Nursing management career paths are varied, and very often nurses need to make significant career choices about what is best for their overall career and wellbeing. At some point, many nurses face the decision to either leave the healthcare industry or find a career within the industry solving the issues they face utilising their skills and experience.
Practice Management can provide the logical and practical nursing career pathway that happily satisfies the many reasons you entered nursing as a profession in the first place.
Here are 5 key reasons that Practice Management is ideal for nurses who are making a career change.
1. A more rewarding, and ‘less stressed’ workplace
As a career nurse, you may recognise these key stressors:
- The challenge of balancing workplace demands with family demands.
- The feeling you are working harder yet being less effective in your role.
- Finding that the stressors are affecting your quality of life and your performance.
Practice Management can provide you with a workplace where there are minimal night or weekend shifts and quickly return your work-life-family balance. It can provide greater independence and autonomy to the competent nursing professional and provides a rewarding and productive alternative in comparison to hospital-based workloads while still doing much of what you love about nursing.
2. Continue making a difference
Nurses love their work because they want to make a difference. You are likely to recognise these common motivations:
- A desire to help
- Career diversity
- Ongoing professional and personal growth
- Challenge
- The potential for career and salary growth
- Job security
Nurses often revel in the knowledge that what they do makes a difference, and this can be one of the main reasons they continue to work in a hospital and related settings. A change in career direction as a Practice Manager can give these same levels of satisfaction and motivation.
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3. An obvious platform to maximise your experience
You can easily transfer your skills and experience and use them as a platform for career advancement in a Practice Manager’s role. There are many areas in Practice Management that overlap with nursing. These include working with diverse people, work health and safety, quality client service and leading teams, areas in which nurses are highly skilled.
4. Heightened independence and authority at work
As a Practice Manager, you’ll be responsible for the overall management, the staff, stakeholders and the clients of that Practice. You will be given the scope to expand your skills and implement knowledge in areas such as:
- Setting strategy and managing the operational plan
- Recruitment, selection and inductions
- Performance management
- Legal and ethical compliance
- Health billing and accounting, along with managing budgets and financial plans
- Using your skills and experience in patient care to create a safe place every client needs
5. Salary isn’t everything, but in this case, it’s better than expected
Another attractive part of the change in career direction from nurse to Practice Manager is the opportunity to attain salary equivalence. A median salary for a Registered Nurse is approximately
Securing your new Career Pathway
You have already shown competence in your current career as a nurse. To capitalise on your background and capabilities and to provide you with the confidence to move smoothly into your new role, it is important to make sure you are suitably qualified.
Gaining a Diploma in Practice Management (HLT57715) is a logical next step. You can move forward in your career and gain the professional and financial rewards waiting for you as a valued and respected Practice Manager.