Interview Questions for New Grad Nurses

Getting to interview as a new grad is a really nerve-wracking thing to do for both parties.

The nurse has no real medical experience and just got out of school looking for a job, but you have a hospital to manage and need the best people available to hire.

It’s always best to naturally have a conversation and not have to script all of your questions, but you should have some sort of structure for the sake of time.

These interviews are just to get a gist of who the individual you’re hiring is and to look at their qualifications.

Rely on these questions if you feel like you’re not learning much about the new grad nurse.

See also: Interview Questions for Nurses

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Table of Contents

New Grad Nurse Interview Questions

1. Where do you think you’ll be in 5 years?

This is a good question to ask because it will represent how ambitious your new grad nurse will be.

It’s a hard job to do consistently, and it’s telling if there’s a nurse who has a career plan laid out for herself.

Not all of them have to know where they are going to be in five years.

They just graduated from college and still have their entire lives ahead of themselves.

There’s a lot to get out of this career, and this question could potentially define the future of this hospital.

2. What made you become a nurse?

This is a really important question since this is the main reason why a nurse won’t give up on the job.

See also: Why Nurses Leave the Bedside?

We all need physicians, doctors, and nurses in every society out there.

School is very difficult and is expensive since there are lives on the line and the medical industry is always evolving.

Having a primary motivation to get out of bed every day and deal with cranky co-workers or rude patients is what separates someone who’ll go far in their career from someone who stays at the same level consistently.

See also: School Nurse Interview Questions

3. What are your weaknesses as a nurse?

Every living person has weaknesses and it’s important to know how to address them.

Some people don’t always make it to work on time and some other individuals point the finger at others.

Other nurses may panic and potentially say things that the patient shouldn’t hear.

At this point in the hospital, it is best to address these weaknesses now so that they can put their best step forward to save lives when they get the job.

The nurse should be honest, but they should also look for strategies to try and improve their situation to negate those weaknesses.

Interview Questions and Answers for New Grad Nurses

1. How do you handle pressure?

This is one of the biggest interview questions for new grad nurses since pressure can decide a lot in the face of adversity.

Pressure can be what makes a nurse freeze and lose all of the intelligence that they spent years gathering.

Some of them are completely focused, but a lot of them are nervous and sweating about what will happen to their patient.

It’s something that they will have to develop over time, but in other cases, nurses can handle pressure very well and may very well be the reason why they’re here.

2. What do you not like about being a nurse?

In any job that’s out there, there are going to be parts of it that you hate.

See also: Do Nurses Clean Poop?

Nurses need to understand that not every day they are going to get along with their administrator or know how to handle the patients that well.

They need to be prepared to tell families and the patient hard truths about their status which isn’t good for anyone.

It’s important to remember the things that you don’t like so that you are able to fully appreciate the truly great things of helping people in the hospital.

See also: Is Nursing for Me?

3. What are your hobbies?

A nurse is never obligated to give an answer to disclose what they do in their private time, but it certainly gives the administrator more of an idea of who they are working with.

Most of them want you to have hobbies since that’s what represents your humanity.

It shows that you have interests outside of work and that you care about your community.

Ultimately, those hobbies are ironically going to make the employer trust the nurse more.

It’s even better if you have the same interests as them so that you two are able to relate to each other.

New Grad Nurse Interview Clinical Questions

1. How available are you?

This is an essential question as to whether or not you should hire this nurse. Most nurses should be ready to work since they really won’t have that much else going on.

However, you need the most accurate response available.

Some of them truly aren’t available for a while and can only work morning or night shifts.

For others, they know that their schedule is going to open up in a bit of time, they just need some months to pass to get their work done.

See also: Can Nurses Work Part-Time?

Some are still in school and obligated by that before they do anything.

2. What can you add to our hospital?

In every important industry out there, someone is given a job because the employer believes that individual can add value to the company.

People who are going to be adding nurses to their lineup need to hire people who aren’t doing the same things that all of the other nurses are doing at the company.

For the struggling nurses out there, it can be a tough reality to accept that they may not have the skills required for the job.

See also: Qualities of a Nurse

But in other cases, it can be known that.

3. What inspired you to become a nurse?

Something that becomes very well known during college is that the people who are currently working this job are people who could’ve worked any other job and made a lot more.

There is definitely a strong motivation as to why these people are currently applying to be at the hospital.

It’s not your job as the employer to morally agree with their reasons for doing this, but it’s a question worth asking.

The very worst thing that can happen is that the nurse says something that you disagree with, and in the best case, the nurse can end up being someone you respect.

See also: Travel Nurse Interview Questions

New Grad Nurse Scenario Interview Questions

1. How would you deal with a disruptive patient?

In a hospital full of young and old, along with many different drugs, not every patient is going to be comfortable with you.

In fact, some of the patients that you’re going to take care of expose themselves to you in ways that they would not expose their significant others to.

It makes people incredibly insecure and as a result, they can act irrationally.

Unfortunately as a nurse, you need to be able to calm those people down and you can’t do so in a forceful manner.

2. What would you do if a drug or piece of equipment was missing?

This happens all of the time in hospitals, though thankfully they don’t happen that often in situations that are serious or urgent often.

Some operations can only be completed with a piece of equipment, or the only way to get a patient numb to pain is with a certain drug.

See also: Do Nurses Get Drug Tested?

This question demonstrates how prepared the nurse is to deal with the patients that day.

Not all of them are going to be prepared for situations that they didn’t see coming, but it should be a habit to minimize the frequency of when this happens.

3. What adversities have you overcome in life?

Life is full of challenges that we aren’t going to see and the hospital is only going to have more of them.

It’s an important question to ask since the patient is going to see and hear things that they have never seen before and will likely never see after they retire in the hospital.

See also: Do Nurses Get Pensions?

How someone reacts and responds to these challenging situations reveals their true character.

Of course, you as the interviewer aren’t going to see that character in the interview, but their response should tell you something.

Conclusion: Interview Questions for New Grad Nurses

Being a nurse is very challenging, and on the day that you interview them, that can be even more challenging.

It can be a really hard decision to hire someone with new skills and qualifications, only to fire someone else who may not have as many skills but is older.

When you hire a nurse, you’re putting your faith in them that they are going to be able to provide value for the patients there.

Most of them are very educated but know that you’re dealing with people that have strengths and weaknesses.

Hopefully, these interview questions for new grad nurses helped you out!

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