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There is no health without care. From asking where it hurts to monitoring the ICU, you combine skill and compassion in everything you do. You could probably explain a thing or two to Dr. House!
You’d make an excellent addition to the nursing staff at any medical institution. It’s just that the recruiter doesn’t know it yet… How do you get the point across?
Send them the best registered nurse resume that demonstrates your nursing skills and key accomplishments, in less time than it takes to set up an IV.
This guide will show you:
A professional registered nurse resume example better than 9 out of 10 other resumes.
How to write a resume for registered nursing jobs that will land you more interviews.
Tips and examples of how to put skills and achievements on an RN resume.
How to describe your experience on a resume for registered nurses to get any job you want.
Want to save time and have your resume ready in 5 minutes? Try our resume builder. It’s fast and easy to use. Plus, you’ll get ready-made content to add with one click. See 20+ resume templates and create your resume here.
Licensed RN with 5+ years of clinical experience, seeking to ensure high quality care at Lutheran Medical Center through proven daily care skills. Maintained 95% patient satisfaction at Centura Health. Successfully onboarded 10 new nurses.
Centura Health
Registered Nurse
2012–2018
Handled care, safety, and long term health plans for 15+ patients. Commended 10+ times for efficiency and problem-solving skills by preceptor.
Assisted patients with limited mobility in all necessary movement. Maintained 97% positive patient scores for compassion.
Created assessments, diagnoses, and plan-of-care for high-volume of patients.
Onboarded 10 new nurses and trained in quality, personalized care and compliance policies.
Key Achievement
Supervised refurbishing of meeting rooms to create a more comfortable, friendly space for difficult discussions with patients and/or their families.
Education
Bachelor of Science in Nursing
University of Colorado
Completion: 2012
Certifications and Licensure
Registered Nurse, Colorado Board of Nursing, License # 0000000
Phlebotomy Certification
Patient Care Technician Certification
Basic Life Support Certification (BLS)
Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist (CRNA)
CPR Certification
Skills
Patient Assessment
Stress Management
Attention to Detail
Compassion
Safe Patient Transfers
Microsoft Office
Wound Care
Decision Making
Interests
Elderly patient care
New technology
Psychology
Everyday Emergency Podcast
Languages
Spanish (Conversational)
Now let’s get to writing a job-winning RN resume.
1
Structure Your Registered Nurse Resume Template Properly
What would you do if you saw a colleague administering medication before calling for appropriate tests and asking the patient how they felt?
Yeah, I can see them being flung out the doors right now.
Medical treatment is a structured process for a reason. It’s the same with your resume. Good formatting ensures good readability.
You’re not going to begin with a resume objective/summary, though. Think of it as a diagnosis.
Start to go through each section—your job experience, education, and skills, gathering up the most notable of them along the way. When you’re done, go back to the beginning of your resume and write an intro that encompasses the whole of your resume.
2
Start with a Registered Nurse Resume Work Experience Section
Employment forecasts say that there will be above average growth in nursing jobs in the coming years.
In fact, the BLS predicts that there will be more registered nurse jobs than for any other profession in the U.S. by 2022 and after.
But that doesn’t make your life any easier.
Rising employment demand means a rise in the amount of people taking up nursing as a career. That means more competition for you.
Hospitals and treatment centers also aren’t just going to take anyone of the street. After all, you’re in the business of saving lives—you need to be the best.
So how do you convince the hiring manager that you are, indeed, the best?
Here’s the best way to create a registered nurse resume description of your job experience:
Georgia Department of Public Health, Brunswick, GA
Key Responsibilities:
Assessed patient’s health care needs on the basis of initial patient screening and senior nurse’s recommendations.
Consulted health care team to plan and implement patients’ long term health care plan.
Monitored and recorded patient symptoms and condition and added them to detailed patient reports.
Key Achievement
Proposed new stock replenishing system to ensure each shift starts at full stock.
Wrong
Nursing Student
Dec 2018-March 2019
Georgia Department of Public Health, Brunswick, GA
Key Responsibilities:
Monitored patients’ condition.
Provided health care and first aid.
Prepared rooms and equipment.
As you can see, even short, entry-level experience gained as a nursing student can speak volumes when presented correctly. Now that's what a resume should look like!
The wrong example is so vague that it could have been written on the basis of watching Grey’s Anatomy.
When making a resume in our builder, drag & drop bullet points, skills, and auto-fill the boring stuff. Spell check? Check. Start building a professional resume template here for free.
Though it may be tempting, refrain from adding your GPA on a resume unless it’s higher than your own blood pressure. If you’re an experienced RN, leave out your GPA completely.
For inexperienced RNs who were the smartest nurse in the room, it might be a good idea to add your magna cum laude on your resume.
This is what it would look like:
Right
Bachelors of Science in Nursing, magna cum laude
University of Washington, Seattle, WA
Completion: 2016
Super simple!
You may be wondering where the rest of your credentials should go. We’ll discuss them in the next section.
The hiring manager has 99 problems, but finding your credentials shouldn’t be one.
Nursing is quite unique in the fact that it’s not enough to just have a higher education. There’s also a number of certificates, renewable licenses, and credentials registered nurses need in order to practice nursing.
