Nursing Interviews in Switzerland: How to Vet the Ward

A nursing interview in Switzerland usually runs 45 to 60 minutes. In that hour the ward sizes you up — and you get to size them up just as hard, because the staffing gap in Swiss healthcare has been documented for years (Obsan, the Swiss health observatory). Walk in with three researched facts, three stories you can actually tell and seven questions of your own, and you will learn more about daily life on that ward than any job ad gives away. What follows is both halves: what they will ask you, and what you should ask back.

Research: three things the ad rarely tells you

Check three things before you go. First, the roster model: fixed rotation or request-based planning, how many weeks ahead the plan is published, and whether a late shift is routinely followed by an early one. Second, the nursing model — primary nursing, task-based care or a hybrid shapes your day far more than any mission statement. Third, the public numbers: annual reports from larger hospitals carry headcount and sometimes turnover, ANQ, the national body for hospital quality measurement, publishes results for acute care, psychiatry and rehabilitation, and the Federal Office of Public Health publishes medical quality indicators for nursing homes. A vacancy open for eight months tells you something too. Turn each point into a question.

The questions you will actually be asked

Four come up almost every time: why you are leaving, why this ward, how you prioritise when three things are urgent at once, and how you handle demanding relatives. Then availability, notice period and your willingness to work nights and weekends. Answer in numbers, not adjectives: “32-bed ward, six to eight patients per nurse on late shift, mostly post-operative” beats “lots of experience”. Prepare three stories you can tell in 90 seconds each — one clinical, one about the team, one involving a family. Three is enough; two rarely is. If you trained abroad, expect two more topics: your German or French, and where your diploma recognition with the SRK/CRS (Swiss Red Cross) stands.

The questions that show how the ward really runs

Ask for numbers. How many patients does one registered nurse — dipl. Pflegefachperson HF/FH — carry on early, late and night shifts, and how often was the ward below target staffing last month? What is the grade mix between registered nurses, FaGe (a three-year federal vocational qualification in healthcare) and AGS (its two-year counterpart)? How long is the induction, is there a written plan and a named mentor, and when do you first take a night shift alone? Is there a float pool or a documented absence plan, or do they call you on your day off? National staffing ratios belong to the second stage of the 2021 nursing initiative and are not law yet, so what binds today is whatever the employer has written down.

Talking about hard situations without trashing anyone

Four steps: the situation, what you did, how it ended, what you would do differently now. Stay with verifiable facts — “for four months, two of us covered 24 residents on the late shift” is a description, not a complaint. The same goes for mistakes: a fall or a medication error that you reported and worked through in CIRS, the incident reporting system most Swiss hospitals run, speaks for you rather than against you. How they react to that is a culture test in its own right. Ask back: how are reports handled, who chairs the case reviews, and can staff report anonymously? Then say what you learned, not who was at fault.

Pensum, allowances, notice: settle these before round two

Five things should be in writing before round two. First, the Pensum — your contracted percentage: is 80 percent really 80, or 80 plus covering gaps? Second, how overtime and time balances are settled: hours off or cash. Third, allowances for nights, Sundays, holidays and on-call. The Employment Act gives a 10 percent time credit for regular night work, with exceptions, and where Sunday work is regular it requires compensating rest rather than a wage premium. Fourth, training days, cost share, repayment clause. Fifth, start date, probation and notice: absent a written agreement, the Code of Obligations sets one month in year one, two months in years two to nine. Your contract, the collective agreement (GAV/CCT) or cantonal staff regulations decide the rest — ask for them as a PDF.

Where we come in

We prepare both sides. Before the interview you get what we know about the employer: roster model, how the induction actually works, team size, who will be in the room and what they tend to ask. Where our information is thin, we say so instead of guessing. Afterwards we collect the feedback, including the uncomfortable parts, and pass it on. What we cannot do is tell you whether the team fits — you decide that on the ward, ideally during a trial shift (Schnuppertag), which most Swiss employers will arrange if you ask. And if you want to know whether an offer sits inside the market range, our salary check is free and non-binding.