Nursing job in Bozeman!

Bozeman, MT (Mom and Nanuq)

I’m stoked!!! After a few months of disheartening job hunting, I was fortunate to land a nursing job in my home town of  Bozeman, MT. It wasn’t my original plan, but I couldn’t be happier. I’m thrilled on the job, and I can’t wait to start working at Bozeman Deaconess Hospital and get some solid RN experience. Medical/Surgical floors….here I come! I knew the job market would be tougher than normal when I graduated, but I had no idea that it would be this bad….I mean, I’m a nurse. I quickly found out that employers at the moment don’t want to deal with the investment of a new nurse when budgets are tight and experienced nurses came back to work, didn’t retire, or went part-time to full-time in this unique and troublesome economic climate. I thought graduating in nursing was a sure thing, bad economy or not. I’ve learned that is not necessarily the case. Although, while it’s a more formidable process than normal for the new graduate nurse, it is still just a matter of time, a matter or when and not if. Some professions probably can’t say the same.

It has been a frustrating and eye opening experience this winter as I exhausted hospital after hospital west of the Mississippi, so I have one more rant before I get off of my soap box. I would like to send a heads up, out to all upcoming new graduate nurses….I highly recommend starting your job hunt early. While the final push is full of papers, exams, and stress–take the time to inquire with nurse recruiters and upcoming new grad programs or internships. It is my belief that many organizations are taking care of their own, so to speak, right now with the few, new graduate RN positions that are out there. I can definitely tell you this, experience trumps education big time at the moment. Unless you’re okay with chill’n for the next six months to a year, waiting for something to open up, get your foot in the door any way possible and get on it now, because it’s not easy. Granted things are extremely different than normal, and a lot of schools may not even realize the extent of difficulty for their students in this unique job climate, but I didn’t get a whole lot of anything from my faculty with regards to preparing for this beat down. I’m wishing someone had thrown me a bone, but maybe it just wasn’t something anyone saw coming. With that said, I’ll get off my soap box…just some food for thought and words to the wise.

After all my hunting, I find myself in the place where it all began. After being here for almost three months now, I’ve realized how much I missed Bozeman. I’m actually really happy to be back and thrilled to stick around for awhile. I have the mountains again, including Bridger Bowl, and I have beautiful Montana summers. On top of all that, I have my family and some really cool friends.

I had grandiose dreams of nursing in a big city, wading through level one trauma in the emergency department, but when it’s all said and done, I’m pretty blessed and stoked that things worked out the way they did. It’s funny how it works like that…I say, “everything for a reason.” That’s not to say I may not look for that high acuity, high stress emergency department down the road, but for now, I’m home.

Bozeman Deaconess Hospital in the background….my new home of employment!

Bad cell phone photos, but South Bozeman and Spanish Peaks in the background of photo on the left and Bridger Mountains to the North in photo on the right. A nice March day for a dog walk.

South Bozeman in March…it’ll be beautiful when its green.