Changing workplaces — what's worth asking about

Looking for a new job in healthcare is not like looking for a new job anywhere else. You''re not just moving desks — you''re moving into a group where trust has been built over years, into a patient mix you didn''t choose, and into schedules that affect what you can do for the rest of the week. These are the questions colleagues keep coming back to when we talk about what they wish they had asked before switching. 1. What does staffing look like at night and on weekends? The daytime schedule rarely tells the whole story. Ask specifically: how many people are on the floor at 3 AM on a Sunday? How often do you cover the on-call from another department? These are the evenings and weekends that de facto shape your everyday life. 2. What proportion of staff are agency workers? This isn''t a question with a simple right or wrong answer. A high proportion of agency staff can mean the department has structures for onboarding newcomers — or that continuity is broken. Ask the follow-up question: how long have the last three permanent senior colleagues been around? 3. How does the handover between shifts work? A good handover isn''t 30 minutes with 14 names. It''s a structured process where you leave knowing exactly who needs what. Ask to sit in on a handover before you accept the offer, if possible. 4. Who makes decisions when things get tough? Who do you call when you''re unsure about a patient? Is that person actually available — or just on paper? Departments where the answer is ''it depends, I usually ask X'' are often calmer than those where the answer is ''call the backup on-call.'' 5. How are conflicts handled? This sounds soft but says more about a workplace than anything else. Ask for a specific example of a conflict in the past six months and how it was handled. Listen to how the answer is phrased — if the answer is ''we don''t have conflicts,'' that''s actually a red flag. 6. What kind of introduction do you get? Two weeks side by side with a senior is not the same as two weeks of ''look around and ask.'' Ask for the structure in plain terms — who do you follow, how many days, who checks in with you after two weeks, four weeks, three months. 7. How do you bring up difficult things with the manager? The question isn''t whether you can — everyone says you can. The question is how it actually tends to go. Ask for a story: ''can you give an example of something someone brought up that led to a change?'' Silence or generic platitudes speak for themselves. This makes a difference later No department is perfect. But departments that answer these seven questions concretely — without dodging — generally have a better picture of themselves. That often says something about the leadership. And the leadership is, in the end, what makes the difference between a job that works and one that doesn''t. — Redaktion Turen