can be days that the only in person human interaction I have, are the professional conversations I have with people in my accounts and the servers at restaurants. To make matters worse, I would often come home on the weekend, after a long week of travel and not want to do anything- further, isolating myself[11].
Travelling can also take a significant toll on your relationships. I often found myself drained after a long day and proceeded to be short and snappy on the phone with my loved ones. As a single woman, dating, presented to be a challenge as well[12]. And even for my married/coupled work colleagues, travel can significantly take a toll on the relationship.
Work travel has not lived up to be the glamorous travel life, I thought it was going to be. But, there are still definite perks, and there are some days, where I feel so incredibly lucky to be able to travel for work!
5. The good, The Bad, and The Great
Travelling has its benefits. You have hotel and airline miles, and status. You definitely get to the learn the culture of a city a little more intimately. If you are a foodie, you can explore different restaurants. And sometimes, if you have some downtime, you can do some exploring. But for me, travel serves even a greater purpose. I get to speak and interact with health care workers across many different cities and states. I get to learn how they practice medicine, what challenges they face, what their priorities are, who their patient populations are and what specific needs those patients have. I have gotten to work with different IDNs and learned how different hospitals/systems operate- sometimes even region to region. It has been incredibly insightful and a learning opportunity like no other-especially given my end goal.
I also really appreciate the autonomy my boss and the company has given me (and the team in general). My incredible boss is always there when I need her and offers her guidance and assistance when I ask. But she also always gives me the opportunity to explore and figure out my own way even if it’s through mistakes sometimes. In addition, she has taken the time to share other aspects of the business with me (something she didn’t have to do) and helped me expand my professional boundaries. Once again, my boss is one of the big reasons, I appreciate and enjoy my job. Do be sure to find a boss/team/company that embraces a culture of growth and support.
There are other aspects of my job, I really like and appreciate[13]. But I do want to take the time to touch on one, somewhat large, negative of life outside of bedside.
I am about to make a pretty arrogant statement right now (don’t hate me): I used to think people in the business/sales/insert almost any ‘nonphysical’ job- didn’t really work all that much or not to the level of health care workers. I didn’t think there were too many ‘desk jobs’ that could compare to the mental, physical, and emotional stress of nursing. But I learned that work outside of nursing can be challenging and tough in its own way. The benefit of nursing is that no matter how horrible work is in the moment, for the most part, you don’t have to take it home with you (other than the emotional trauma from time to time). When you are home, you are home. In life outside of nursing, and especially working for a successful, expanding start up- you can work pretty long days and there are no set shifts, you work till you need to. The fact that you are accessible by email and phone almost 24/7, doesn't help. I feel "on" Monday-Friday sometimes from 7am in the morning till 8-9pm at night (writing emails, following up, etc.) And to all you nurses, who work three days a week (my previous schedule) this can be a pretty big change. Not to mention, nursing is pretty vacation friendly. You can pretty easily arrange your shifts to have four-six days off and get a little escape if and when you need to. In my world, you can definitely take a break when you need one[14] (my company's culture appreciates and recognizes the need for a work/life balance) but still it is by no means as flexible as a typical nursing schedule. FYI, there are many non clinical roles that are 9-5, no weekends, lower stress, etc.; I just happened to choose a more challenging position based on what was right for me. But in general, if you are looking to leave bedside/shift work, be ready to potentially sacrifice your days off/downtime.
6. Would I do it Again?
Yes. 100% yes.
Look, I am not going to lie, I do miss aspects of nursing. The most significant being, I miss working with patients. In nursing, no matter how horrible your day, at least you can walk away knowing you helped someone or tried to. Your day has this sense of greater purpose, that quite honestly, not many other lines of work have[15].
Lucky for me, I don't have to give that feeling up completely. I get to work with a company's whose product I truly believe in, and moreover, which I know will positively impact patient outcomes. In addition, I have the opportunity to learn so many new skills and grow tremendously professionally. I can now pretty confidently conduct and participate in meetings. I am significantly faster at writing work related emails. I still can not navigate excel- but lol I will make it happen one day.
