57// The Real Reason Nurses Feel Stuck in Their Careers (+ What to Do First)

Feeling stuck in your nursing career—even with years of experience or an advanced degree? You’re not alone. In this episode, Bonnie breaks down the real reasons nurses feel uncertain about what’s next—and introduces a simple tool to help you get clear. Whether you're an RN, APRN, or nurse leader, discover how self-awareness and career reflection can reignite your purpose.

Key Takeaways:

• Common causes of career stagnation
• The power of clarity over job searching
• How to use the free Nurse Career Growth Roadmap

Transcript

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Just because you don't see it in your organization, doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Just because you don't see it doesn't mean that people can't create it. Sometimes my question is, have you told anyone that this is the thing that you're looking for? Have you told someone what your goals are? Who have you connected with? Are you feeling stuck in your current clinical environment? Do you want to make a change in your nursing career, but not sure what to do next? Exhausted, burnt out, and maybe even ready for different leadership? I'm Bonnie Meadows, a board ified clinical nurse specialist, influential leader, career coach, and wellbeing coach. Being in the nursing and healthcare profession since 2004, I have felt stuck and unsure about what was next for me. I wanted to be fulfilled in my purpose, to have a voice at the table and to be a resource for others. I kept telling myself I wanted more, but didn't have the direction I needed until I found clarity and career growth strategies for experienced nurses like. Me. In this podcast, you will find simple tactical steps that allow you to gain the clarity you need solutions for how to grow even without supportive leadership and guidelines for setting boundaries at work so that you can grow purposefully in your career as a nurse with a graduate degree who makes a huge impact in the profession. So get ready to trade your scrubs for yoga pants, pop in those earbuds and let's chat. Hello my fellow nurses. It is good to be back. I appreciate you all hanging in there while, I had my top 10 episodes from 2024, on replay I hope you enjoyed them. I am so happy to be back here, to talk with you about all things nursing career growth. As I go forward I will probably be, talking about a few other things that I have been actively working through and working in. Especially as I grow in my role as, president of the North Carolina Nurses Association, I get inducted in September and I am learning a lot about advocacy and much more about leadership. So I hope to bring more advocacy and leadership topics. I am very much a person who doesn't necessarily like to be controversial. I like to give people tools on how to advocate for the profession better than we currently do. And as I grow and I learn more about advocacy and how much is. Out of our control, but technically could be in our control. I want to be able to get that message out to as many nurses as possible. So I will be incorporating that in, some episodes going forward. Also have to say Happy Nurses Week. I know I'm late. But I had a very eventful nurse's week. I spoke at a pending ceremony for a nursing school and then I did a speech, for my. Case management colleagues within my organization. It was about a group of, 80 something nurses and much of my conversation focused around finding joy and work. I really, I. Am a glass, half full type of person. My talk there was about how to find joy in work, even in the midst of everything that is going on right now. As I move forward in episodes, I hope to encourage you, and to equip you to find clarity in your career. And so that's what I'm talking about today. I'm getting back to the basics of the question that everyone usually has in their mind I don't know what I wanna be when I grow up. And it's not just nursing students coming into nursing saying, I don't know what I wanna be when I grow up. This podcast is for experience nurses, because so many have come up to me and said, I don't know what I wanna do when I grow up. Some of these nurses are five years in, 10 years, in 15 years in master's degrees, doctorate degrees. I was sitting in a session for a, task force in the state in which I work, which is in North Carolina. This particular task force did a study focusing on the workforce of North Carolina. Within that study they did a survey. One of the things that stood out to me was. There were nurses in the survey who felt a future or hopeful about their current job, but not necessarily had a great outlook about the their nursing career. And to me, that says you're not aware of all of the options. Of things that you could do as a nurse. Because you're not aware of all the options, all you see in front of you is your current job, and then you look out and, you see what is right there before you, whether it be, and most of the time it's whatever's right in your organization. You're looking out within your organization and in your mind, you're thinking, there are no opportunities for me, so I'm gonna stay where I am. I'll stay here for a while, but I don't really see any growth opportunities in my organization in my 20 years. I will say I'm a firm believer in just because it's not here today doesn't mean that it won't be available. And about a year or 2, 3, 4, 5 years. Just because you don't see it in your organization, doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Just because you don't see it doesn't mean that people can't create it. Sometimes my question is, have you told anyone that this is the thing that you're looking for? Have you told someone what your goals are? Who have you connected with? Like these are the questions that I ask people because we all have this idea of what type of work we want to do, and sometimes that doesn't match up with the reality that is right in front of us, but it is a reality that actually could be if we just reached out to others, got a mentor. Found a coach. I'm here and had some conversations about possibilities of what is out there for you. As we go through this podcast episode, I'm gonna talk a little bit about why people feel stuck. I've got a little tool to share to help you get unstuck. I've developed a new tool called the Nurse Career Growth Roadmap. It helps to take you through a few action steps, some reflection points, not a long reflection point. Like it's not, it should not take you. It should only take you about 30 minutes to get through the document. You need to take 30 minutes to sit down and take, take inventory on what is it that I need to do. But it it, it goes through several questions, helping you tease out your thoughts to help you get unstuck. Let's talk about why. Experienced