Job Interview Questions for Nurse Practitioners (NPs)
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“Over the last couple of years, we’ve seen the advanced practice provider space, which includes physician assistants and nurse practitioners, become the most heavily trafficked and most highly searched.”
Michael Belkin, Divisional Vice President of AMN Healthcare’s Physician and NP Search Division
Nurse practitioners (NPs) belong to one of the fastest-growing professions in the country. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) projects the need for an additional 112,700 NPs by 2031, representing an increase of 46 percent (BLS 2022). Both new and experienced NPs have a critical role to play in caring for an aging population’s complex healthcare needs.
“Over the last couple of years, we’ve seen the advanced practice provider space, which includes physician assistants and nurse practitioners, become the most heavily trafficked and most highly searched,” says Michael Belkin, divisional vice president of AMN Healthcare’s physician and NP search division (formerly known as Merritt Hawkins). “It’s even surpassed primary care physician recruitment and psychiatry recruitment, which have always been at the top.”
Nurse practitioners still participate in traditional recruitment and hiring processes despite the high demand for their services. Job interviews remain the de facto standard for health systems, hospitals, private practices, and clinics seeking to retain the services of an NP. Read on to learn more about what employers are looking for in those interviews, what some of the common questions are, and how an NP can prepare themselves.
What Employers Want From NPs
“Most employers would love an NP that already has experience in something specific that they’re looking for,” Belkin says. “But there’s a good amount of new NP graduates in the market who are looking for experience, and our clients are hiring them.”
Fluctuations in demand for NPs will vary based on specialty. Many healthcare facilities retain the services of a recruiter to fill specialist positions, which are less easily filled compared to general primary care ones.
Geography, too, plays an important role. Many employers don’t offer NPs the same relocation benefits that they’d offer to a physician, so they’re usually looking to hire someone from relatively close to where they’re located.
“The number of candidates for a job opportunity often depends on the location for that opportunity,” Belkin says. “If it’s in a major metropolitan area, you’ll probably be competing with a lot of other candidates. But if it’s in a rural community, there may not be many at all.”
New NPs shouldn’t be frightened of the hiring process. Even though most employers would prefer an NP with years of specialized experience, there are benefits to hiring someone fresh out of school. New NPs can be trained into a position and shaped into leaders. Belkin also points out that NPs have valid experience to draw upon from their time working as registered nurses (RNs) and NP students going through rotations.
“As a new graduate, you want to look back through your work history and see what kind of patients and physicians you’ve worked with, and then extrapolate that experience into a particular skill set,” Belkin says. “Sometimes you can translate ICU experience into working with a cardiologist, or time as a labor and delivery nurse into working in women’s health.”
Belkin also highlights the value of taking a job based on the experience it can provide. New NPs can look at a two- to three-year contract as an informal fellowship—one that gives them the mentoring, networking, and experience they need to become better and more marketable NPs.
Common Interview Questions for NPs
Every job interview is going to be slightly different, and so are the questions, tailored as they are to the position, the individual, and the location. Geography once again plays an important role here: if a state is restricted or reduced practice, an NP will often be asked about how they feel working under the supervision of a physician; if the state has full practice authority, an NP may be asked instead about how they feel working independently, without supervision.
Each state, health facility, and individual provider’s role will come with its own set of priorities and top concerns. If an NP is applying to a rural care role with a large indigenous population, the NP should be prepared for specific questions on those topics; inversely, if applying in a metropolitan setting focused on women’s health, a candidate should be prepared to answer questions related to those topics.
Some similarities exist across different positions, roles, and geographies, and there will be an overlap in responsibilities and priorities. Across all NP job interviews, some likely common questions include:
- Why would you be a good fit for this position?
- What type of patients have you seen in the past?
- Can you tell us about how you handled a clinical emergency?
- How would you respond to a difficult patient or family member?
- When did you first know you wanted to be a nurse practitioner?
It’s important to remember that if you’ve been invited to a job interview for an NP position, the employer is more than likely satisfied with your level of experience and education. So when answering interview questions, tell the truth, but tell it well. Answers that include concise, compelling stories can communicate much with a little; the right detail speaks volumes.
How NPs Can Prepare for Job Interviews
Before the job interview, a candidate NP should do significant research. Most health systems will have online documentation related to their mission and vision. Each state has its own set of top health concerns. A little internet sleuthing can go a long way when the time comes for the NP to ask their own questions.
“You definitely want to have prepared questions,” Belkin says. “It shows that you have interest. If you come prepared, then you’re going to ask more important questions, you’re going to ask more specific questions, and you’re going to ask more questions that are geared towards the actual employer, versus some general questions that everybody asks.”
The questions everybody asks are still important. Generic questions that NPs interviewing for any new job should consider include:
- Why are you looking to fill this position?
- Who will I be working with, and in what capacity?
- Is there a patient panel that needs to be absorbed?
- What are the top challenges facing providers here?
When preparing your own questions, select ones that you might ask if you were starting work in the open role that same day. Belkin advises bringing a pad of paper and a pen to take notes.
And most importantly, bring a high level of energy. During NP interviews, a candidate might be meeting half a dozen people or more. For each of those people, it’s their first impression of the NP. As a candidate, you have to remember to take a deep breath and smile, Belkin says. Because you’re not just interviewing to be an organization’s NP—you’re also interviewing to be several people’s coworker.
“If you’re energetic and you’re enthusiastic, and you come across with a pleasing personality, that goes a really long way,” Belkin says. “Even if you don’t have the experience, try to do your very best to sell yourself as someone an employer would want there, walking the halls on a regular basis.”
Matt Zbrog
WriterMatt Zbrog is a writer and researcher from Southern California. Since 2018, he’s written extensively about the modern nursing workforce, conducting hundreds of interviews with nurse leaders, nurse educators, and nurse advocates to explore the issues that matter to them most. His Advocates to Know series focuses on nurse practitioners (NPs) who go above and beyond in changing policy and practice in important areas like veteran’s care, human trafficking prevention, and telehealth access. He regularly collaborates with subject matter experts from the American Nurses Association (ANA) and the National Association of Pediatric Nurse Practitioners (NAPNAP) to elevate issues that empower nurses everywhere.