Now that may seem a little overwhelming, but thankfully the American Nursing Credentialing Center (ANCC) has come to the rescue with a universal format to list all this information cohesively.
List registered nursing education and credentials in this order:
Degree
License
State designations or requirements
National certifications
Awards and honors
Other recognitions
Let’s take a look at how that should look on a registered nurse resume:
Registered Nurse Resume Licenses and Certifications Sample
Right
Registered Nurse, Oregon, license # 12345678
Board Certified Family Nurse Practitioner (FNP-BC)
Basic Life Support for Health Care Providers (BLS)
Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS)
CPR Certification
See that? Easy peasy.
And here's a pro tip: add your RN credentials after your name in the resume header.
List Registered Nurse Skills Relevant to Your Specialization
Although the demand for nurses is rising, the growth in specific specializations isn’t uniform, with demand growing much faster in specializations such as medical-surgical, OR, ICU, or ER.
Healthcare recruiters don’t need to sift through another pile of vague resumes from candidates who cared for patients. They’re looking for specialized nurses and fast.
So how to pinpoint the key skills that make your resume stand out?
Follow these tips:
Let the job ad give you useful hints as to what they’re looking for through resume keywords.
Think about what relevant skills and certifications you’ve acquired over time. Look at your credentials and experience sections for extra inspiration.
Pinpoint the skills on your master list that match those required in the job ad.
Make a list of the 5-10 most relevant professional skills in your registered nurse resume skills section.
Always remember to include both hard skills and soft skills on your resume. They’re equally important!
Take another look at your experience section. Does it prove the skills you just listed? Make sure these two sections compliment each other like scrubs and a lucky surgical cap.
The following registered nursing skills will help you compile your list:
Cut down that time by showing the hiring manager that not only are you skilled in saving a life, but that you have a passion for living it as well.
How?
Lots of RNs are going to have the same skills and similar experience to you. You can stand out through your interests and passions. A well-crafted additional resume section will have recruiters breathing a sigh of relief and saying “This is the one!”
Knowledge of a foreign language can really give you a big advantage over other candidates. From gathering patient history to talking through treatment to reassuring worried family members, knowing a foreign language can be a very valuable asset.
No one cares that you love cats, right? Maybe the recruiter doesn’t, but they will be interested in your curiosity about psychology, meditating, healthy eating. These hobbies not only demonstrate you have passions outside of work, but they can also be a positive influence on your work.
Memberships in Organizations
Demonstrating membership in a medical or nursing association shows the hiring manager that you take your career seriously and that nursing isn’t just some job for you.
Volunteer work may not carry the same weight as your job experience, but it does demonstrate a passion to help others, one of the crucial attributes of a fantastic registered nurse. And don't forget about your experience shadowing.
Skim over your resume once again. Look for the skills and achievements that stand out like a Mickey Mouse band aid.
Choose 2-3 of those top achievements that will get the recruiter’s heart racing and write out your heading statement based on them.
Now—
If you have years of experience and quite a list of skills, choose the professional summary.
The resume summary gives a brief, but impressive overview of your accomplishments and experience. This is the definite go to if you could teach Dr. Mike a thing or two.
Take a look at these two registered nurse resume summary examples:
Registered Nurse Resume Summary
Right
Enthusiastic and friendly registered nurse with 6+ years’ experience of providing high quality care to a variety of patients. Feels comfortable working in 20+ bed units and in dynamic environments such as ER or ICU. Looking to leverage wide range of nursing skills and knowledge as a registered nurse at East Orange General Hospital.
Wrong
Experienced registered nurse committed to high quality care looking to effectively fill nursing position at EOGH.
That wrong example will make the recruiter feel like they’re waiting outside the ER—they’re anxious and are starved for information.
So what if you’re just starting out as a registered nurse?
Use the professional objective. This is the go to when you have little experience and need to lean on your skills and knowledge to show you’re a valuable hire.
Here are two registered nurse resume objective samples:
Registered Nurse Resume Objectives
Right
Friendly, compassionate, and positive new RN grad with 80 hours of clinical experience and 15 hours in critical care as a nursing student. Looking to leverage knowledge and passion for elderly patient care as a registered nurse at Roosevelt Care Center.
Wrong
I’ve just finished nursing school and I’d like to use my enthusiasm and hard work to care for elderly patients!
Both the summary and objective follow the same rules—tailor your objective to the needs of the employer and impress through numbers.
You don’t need to write a cover letter. Especially if the job ad doesn’t ask for one. Even more so if you want your resume rolled straight into the morgue.
Think of it like a pair of brightly colored, clean scrubs—if the recruiter sees both a well-written resume and cover letter, they’ll know that they’ve got a professional who knows that nursing is more than cleaning bedpans and giving shots.
This is how to write a registered nurse cover letter:
Plus, a great cover letter that matches your resume will give you an advantage over other candidates. You can write it in our cover letter builder here. Here's what it may look like:
Oliwia is a career expert with a solid background in various industries, including consulting and aviation. At Zety, she writes dedicated, advice-driven guides to help readers create great resumes and cover letters to land the job of their dreams.
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In this guide you’ll learn *when* and *how* to use a general, universal resume. Plus, you’ll see an easy-to-use template you can copy and tweak in no time.