Tips & Advice For Newly Registered Nurses

"We’re all here because we want to make a difference, but it is not easy, and I would be lying if I was to say that it's been a walk in the park. But at the same time, it has been an amazing journey. And it still is an amazing journey."

Newly Qualified Nurse Alex shares her tips for other NQNs, covering everything from researching your role through to staying open to learning new things and trying new skills.

Hi guys, for those of you who do not know who I am, my name is Alex. I am a Newly Qualified Paediatric Nurse currently working in a neonatal intensive care unit.

Today, I'm just going to be talking about my experience as a Newly Qualified Nurse, or NQN, I'll be using the terms interchangeably, about my experience and about tips that I have for any Student Nurses that are about to qualify or any other Newly Qualified Nurses that might be watching this and might want some advice or want to hear about what it's like first-hand from myself. So, if that interests you, then keep watching.

Challenges That Come With Being A NQN Today

I just kind of wanted to give a little introduction about the difficulties that can arise with being an NQN, especially in the current climate that we're in. We're living in this post-COVID world, and we're living in a world, particularly in the UK, where healthcare is suffering.

The NHS is really on its knees in every single aspect of care, at the moment. And obviously, I can only really speak for the neonatal and paediatric side, but I know it is a problem globally and nationally. It's a massive struggle, and it has been a massive struggle for a long time, not just during COVID and post-COVID.

I'm part of a COVID cohort. We went into lockdown when I was in my first year, halfway through my first year. So, I've kind of qualified through the end of the pandemic and have seen the effects that it's had on patient care, and staffing and burnout and things like that.

Becoming qualified at this time has been very overwhelming. I think qualifying anyway in that transition from Student Nurse to Staff Nurse is really overwhelming in general. But during this time, where there's a lot of short staffing issues, and there's not as much support as there might be if staffing was safer and areas were consistently well staffed. It is difficult. It is a big jump.

I'm hearing a lot of negative things in the press, hearing a lot of negative things from people around you about how tired they are, how fed up they are. Sometimes it's not very encouraging at all, but you just have to form your own opinions about things and just stay true to yourself, and really push through because we all kind of came into this profession for a reason. You have to hold your reason and your purpose close, otherwise you can lose yourself.

You have to just remember to look after yourself. The times that we're living in as the NHS, as nurses, are very scary. A lot of the time, we have to compromise patient care and we have to really make even more difficult decisions with our time management.

Our days can be very stressful. Sometimes we're not leaving on time. I have a lot of colleagues, that work in different areas, that leave one hour or two hours after their specific time of finishing work. And it's just not okay, but that's the reality of it.

Tips For NQNs

We’re all here because we want to make a difference, but it is not easy, and I would be lying if I was to say that it's been a walk in the park. But at the same time, it has been an amazing journey. And it still is an amazing journey.

So, I'm just going to give some more tips about how to get through being an NQN and what can maybe help you to make your ride a bit smoother.

Research Your Role

First thing I would say is to do research if you're working somewhere that's quite specialist. Obviously where I work is really specialist, in the NICU. If you're working in respiratory, oncology, liver, cardiology, surgery, anything, do your research.

Do your research about the Trust, about the hospital that you're working in, especially if you're moving somewhere else for your first job. Research the ward, research types of patients that come in, the most common conditions that you're going to come across, common medications. That will set you up really well.

Obviously, you're not going to know everything, you're never going to know everything. Just try and do as much research and preparation as you can, it will set you in good stead so that you're able to answer people's questions, maybe if patients or families have questions, and you're able to feel more confident in your own knowledge when you're looking after your patients as well.

Sometimes, You Might Get It Wrong- And That’s OK

Also, don't beat yourself up about maybe answering a question wrong if you're being assessed on something or for not knowing answer to a question. The amount of times somebody's asked me a question, like a parent or something, and I'll just be like, "I'll be honest with you, I'm not too sure, but I can ask this person for you," or "I will double check with this person."