More notably, In the last six months, my boss has allowed me the freedom (through her guidance) to build a team. This is my first meaningful experience- hiring, training, and managing a team. It has been one of the most challenging but also educational parts of my job thus far. I thought I had my organizational skills figured out during nursing- no sir, no. It wasn't until the last three months, where I had to manage my accounts, per diems, and my own work that I really learned how to optimize my organizational skills (still somewhat a work in progress). This skill alone was worth the career change.
But obviously, there is more...
FINAL THOUGHTS
On some level, I think my burnout in nursing had a little bit (a I mean only a very little bit) with complacency/stagnation. Not because I knew everything, trust me, that was not the case. There were plenty of things I could have learned if I wanted to- open hearts, ECMO, Swanz, etc. But to be honest, I just didn't have desire to (lol can you tell, hearts aren't my thing). And so I found myself operating more robotically than I liked with the things I did know. And I am just not about that life.
If there is one thing I have to give myself credit for, is not being afraid of change. And I urge you to do the same. If there is anything I have learned in the last 7 years- where I went from acute rehab to Neuro ICU to Travel ICU RN to now, Clinical Outcomes Director is any move is the right move, the only move that is the wrong move is no move.
If you are looking to change and looking to leave bedside, I say just take a leap of faith, and try something new. Worst case scenario, you go back. Best case scenario, you discover a whole new world[16].
[1]‘Get up 10’ is where I share insight into my personal growth, largely thanks to countless hours on the road that allowed me hours of reading, listening, and watching self-help material. Link:
[2] Primarily, because the last two months have been so busy and taxing, I feel it is negatively tainting my larger perspective. But also, nothing in life happens in isolation. As I previously stated, this past year has been one of enormous personal & professional change. The first six months of my career change, I was battling heartbreak, coupled with a recent move across the country away from my closest family and friends. It was one of the toughest times of my life, but ultimately, I made it through. When writing this post, I thought of trying to bar all personal matters, and to the best of my ability, objectively share my experience. However, let’s be real, rarely does everything in life go smoothly. And if you want insight into this world, then you might as well know what it is like when life is good, but also not so good.
[3]This is my own experience exclusive to my own unique job. This is in no way representative of all careers outside of bedside and patient care. Nurses, can and do, wear many hats…I just found myself drawn to this one.
[4] My top three reasons for leaving bedside were, I stopped enjoying nursing, increasing back pain/discomfort, and finally, I didn’t see myself growing in the role*. I always told myself, I didn’t want to be nurse ratchet. I wanted to always provide the best care for my patients, with a smile and positive energy. When I saw that it was becoming increasingly difficult to that, and that I was starting to resent work, I knew it was time to leave. I basically had a case of the unfortunately common ailment of ‘Healthcare Burnout’.
*(I didn’t want to be a nurse manager, NP, educator, or anyone of the other numerous clinical roles).
[5]Case and point are the recent remarks made by Senator Maureen Walsh of Washington State, where she suggests nurses spend their time playing cards instead of providing lifesaving care while advocating for not passing a bill that would require small hospitals to give uninterrupted meal and rest breaks. We need people who understand what patients and healthcare workers need to effectively make laws on health care.
[6]I interviewed for a corporate position in a travel nurse company, product manager for a pharmaceutical company, billing and compliance manager for a long-term care facility, and finally Clinical Outcomes Director for my current company. As you can tell, all very different positions in very different industries.
[7]My job at the most basic level involves, ensuring the successful adoption and maintained success of a new medical device into a facility. I support and manage the entire west coast territory up and down from Washington state to Arizona, and across out to Utah, Montana, Nevada, etc. Because we are a start up, we often wear many hats, so I have had the pleasure of learning, being offered insight, and engaging in the sales, clinical, and management side- even though that is not my primary role.
