Nursing programs will teach budding nurses the knowledge and the skills they need to develop to become good nurses, but few will be able to promote the necessary, personal qualities that it takes to make a good nurse. These qualities have to be innately within a budding nurse, and they can’t necessarily be learned.

Having the right, personal qualities is as important to the nursing profession as having the medical knowhow of how to treat patients. After all, a lot of being a nurse has to do with bedside manner and being able to deal with and interact with people who are not experiencing the best of times. A well-rounded and good nursing education will ensure that nurses are reminded also about personal qualities instead of just medical knowhow.

Job Outlook

Nurse jobs involve dealing with people on a constant basis, which is why the development of the right, personal qualities is such a must. From the very beginning, the most material, personal quality to possess is compassion, for this quality empowers nurses all the more to be able to empathize with the pain, illness and feelings of their patients. Having compassion does not necessarily demand that a nurse knows precisely what a patient is experiencing. It is enough that a nurse simply expresses the fundamentals of concern by making an effort to want to know why their patient is feeling the way they are feeling. Some online nursing programs stress that if a budding nurse is not capable of basic empathy or even just showing curiosity in wanting to know why a patient feels the way they do, they may not be the most ideal personality type for the profession.

Patience

Some online LPN programs point out that patience is another integral, personal quality of the effective and appreciated nurse. The old adage that patience is a virtue is really applicable to the nursing profession, as nursing demands a lot of care and understanding from nurses to their patients. Patience is a personal quality that is a little bit different from empathy and compassion in that budding nurses can actually work on becoming more patient, as some online RN programs stress. In the nursing field, nurses must not only show patience to their patients, but also to their coworkers, the patients’ family members, and the doctors in the hospital. Some nurses like pediatric nurses will have to be more patient than other nurses, just because the nature of their job demands this personal quality more. If after a long day at work, the umpteenth family member or friend of a certain patient comes along and inquires about the status or location of the patient, it is easy to see just why patience is so integral to a nurse.

Confidence

Another personal quality that an LPN program highlights is the personal quality of confidence. While not as obvious as compassion or patience, confidence is also an elementary attribute of a nurse, which will help the nurse along during their workday and for the course of their career. Exhibiting confidence to patients is key because said patients can sometimes be scared or under stress, and a well-timed show of confidence on the part of a nurse can really go a long way in calming down a fretting patient. Because patients are much of the time in a situation that they do not fully understand, it is a nurse’s task to be the professional, to be the person that a patient can look to for guidance.

Good Communication Skills

Any good RN program should teach budding nurses that good communication skill is yet another personal quality that can serve nurses well on the job. Good communication skills are not just fundamental in nursing, they are also critical. Good communication skills are necessary for a nurse to be able to do two things better than any other duties of their job: To follow the directions from doctors properly and also to efficiently converse with patients and their families. This personal quality also comes in handy when it comes to being able to advocate for patients in an effective manner, as good nursing schools will enforce to budding nurses.

Emotional Stability

A nursing career will benefit from the personal quality of emotional stability, which can also be thought of as calmness in the nurse. Being a nurse will automatically mean that many traumatic and stressful situations will be encountered by the nurse, so it does not only pay but it is required to be emotionally stable. There will already be enough stress and trauma that the patients and their families will be experiencing without the nurse being stressed out, too. One huge reason that emotional stability is so essential is the requirement for a nurse to be able to process the occurrences of suffering and even death in their patients without allowing it to become too personal. While there can also be happy moments and experiences in nursing—such as seeing patients convalesce, bonding with fellow nurses, and reuniting patients with families—it still pays to retain emotional stability at all times.

Flexibility

Nursing occupations demand a fair amount of flexibility among nurses. Being flexible is another personal quality that entails flexibility regarding working hours and the duties on the job. Flexibility comes in handy when a nurse is called on to work overtime shifts, often unexpectedly and abruptly with little prior notice. This call to work overtime can happen on the weekends, too. However, being flexible means that a nurse’s schedule is not bogged down in the traditional, nine-to-five workday schedule, which sometimes allows for more free time during the day to spend with family.

Personal qualities can be integral to nursing, which is a profession that does not only value medical knowhow. A balance of good, personal qualities along with the knowhow it takes to administer medicine and care for patients is what it takes to be a successful nurse. Good, personal qualities are not only useful in helping patients. They are also helpful in getting the nurses through some tough times that involve the pain and the suffering of patients.

To learn more about the personal qualities of a nurse, see these links:

• Qualities of a Decent Nurse
• Personal Qualities Helpful to a Nurse
• Qualities of a Good Nurse
• Personality Traits for Nursing Graduates