A healthcare career is something that a lot of people feel drawn to. It’s a way of helping others that can be extremely rewarding. And it’s ideal for people who want to feel as though they are making a difference through the soft skills used in Healthcare.
Not only that, but there are many ways to progress a career in healthcare, so ambitions can also be met.
It might even be that you want to start your own business in a healthcare-related field. Maybe you want to start your own practice and open a clinic, or perhaps you feel your skills are best utilized in administration and management.
Whatever it is you want to do with your nursing qualifications once you have them, it’s important to understand that you can gain many soft skills through studying for a career in healthcare that can then be used in other areas, namely your own business if that’s what you choose to do.
With that in mind, here are some of the soft skills used in Healthcare that you will gain that will help you in any way you choose to go in the future.
Empathy
No matter what your position might be in healthcare or what you’re studying for to get there, there is one soft skill that will be crucial: empathy. Your patients are going to be scared and confused and they will often be in pain. If you can offer them empathy and help them understand what’s happening, you can make a bad situation that little bit better. It could even make treating the patient easier, ensuring that recovery takes place faster.
If you want to do more with your nursing qualification, for example, and start a business using your knowledge and skills, you might not think that empathy is going to be of that much use – how can you be empathetic in business and still be professional?
The truth is that having empathy in business is more important than most people imagine – you can use it to negotiate better deals, for example. By putting yourself in your client’s shoes, you can understand their pain points and make sure you address them. Empathy can be very useful indeed.
Communication Skills
Communication is such an important skill in the medical and healthcare field. As a registered nurse, for example, you’ll need to communicate with many different people in many ways. You’ll have to talk to your patients, leverage your intuition, and keep them informed as to what is happening with their health and recovery.
You’ll also need to talk to your colleagues because, in nursing, teamwork is paramount. Plus, you’ll have to talk to other medical personnel from other departments to ensure your patient has whatever they need and that you can provide the right care.
Communication in business is just as crucial. It might not be a case of life and death as it can be in healthcare, but it is still important. If you want your business to run smoothly and be successful, you’ll need to be able to communicate with your customers, employees, suppliers, and prospects. Marketing is all about communication too, and without good marketing, you don’t have a business to speak of.
Teamwork
We’ve just mentioned that teamwork is a crucial factor when it comes to being a good nurse and ensuring your patients’ health and wellbeing. It’s not just nurses who need to be great at teamwork, but the entire healthcare profession must work together to offer the very best care. If this doesn’t happen, patient outcomes will be less positive, and healthcare will suffer.
Teamwork makes a huge difference when it comes to healthcare, but what about business? The same can be said there too. Although it is possible to essentially start and run a business by yourself, you’ll still need to work with others to get things done.
This could be anyone from freelancers you outsource work to, to the suppliers you depend on to help your customers. If you take on any staff, you’ll all need to work together closely for the good of the business. Teamwork plays a big part in your success.
Stress Management
It doesn’t matter if you are an RN or you’ve taken on extra study to gain additional qualifications to help you move forward in your career; you’re going to be stressed when you work in healthcare. Healthcare could even be one of the most stressful professions you can choose because you are dealing with someone’s health; making a mistake could have dire consequences.
Not only that, but you’ll be busy all the time, and that can be stressful too, especially when you want a good work-life balance. For most nurses, the rewards outweigh these stresses, and they can handle the stress – they learn how to do it and do it in such a way that it won’t cause them any difficulties. If it does cause them problems, they’ll also know how to ask for help. This is crucial.
Stress management must be part of the healthcare profession and is a soft skill that will need to be quickly understood and put into practice when a nurse begins work. Yet, although nursing might be one of the most stressful jobs to have, running a business comes with its own set of stressors, from making money to marketing, and so on.
Many entrepreneurs find they can’t handle the pressure and must go back to working for someone else. Of course, there is no shame in this; you must do what’s right for you. However, if you have a dream of running a business, then it makes sense to do everything you can to make that dream come true. Stress management can help and if you already know how to do this, it will help you right from the start.
Flexibility
Healthcare professionals such as nurses don’t have set schedules. They might have shifts that start and end at a certain time, but these will change – sometimes nurses will work nights, sometimes days, sometimes a mixture. They’ll work weekends and holidays, but they’ll also have time off when most other people are at work.
For some, this kind of work is ideal. It does, however, mean that, if you want to be a nurse and work in healthcare, you need to be flexible. Otherwise, you’ll become stressed and not be able to do your job well.
When you run a business, you also need to be flexible. Again, there are no set hours, especially when you are starting up. You’ll have to work hard, and that can mean weekends and holidays. It can mean working late. Most of all, it means working when you need to. The more flexible you can be with your work, the better your business will be, and the sooner you’ll reach a stage when you can step back a little and relax more.