Informational Interview Assignment

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The individual I spoke with for the Informational Interviewing Assignment was Kalie Wieber, and who works as a registered nurse at at Abbott Northwestern in the cardiovascular ICU. My interview with her was set up by some mutual family friends. She was able to talk to me for over a half an hour by phone. The interview was at 5:00pm on October 16th. We began the interview by discussing her background. From an educational front, her path towards becoming an RN was set all the way back in high school. She took several PSEO and prerequisite focused courses. She was also greatly involved in a health careers organization that gave her familiarity in a clinical environment and shadowing experience. For college she spent her first semester at Winona …show more content…

After receiving my interest inventory score and seeing that the “Registered Nurse” career aligned most closely based on my answers. A lot of the values and skills required for the career align with who I am. I’m can be a very focused, hardworking and sociable person who is competent and detail oriented enough to thrive and be a leader in a clinical setting. The intricate patient care that comes with a career in nursing greatly aligns with my values. Additionally, I want a career where there is room to grow and develop professionally. As a nurse there is always the option of becoming a Nurse Practitioner, Midwife, CRNA or even apply to medical school. I’ve always known that I want a career in healthcare. I possess a strong sense of compassion and empathy for others, so it’s only natural that I’d be drawn towards the field. One thing that I’ve struggled with though was determining the best way for me to get involved in healthcare. My current classes are heavily science based as I’m on the Biology major track and was intending to get into a PA or similar health care program through that method. I’ve felt myself become slowly burnt out on the sciences in general though. Looking ahead at four more years of doing subjects, I found that I was slowly was losing passion for my education which left me feeling rather poorly about my potential future in healthcare. I feel like nursing is the best of both worlds. The required …show more content…

While I didn’t necessarily gain the “in person” interview experience, I still gained a lot of valuable information from the process. It surprised me greatly how much I actually strayed away from the scripted questions that I’d planned out, but this turned out to be better. The conversation became more natural and we discussed interesting components of the career that I truly cared about. I learned first hand how valuable an interview in any area you’re interested can change your perception about the particular area. An individual's personal insider experiences in a career or group can be super helpful to an outsider like myself. My interview with Kalie sparked my interest and made me really want to learn even more. Kalie encouraged me to get on site experience and shadow a nurse, which is actually exactly what I did. Two weeks later I shadowed at North Memorial Hospital with a RN in the emergency trauma unit. While I was there, I employed many of the same informational interviewing techniques and questions that I conducted in my phone call with Kalie. The “in person” shadowing setting made the interviewing process much more fun for me and I actually learned even more about nursing while on the job and asking

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