Relocating for your career can be transformative on many levels. Opening yourself up to the possibility of moving to a new area for work broadens the field for nursing jobs and new experiences. While relocating for a career in nursing offers an opportunity to augment your resume, you shouldn’t deny the personal growth aspect of a relocation. Here we look at 10 reasons you should consider relocating for your nursing career.
Ten Reasons to Consider Relocating for A Career in Nursing
- Professional Growth: When you open yourself up to relocating for a career in nursing, there are so many more new opportunities that await. Specialized units and trauma centers provide ways to grow professionally that you may not have access to in your current location.
- Career advancement: Depending on where you hope to relocate, you’ll have more access to top-tier hospitals, which means more opportunity for leadership roles and experiences to advance your nursing career.
- Develop New Skills: Not all healthcare organizations do things the same way. You’ll be exposed to different protocols and different ways of thinking. You’ll develop new skills that you can take with you and use to build on in your next career move, including exposure to new technologies.
- Expanded Networking: Relocating for your nursing career means developing working relationships and even friendships with an entirely new group of people. Diversifying your professional peer group opens up new networking opportunities that will serve you well throughout your career.
- Diverse Patient Population: Relocating to different parts of the country exposes you to different patient populations. When you go from rural to more populated areas, or from a large metropolitan city to a remote town, healthcare needs and focuses change. If you’re feeling stagnant or starting to feel indifferent in your nursing career, relocation can help. Even a temporary move to a completely new area as a traveling nurse can do wonders to reignite your passion for nursing.
- Cost of Living: Some nurses choose to relocate to an area with a lower cost of living. If you’re feeling the pain of financial stress, relocating for your nursing career may be a good idea.
- Reimbursement for Licensing: In many cases, if you need additional credentialing or you need stat-specific licensing, your employer may offer financial reimbursement.
- Better Compensation: Relocating can mean a better compensation package, including benefits. Some regions, rural, and large city hospitals and healthcare centers experience the nursing shortage much more intensely. Healthcare organizations in these areas typically offer a much more competitive compensation package and sometimes a sign-on bonus. Even if the cost of living is slightly higher than what you’re used to, the move may prove to be worth your while.
- Improved Quality of Life: Relocating for a career in nursing can provide a fresh start in both your professional and personal life. You’ll open up new cultural experiences, new opportunities to socialize, and discover new interests. By electing to relocate, you can move to a faster-paced environment that’s exciting and aligns with where you are in your life, or choose a small town location that offers a way of life you desire.
- Better Work-Life Balance: When your work and your life are in balance, your career excels. When you relocate, you may find that the pace of life and the demands of your career fall into balance with your personal life. That’s a great reason for relocating.
How Relocating for A Career in Nursing Changes Your Life
Relocating for your nursing career can transform you both professionally and personally. But there are some key aspects to consider. Even if you want to pursue a temporary relocation or try travel nursing, you need to approach these changes in a thoughtful way.
Economic Benefits: The economic benefits of relocating for a career in nursing can impact your career today and for years to come. The exposure to diverse patient populations, the adaptability that comes from adjusting to a new workplace, and learning new techniques and protocols simply make you a better nurse. That means you’ll be much more in demand when you look for new opportunities.
Workplace Culture: Workplace culture factors highly in your job satisfaction. When you’re unhappy in your job, you are subject to burnout. The stress of a poor workplace culture wears on everyone sooner or later. When you relocate, you can leave the old workplace culture behind. Sometimes, simply by changing your environment, you find you’re in a better culture with like-minded people.
Lifestyle: One of the surest paths to career happiness and overall contentment in your place in the world is found by nurturing your lifestyle. Depending on the type of lifestyle you appreciate, your environment makes a huge difference. For example, if you are someone who likes the beach and longs to be near the ocean instead of being landlocked, relocate to an area that offers that option. Likewise of you prefer hiking in the mountains, look for a location that helps nurture that part of your lifestyle. Maybe you enjoy music and entertainment and dining in the big city, or long to be closer to a loved one. Relocating for a career in nursing isn’t always just about your job.