nurses feel stuck. There are several reasons why nurses feel stuck. A few things I hear that translate into stuck is there are too many options. Like I said before, I don't know what my next step is. I don't see the job I want i've been applying and can't seem to get hired for a new role. That's a little bit different than not having clarity, but to me that's why people are stuck. I don't know when I wanna be, when I grow up. These comments come from several sources. They stem from lack of awareness. Lack of clarity about what you want. You don't want to admit what you want because you wanna keep all your options open. Fear of trying something new that may not work out. Some of it is lack of confidence. You might blame it on imposter syndrome, but it's really lack of confidence. Some of it is not being willing to step out into a new identity. Like it really might be time for you to garner a new identity in nursing, but you're afraid to do so, so you stay stuck. You don't see yourself in a higher role, but others may see you in a higher role. You're self sabotaging to stay with what you know because you don't like change. All of these are reasons why. Many nurses tend to feel stuck. They tend to stir right where they are. Not really knowing whether it's you that's doing it or whether other people are doing it to you i'm not necessarily gonna say other people are doing it to you. 'cause I don't believe in, blaming others for you being stuck, for you not being able to get the opportunities? Do people do that? Oh, they do. I'm currently reading this book called The Slight Edge, and they talk about blame versus responsibility and really just digging into people who are successful are responsible. Meaning they feel like it is their responsibility to move forward in whatever it is that they're trying to move forward in, regardless of who's trying to step in their way. I am a person of responsibility. Yes, there are others that could be blamed. They need to get their hand slapped, whatever the case may be. But it's still up to me to be determined to overcome that and get to the place of success that I believe is purposed for me. These are. Some of the reasons that you wanna think about as to why you may feel stuck? When you are feeling stuck and when you don't have clarity. One of the main things I said is because it's a lack of self-awareness, and so I wanna dig into that one clear reason. 'cause I could probably give you. I could go deeper into all of these topics, but the one topic I wanna go into further into is the importance of improving your self-awareness and having some sort of career reflection. When someone approaches me about being stuck in their careers, they usually start with the jobs, they have searched for, and the lack of passion they see for what is available. When I start to have a conversation with someone that I'm coaching, they will start with, I don't know what I want to be when I grow up, or I don't know what I wanna do next. And then they will go to well, I've been looking at this job and that job. And that's not a wrong thing to do. It's not wrong to do at all, but I wanna challenge you to start differently. I like to help people consider what they want first in their careers. Because many of you could be at a place where you already have your master's degree, you already have your doctorate degree, and it's usually that group trying to figure out the next job. And yes, nurses who have their BSN, they're looking for the same thing. But we tend to think that once we have the master's degree or the doctorate degree, that everything else should just fall into place and it doesn't. It's essential to reflect on moments that brought you joy and peace in your career and to have hope that you can find that in work, yes, you will always have politics, but if you like the work that you do, if you have joy about the work that you do, that will make the difference. It is necessary to reflect on what you do well and what you do not do well. This helps you to shift your focus away from a job search and to a discovery route to find what works best for where you want to go. This practice is career reflection and the development of self-awareness. In nursing. We have so much autonomy in our clinical practice, but for the most part, we are told a lot of what to do. Once it comes down to our careers, it's hard for us to navigate out of. Okay, this is, I, I need to do something differently and us to wrap our heads around what does differently mean? I am asking you to develop your voice to say, this is what I want. I would like a job that includes this, or, this is what I want to do next, because you've done some reflection. You now understand. What brings you joy? What brings you peace? What helps you to operate in your core values? And when you do that, it provides clarity about what you like about your career, and it helps you to understand why you're stuck. It gives you the tools to know where you may want to go. It provides direction for your next steps and goals for your career. And so now that you have that concept of why you feel stuck and why your career reflection and self-awareness can help you get clear on your next steps, I have a way for you to gather all of that information in your head and put it on paper. It is my nurse career growth roadmap. It was developed because many of you stated you didn't know what your next step was, and many of you see it as a job issue, which may be tripping you up. We put the cart before the horse when we search for our next job, but we must begin with what is in us. That we want to grow to be the best nurse in the profession and the healthcare professional we want to be. In this guide, I take you through four steps to help you jumpstart your thoughts on what's next for you. Best of all, it is free. My call to action to you is to click the link below. And join my email list. With that, you will get access to this free nursing career growth roadmap. It takes about, five to 10 minutes to go through the first exercise and start identifying what you truly want in your career. So go ahead and download that guide and feel free to reach out to me if you have any questions. Send me a fan mail if you have any questions, and I'll be happy to answer it on the show. You click the link in the show notes and I'll see you next week. I hope you enjoyed today's episode. If so, would you take 30 seconds and share it with another nurse who may be unsure of where to go next in their career or maybe need some career clarity? Also, please leave a quick review for the show on Apple Podcast. It brings me so much joy and so much encouragement to know this podcast is helping you now go get the career you want and not the one you settle for. And I'll meet you back here next Thursday for another episode. See you soon.