It's better to be honest than to just make up an answer and kind of waffle your way through, because that's not a good thing to do. If you're not sure about something, just ask. No one's going to laugh at you for double-checking something because it's better to be safe than sorry.

Be annoying, ask as many questions as you need to ask because it's better for your learning, and it's better for your patients and their care because, at the at the end of the day, that is the priority. Ask for help, ask questions. Don't be afraid to ask something that you might think is stupid. It's better to know than to not know.

Stay True To Who You Are

And just be yourself. You don't want to try and fake who you are or try to force people to like you. There will be people that you might not get along with. You know, you might clash heads with people. Just be true to yourself.

Be friendly, be approachable, even if you're not having a good day. If you are really struggling, talk to somebody, but don't take it out on other people, or, you know, be that nurse that nobody wants to work with. You don't want to be that person. So just be yourself, be friendly, be approachable, especially if there are people that are newer than you. Be friendly and always be humble and remember what it's like to be the new person or to be the most junior person in a situation because we're all going to grow with experience and become more senior eventually, and there'll always be people that are more junior than you.

You just have to remember where you came from and always be supportive of other people because at the end of the day, we're all working in one massive team. It's a 24-hour service if you're working on a ward. We're all there to help and support each other, so you’ve just got to be a good person, be a nice person and treat people how you'd want to be treated. I think that's really important.

We’re all here because we want to make a difference, but it is not easy, and I would be lying if I was to say that it's been a walk in the park. But at the same time, it has been an amazing journey. And it still is an amazing journey.

Work-Life Balance Is Vital

Another really important thing that I'd love to stress to people when they ask me for advice is please figure out a work-life balance as early as you possibly can. This is something that you can get into practice with when you're a student and when you're on placement: how to manage placement, assignments, family life, social life, whatever you've got going on privately.

But figuring out a work-life balance is so important because this job is not easy. You have your amazing days, you have those shifts where you're like "Oh my gosh, this is amazing!" You have those shifts where you can't wait to go home. It really varies. This job is a very up and down.

So always make sure you're prioritizing yourself, prioritizing your rest, prioritizing if you've got errands to run, if you've got appointments to go to, pamper yourself, make sure you're staying in contact with your friends, whether that be fellow nursing friends, your other friends in your personal life, or your family. Prioritizing your relationships is so important because, otherwise, you're just going to lose yourself.

It can become very isolating and then that's when it can start to take a toll on your mental health. And then that's going to take a toll on how you perform at work and how you feel at work, and it's just going to be a downward spiral from there. So, making sure that very early on, you can figure out how to manage your time and how to balance doing a little bit of everything without exhausting yourself. I think that is a really important thing.

I've been qualified for nearly six months now, and I've been working as an NQN for just over five months, and I think just now I've got to a point where I'm really prioritizing my time. I make the most out of my days off.

If I've got annual leave, I'll use some of it to rest. I'll use some of it to travel, use some of my days off to see my friends, to prioritize appointments, whether that be like beauty appointments, hair appointments, or like health appointments, anything. Make sure you are getting everything done that you need to get done.

But also have days during your week where you're not working to just chill. Like it's so important that you need your downtime, but you also need a social life, especially if you're young like me. I went to uni straight from school. You don't want to miss out on being young and enjoying yourself. You don't want to sacrifice your time. Well, no matter how old you are, you don't want to sacrifice your time and not enjoy the time you have off. Like, we have time off for a reason. So just enjoy it and try not to isolate yourself because it can get to that point; just make sure it doesn't.

Use Benefits You Might Be Offered

And that kind of goes into utilizing your benefits. With your NHS discount, showing your ID, you can get discounts for so many restaurants, shops, and gym memberships.

Look on your Trust website and see if you can get any local discounts around your hospital, because I know quite a lot of hospitals do that, like local restaurants around the hospital will give you discount if you show your ID. You can get travel discounts, so many things.

Take Advantage Of Request Days

Utilize your request days every month. Depending on where you work, where I work it's five days every month or every rotor block, I get five request days off. Use them, it doesn't come out for your annual leave. Plan your shifts if you can. Self-roster if you can. Decide to make the most of your time and your days off.

