Strategies to Get an EMT or Paramedic Job in EMS

Strategies to Get an EMT or Paramedic Job in EMS

The most important element in getting a job in the field of Emergency Medical Services (EMS) is you!  You have much more control over the job situation than you may think.  As a 35-year veteran of EMS, I have interviewed, coached and recommended for hire many who wanted to get a job in EMS.  I have also participated in the promotion process for others.  The current economic difficulties have escalated the level of competition for the few Paramedic or EMT Jobs that come open and have absolutely affected the advancement process for those already employed.  Here are five (5) job interview tips, that if properly followed, have the potential to get you onto the “short list” during the hiring or promotion process or even get you that job!  More hints and tips are planned to appear in later Paramedic Moments blog articles.

The First Job Tip is to have something that the hiring agency wants and needs.  If an agency is advertising for an Intermediate or a Paramedic, chances are, they’d be favoring a Paramedic over an Intermediate.  However, if you are an Intermediate with years of active patient care service in an ambulance environment and you also are experienced as a Hospital Emergency Department staffer, then you might just have more of what the hiring agency is looking for. 

The Second Job Tip is to do your homework.  I can’t count the number of applicants who interviewed and knew very little or absolutely nothing about the agency they were interviewing with.  It was almost as though they didn’t even know how to spell EMS.  They were clueless.  This is such a basic requirement you should consider it as important as ABC (now CAP for CPR) in patient assessment.

The Third Job Tip is to take nothing for granted.  A fatal mistake done by many employment candidates who are interviewing with one, or a panel of people who they know, is to assume that those doing the interview know everything about them and thus they don’t have to give complete answers.  For instance, volunteers who have interviewed for a job with the county or city EMS Department failed miserably at answering a basic question such as “What do you know about XYZ Department?”  Because they thought that their years of volunteer service would have been enough for the panel to realize that they knew a lot about the agency, was flat out wrong and their answers were devoid of information.  Your interview performance will determine if you are selected for the “short list” and the job.

The Forth Job Tip is to practice interview questions don’t “wing it.”  If you do not anticipate questions you will be asked at an interview and thus not practice, you will be at a severe disadvantage.  There are so many resources online and at libraries to coach you to give better answers to interview questions.  You must write down and rehearse your answers.  Keep answers to 3 minutes OR LESS.  More than that and you have lost the panel.

The Fifth Job Tip is to Listen to each question and answer the question!  So many good candidates have been passed over not because they weren’t good patient care providers or weren’t knowledgeable in protocols, but because they just didn’t answer the interview questions.  Some rambled on for five, six, or more minutes and when they finished, they hadn’t answered the question.  The key hint here is to listen to the question, think for a moment or two before you start talking, and whatever your answer is, you must relate it back to the job you are seeking.  Tips #2 and #4 can really help you master this tip.

So there you have it.  A few job interviewing tips for an EMT, Paramedic or EMS job interview. Visit back for more tips and other topics of interest to the EMS world.