[8]Lol, a little funny true story, I literally used to be lost half the times in meetings for the first couple of months because of… idioms! Look I don’t know if this is a race thing, because I am not going to lie, I didn’t grow up with idioms- and the people who seem to use them the most are slightly older, white people or just a business/corporate world thing. But I swear to god, I was silently like “what the hell does that mean” every 15 minutes in meetings. If you are wondering what I am talking about, here are a couple of idioms that I had no idea what they meant: “Smoke and mirrors”, “Pie in the Sky”, “On a shoestring”. Could you believe it, I used to go home and google idioms that I didn’t understand!!
[9]I actually consider myself a decent writer, and I struggled (still sometimes struggle) with writing professional emails. Writing professionally is incredibly different than writing for pleasure or the forms of communication I was used to as a nurse (nurse’s notes within charting). I had to limit exclamation marks (I love exclamation marks!). Even though, I know emojis are not professional – I was surprised to learn how much of years of texting with them, made me dependent on using them to express tone/feelings in place of words. I, now, had to sometimes address difficult topics, and I couldn’t even add an ‘LOL’ at the end to soften the blow. It was struggle city lol.
[10]Communication in the corporate world is significantly different than communication in nursing on so many levels. First and foremost, as a nurse, you seek to build a relationship with your patient. You want your patient to trust you, feel comfortable with you, and you look to be a pillar of support for the patient as they fight their illness. This foundation of this relationship is built on honest, kind, simple, compassionate, and often, casual communication. This is a far cry from the formal, colder, and terse communication of the business world. Even with nursing colleagues and management, there is a sense of down to earth and realness in that communication. I mean, it is hard not to be, when you are literally dealing with matters of life and death. To this day, sometimes It is hard for me, to maintain my “new” standard of professional communication. Can’t a girl just keep it real?
[11]I finally forced myself to snap out of the rut of staying home and do things on the weekend. Especially for someone like me, social interaction and a sense of community are important and necessary for my mental health. Even so, there are still weekends I want to do absolutely nothing and stay home, and that is a battle I have to fight.
[12]For starters, you often don’t even know what city to date in. Most months, I spend more time in norcal than socal! But regardless of whether I dated a norcal guy or a socal guy or someone from out of state, I quickly learned- it is no easy feat. My life requires a large measure of patience and flexibility on a guy’s end. He has to be okay only seeing me a day or two a week (if that), not always hearing from me if I am super busy, and just generally, a not as attentive Nandita. I quickly realized, I should probably only date men just as busy. But then the challenge with dating someone just as busy, is it is hard to align schedules ad priorities. Lol it can be one big mess, that to be honest, I haven’t fully figured out. So, if you are single and want a relationship, and are considering a position like this, I would tell you to give it some good thought because I am not saying it is impossible (I dated a couple of guys for a couple of months in this past year) but it is 100 percent harder than normal dating- and let’s be real, that’s hard enough!!
[13] I love not having to work weekends (most of the times, every once in a while there is a rare weekend I have to work]. I love not having to work night shifts, or taxing my body with heavy lifting and other strains that patient care can induce. I do appreciate the relief of not having some one else's life in my hands. I think on some level (though it can definitely be annoying too), I appreciate the inconsistency of my work- there is never a boring day. The list goes on and on.
[14] As much as our company is supportive of taking time off, truth is- most of our team is a stakeholder, and on some level, we want to work to ensure the success of the business. So, for example, we have been growing and expanding rapidly since January, and the whole team has been working pretty tirelessly, and as much as we all probably want a break, we also want to see things get done, get done well, and get done now rather than never. It is a different mindset, and does require a certain amount of dedication and sacrifice.
[15] I am looking to get back into volunteer work soon, and find a way to give back. I am thinking monthly beach clean ups! I think it is really important to give back to your community and find a way to be a meaningful member of society. Not everyone can be an activist, health care worker, public defender, teacher, etc.... but everyone can do there to help make life better for themselves, and the communities they live in.
[16] I have watched a little too much Disney in my life for own good, also I really couldn't think of a better title. And finally, lol I got sick of writing on this topic (thanks to my short attention span) and wanted to wrap this ish up. So boom!
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