That is the beauty of shift work, I feel like. Even though the days are long, your shifts are long, you're working all sorts of random hours and shift patterns, you can utilize the days off and the benefits that kind of come with that.

There are a lot of perks, there are a lot of downsides, but if you know how to manage your time, you can really, really enjoy yourself when you're not at work and make sure that you're not burnt out.

Speak Up

Another thing is make sure you speak up. If you are not happy with the situation, if you're not happy with the patient caseload, if you're not happy with the way someone's treating you or with how safe you feel at work, or if you're concerned about your patients, speak up.

Tell somebody that you trust, somebody that's more senior. If you need to fill an incident report form about something, fill it out. Just don't be afraid to do that. It's better to document something and speak up about something then to not say anything at all. It's always good to cover your back and speak up when things aren't right.

Or if you witness something, it doesn't even have to be something that you experience, and you don't think it's okay, speak up about it because things like that aren't okay. No one should have to come to work and feel like they're dreading it, or feel anxiety, or feel scared about what they're walking into; that's not okay. So always remember that you have a voice and that you should use it.

Ask as many questions as you need to ask… it's better for your learning, and it's better for your patients and their care because that is the priority. Ask for help, ask questions. Don't be afraid to ask something that you might think is stupid. It's better to know than to not know.

Be The Mentor You Would Want To Have

Treat students with respect. As an NQN, you were only just a student a few months ago.

It's so important, as I kind of said before, to just be humble and remember where you came from because if you become the type of nurse or the type of mentor, supervisor, assessor, whatever you want to call it that picks on students, gives them a hard time, that is just so horrible to me because you need to remember where you came from.

You were a student not that long ago, and everybody knows how horrible that feeling is when you have a nurse or a supervisor that comes to you and is just not very welcoming, not very willing to teach you things. I really enjoy having students. I think it is quite difficult to teach students when you're still learning yourself; I like that is quite difficult.

But whatever time you have, just answer questions. If you don't know the answer, be honest with them. Just make sure you can be the best or prepare to be the best mentor that you can be because students are the future, they're our future colleagues. They are the future of the NHS just like we once were. Treat them with respect.

I think it's important to remember that like being a student is really difficult, and you don't know what people have got going on in their personal lives as well on top of being a Student Nurse. If someone seems a bit dissociated or not as engaged, don't give them a hard time, actually ask them, "Are you okay? What's wrong?" Because they're not being paid to be there, like they might be dealing with a lot of things at home. They might be really stressed about just the course in general.

Just be respectful, be kind, but push students, encourage them to learn, and just be really supportive and be the mentor you would want to have. Be your own dream mentor, I think is probably the best advice I could give.

Stay Open To What Your Role Can Bring You

And then the last thing I would say is just be open.

Be open to learning new things. Be open to building new relationships with people that you work with. Be open to trying new skills, even working in other places you can join, and start working in different areas.

If you're not happy where you are, be open. Even if you think, "Oh this is where I really wanted to be. Like I don't want to move around," be open to moving around because you're so new. There's so many different like avenues you can go down in nursing, it's ridiculous. You don't have to settle. There are so many different opportunities.

And everywhere, every single area of work in healthcare, is always going to need a nurse, so you're not limited for choice. So just do whatever you feel you need to do and just be happy. If you're not happy, if something's not serving you, leave. There's so many other opportunities within the NHS and within nursing that can serve you and accommodate better with your lifestyle and still give you the same satisfaction of delivering good patient care, and still feeling like you’re delivering a good service.

I feel like those are the main tips that I have for any prospective or current NQN's. I hope that helps. If you are prospective or current NQN, I hope everything is going well for you and wish you the best of luck. I know, as I'm currently experiencing it, that it is not easy at all, but you just have to push through it and try your best and just enjoy every second of it because you've got this far, so just keep pushing.

Thank you for watching, and I'll see you in my next video.

Bye.