Practical Ways to Approach Relocating for A Career in Nursing
Relocating for a career in nursing does involve a few tasks in order to be successful. If you have a specific location in mind, or even a few locations, research that state’s licensing process. Once you relocate, you will need to obtain licensure to practice.
Nurse Licensure Compact
It’s important to note that if you have a Nurse Licensure Compact (NLC) that allows you to practice in 42 states, including all of the southeastern states. The NLC comes with many benefits, including:
- The Ability to Practice in Other States: Nurses can practice both telehealth and in-person in compact states without going through that state’s licensing process.
- Saves Time and Money: Having an NLC means you don’t have to apply for and pay for more than one state license.
- Makes it Easy to Relocate: When you consider relocating for a career in nursing, your NLC allows you to move and quickly obtain what you need to work in that NLC state.
- Improves Patient Access to Care: For travel nurses and those who are part of a disaster response team, having licensure in the form of NLC means being able to act fast and also facilitating access to care in underserved communities.
Logistical Planning
You will need to budget for your relocation, and in order to plan realistically, you’ll need to do your research. Here are some tips for planning the logistics of your move.
- Narrow Down Your Locations: Once you have a general idea of where you’d like to relocate for your nursing career, begin looking into facilities that interest you. Check out the patient population, investigate the organization’s reputation, and find out what you can about their workplace culture and employee satisfaction.
- Plan a Realistic Budget: Moving can be expensive, so allocate generously. Remember, there will be deposits for housing and utilities, the expense of moving your belongings, or finding storage in the meantime, and a cushion for living expenses for a few months as you adjust.
- Find Your Housing: You’ll need to research areas in which you hope to live. Make sure they are safe and an easy commute to your workplace. Find out if the social aspects of the area are in line with what you want. Finally, plan to investigate, in person, your options for housing. What you see online isn’t always what you’ll find when you move in.
- Network with Locals: Reach out to professional nursing organizations such as the local chapter of the American Nurses Association. Your best advice and insight will often come from your peers.
- Look at Your Cost of Living: While your new salary may seem generous compared to what you make now, the cost of living may be much higher in your new location. You’ll probably be able to get an idea of the cost of living based on the rental prices.
Travel Nursing
Travel nursing is a great way to “test the waters.” Healthcare facilities in underserved communities or those that face understaffing need travel nurses to fill those gaps. Travel nurses often find work in hospitals, clinics, or specialty units. As a travel nurse, you’re typically held to a 13-week contract.
A job as a travel nurse benefits your career in many ways, from exposing you to different patient populations to providing a view into a new environment. The flexibility that comes from travel nursing is a significant benefit. You can put down temporary roots while you determine if this is where you want to be.
Travel nursing is a great way to reignite your passion for your career. And the compensation you receive as a travel nurse often includes a bump in your hourly wage, tax-free housing stipends, and travel reimbursement. Depending on the agency, there may be additional benefits to working as a travel nurse.
How to Find the Best Nursing Jobs Outside of Your Immediate Area
If you’re considering relocating for a career in nursing, you’re about to enter into an exciting experience. Moving to a new and different area of the country, or simply a different part of your state, means new opportunities in all areas of your life. And with the current nursing shortage, you are sure to find work.
Searching for the job you want in the area in which you wish to relocate is difficult if you go it alone. Poring over job listings, reviewing large medical center job postings, or sending your resume to hiring managers in healthcare organizations is a tedious method for relocating for a career in nursing.
A much easier, efficient, and personable way to find the perfect job for you, in the ideal location, and one that meets all of your requirements is by going through BOS Medical Staffing. At BOS Medical Staffing, we’re much more than just a staffing agency. We partner with nurses to find the right position. We get to know you so we can find your perfect match and help you grow your career.
If you’re considering relocating for a career in nursing, please contact us at BOS Medical Staffing today. A whole new world awaits!
