If healthcare is your name and helping patients is your game, then you might consider a career as a staff nurse. Typically, you'll work in a healthcare facility of some sort, whether that be a hospital or a nursing home.
As a staff nurse, you'll be working closely with doctors and other nurses to ensure patients receive the utmost care and treatment for their health conditions. Usually, this line of work seals the deal with crazy hours. But staff nurses tend to be a little different.
It can vary, but you usually won't work over 40 hours a week. In fact, some weeks you may only work 35 hours. This great schedule does come with a price tag - student debt, to be exact. In order to become a staff nurse, you'll need to earn a bachelor's degree. I mean, you have to know what you're doing in this job so that much makes sense.
Staff Nurse Overview
Staff Nurse Careers
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a staff nurse. For example, did you know that they make an average of $28.69 an hour? That's $59,684 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 12% and produce 371,500 job opportunities across the U.S.
What Does a Staff Nurse Do
There are certain skills that many staff nurses have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed communication skills, compassion and detail oriented.
When it comes to the most important skills required to be a staff nurse, we found that a lot of resumes listed 14.9% of staff nurses included patient care, while 9.5% of resumes included bls, and 9.4% of resumes included health care. Hard skills like these are helpful to have when it comes to performing essential job responsibilities.
When it comes to searching for a job, many search for a key term or phrase. Instead, it might be more helpful to search by industry, as you might be missing jobs that you never thought about in industries that you didn't even think offered positions related to the staff nurse job title. But what industry to start with? Most staff nurses actually find jobs in the health care and non profits industries.
How To Become a Staff Nurse
If you're interested in becoming a staff nurse, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 39.4% of staff nurses have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 4.8% of staff nurses have master's degrees. Even though some staff nurses have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a staff nurse. When we researched the most common majors for a staff nurse, we found that they most commonly earn bachelor's degree degrees or associate degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on staff nurse resumes include diploma degrees or master's degree degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a staff nurse. In fact, many staff nurse jobs require experience in a role such as registered nurse. Meanwhile, many staff nurses also have previous career experience in roles such as licensed practical nurse or nurse.
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Staff Nurse Career Paths
As you move along in your career, you may start taking on more responsibilities or notice that you've taken on a leadership role. Using our career map, a staff nurse can determine their career goals through the career progression. For example, they could start out with a role such as registered nurse supervisor, progress to a title such as nurse manager and then eventually end up with the title nurse manager.
Staff Nurse Jobs You Might Like
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Average Salary for a Staff Nurse
Best Paying Cities
Recently Added Salaries
Job TitleCompany  | Company | Start Date | Salary |
|---|---|---|---|
Mayo Clinic Registered Staff Nurse (RN)-Vascular Access Team, Nights Registered Staff Nurse (RN)-Vascular Access Team, Nights | Mayo Clinic Mayo Clinic | 06/30/2021 06/30/2021 | $58,37306/30/2021 $58,373 |
Geo Group Inc. Staff Nurse Staff Nurse | Geo Group Inc. Geo Group Inc. | 06/30/2021 06/30/2021 | $41,74006/30/2021 $41,740 |
Washington Hospital Healthcare System Staff Nurse II-6 West--Evenings Staff Nurse II-6 West--Evenings | Washington Hospital Healthcare System Washington Hospital Healthcare System | 06/29/2021 06/29/2021 | $146,86206/29/2021 $146,862 |
Unitedhealth Group Inc. Community Transitions Staff RN-Telecommute In Compact RN State Community Transitions Staff RN-Telecommute In Compact RN State | Unitedhealth Group Inc. Unitedhealth Group Inc. | 06/29/2021 06/29/2021 | $53,49006/29/2021 $53,490 |
Broadlawns Medical Center RN Staff Nurse, Crisis Mobile RN Staff Nurse, Crisis Mobile | Broadlawns Medical Center Broadlawns Medical Center | 06/29/2021 06/29/2021 | $51,65306/29/2021 $51,653 |
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Staff Nurse Resumes
Designing and figuring out what to include on your resume can be tough, not to mention time-consuming. That's why we put together a guide that is designed to help you craft the perfect resume for becoming a Staff Nurse. If you're needing extra inspiration, take a look through our selection of templates that are specific to your job.
