Feedback from employers identifies the following critical competencies and how they apply for this job

• Communication, Interpersonal Skills, and Writing — Effective communication (such as with changes in a patient’s status) with patients, family, and co-workers lay a foundation for success. Recognizing diversity in communication, educating patients and families, and creating effective documentation (often leveraging technology) of issues and actions are examples of keys to success.
• Customer Focus — Healthcare is customer service driven – patients and families must have good experiences with staff and outcomes to return for additional care, reimbursements also depend on it.
• Critical & Analytical Thinking and Problem Solving & Decision Making — Monitoring the patient, being proactive to identify changes and items to address, prioritizing potential actions, understanding when to take action versus when to escalate an issue, and then taking the appropriate action.
• Medicine and Psychology — Must have the knowledge to work with a broad range of medical issues from a newborn to the elderly (pharmacology, anatomy, lab results, triage, surgery, medications, immunizations, procedures, and preventative health), including an understanding of a patient’s behaviors, such as with dementia.
• Health & Safety — Must understand a broad range of safety needs and issues from Day 1 in order to treat people safely.
• Teamwork and Integrity — The team and patient care success depends on you being ready to work on-time and your ability, take responsibility to complete your duties, and to work well with a broad range of people.