Learn How To Write a Staff Nurse Resume
At Zippia, we went through countless Staff Nurse resumes and compiled some information about how best to optimize them. Here are some suggestions based on what we found, divided by the individual sections of the resume itself.
View Detailed InformationTop Colleges for Staff Nurses
1. Duke University
Durham, NC • Private
2. University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA • Private
3. Yale University
New Haven, CT • Private
4. University of Michigan - Ann Arbor
Ann Arbor, MI • Private
5. Georgetown University
Washington, DC • Private
6. University of California - Los Angeles
Los Angeles, CA • Private
7. University of Virginia
Charlottesville, VA • Private
8. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Chapel Hill, NC • Private
9. Columbia University in the City of New York
New York, NY • Private
10. Chamberlain College of Nursing - Arlington
Arlington, VA • Private
Online Courses For Staff Nurse That You May Like
(19 contact hours) The Certificate in End-of-Life Care will enhance the knowledge and skills of health care professionals and individuals who work with or care for those experiencing a terminal illness...
Palliative Care Always is a specialization for health care practitioners, patients and caregivers. We've designed this specialization to demonstrate how palliative medicine integrates with patient care, and to help you develop primary palliative care skills. Over the next five courses, you will develop skills in symptom management, goals of care and effective communication to improve the quality of life for patients and families suffering with serious illness. Our hope is that you feel increasin...
This course starts you on your journey of integrating primary palliative care into your daily lives. You will learn what palliative care is, how to communicate with patients, show empathy, and practice difficult conversations. You will learn how to screen for distress and provide psychosocial support. You will learn about goals of care and advance care planning and how to improve your success with having these conversations with patients. Finally, you will explore important cultural consideratio...
Top Skills For a Staff Nurse
The skills section on your resume can be almost as important as the experience section, so you want it to be an accurate portrayal of what you can do. Luckily, we've found all of the skills you'll need so even if you don't have these skills yet, you know what you need to work on. Out of all the resumes we looked through, 14.9% of staff nurses listed patient care on their resume, but soft skills such as communication skills and compassion are important as well.
- Patient Care, 14.9%
- BLS, 9.5%
- Health Care, 9.4%
- Acute Care, 7.9%
- CPR, 6.2%
- Other Skills, 52.1% See All Staff Nurse Skills
Best States For a Staff Nurse
Some places are better than others when it comes to starting a career as a staff nurse. The best states for people in this position are California, Oregon, Alaska, and Washington. Staff nurses make the most in California with an average salary of $87,206. Whereas in Oregon and Alaska, they would average $85,549 and $82,017, respectively. While staff nurses would only make an average of $77,786 in Washington, you would still make more there than in the rest of the country. We determined these as the best states based on job availability and pay. By finding the median salary, cost of living, and using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Location Quotient, we narrowed down our list of states to these four.
1. Alaska
$82,017
Avg. Salary
2. Washington
$77,786
Avg. Salary
3. Massachusetts
$72,208
Avg. Salary
How Do Staff Nurse Rate Their Jobs?
Top Staff Nurse Employers
We've made finding a great employer to work for easy by doing the hard work for you. We looked into employers that employ staff nurses and discovered their number of staff nurse opportunities and average salary. Through our research, we concluded that St. Joseph Hospital was the best, especially with an average salary of $63,167. DaVita follows up with an average salary of $74,024, and then comes Good Samaritan Hospital with an average of $61,527. In addition, we know most people would rather work from home. So instead of having to change careers, we identified the best employers for remote work as a staff nurse. The employers include None, None, and None
Staff Nurse Videos
