5min read

What a decade of agency nursing actually looks like, from the Senior Placement Specialist, Andrew, who was there for the last three years.

I’ve been Jenny’s consultant for the last three years.

Jenny worked 31 agency nursing contracts with Affinity. Queensland, Victoria, Western Australia and New South Wales. Mental health facilities, remote communities and regional hospitals. She retired last month, which I’m still processing.

On our last call, she said something that’s stuck with me:

“It’s been a wonderful chapter in my life. The quality, the substance that these 10 years have given to my career, to me personally. The growth it’s given me. The ability and the privilege to see this beautiful country. How many people get to see and work in the places I have?”

I want to tell you about the nurse behind those words.

Mount Isa, where Jenny enjoyed her final contract.

She didn’t start with a grand plan.

Jenny came to Affinity after 25 years as a mental health nurse. She’d resigned from permanent work. Her kids were overseas. Her routine was gone. She told me she’d had a major adjustment disorder in those first weeks. That she looked at agency nursing not because it sounded exciting, but because she needed something to keep her going.

That honesty is what makes Jenny, Jenny. She never dresses anything up. She tells you exactly how it is. Always has.

I think that’s worth saying because a lot of nurses come to agency work from a similar place. Not chasing adventure. Just looking for something different after years of doing the same thing. Jenny’s proof that starting from that place doesn’t mean the experience is any less extraordinary.

Jenny’s first contract was tough.

The expectation at this particular facility was to hit the ground running. No orientation week, no slow start. You’re the nurse from day one, in a facility you’ve never set foot in, with a team you’ve never met.

Jenny had 25 years of mental health nursing behind her and she had something that not every nurse has – the confidence to say “I don’t know,” and then go and find the answer.

Not bluff it. Not panic. Just figure it out.

By her second contract in Rockhampton, she had the rhythm. By her tenth, she couldn’t imagine going back to permanent work.

Make friends with the accommodation officer.

If Jenny could give one piece of advice to every nurse or midwife starting agency work, this would be it.

The admin staff and accommodation officers are the people who make your contract livable. They know how everything works. They know where everything is. And you’re essentially an outsider. 

“You have to make an effort,” she told me. “I couldn’t get by without them.”

She told me about the time there was a heatwave in Maryborough. It turns out there was no air conditioning in her accommodation at the time. It was the weekend, nothing was open and it was unbearable. By the next day, someone had turned up with a portable air conditioner. It came down to the people, the relationships and the kindness Jenny takes with her to every contract.

Jenny returned to one particular facility in Western Australia three times. Multiple contracts that she loved in the same town. Her advice: “If you want to go back, don’t burn your bridges.”

Jenny is celebrating retirement with her Cattle Dog, Jack

Jenny was never just the nurse.

In remote and regional communities, the job description goes out the window. Jenny was the mental health nurse, the social worker, the OT, and the crisis contact all in one. The allied health team was there, but they had their own caseloads. Jenny learned the community services contacts, the referral pathways, the processes for when something went sideways at 2am.

That’s the reality of remote nursing that doesn’t make it onto agency websites. It’s harder than permanent work in a lot of ways. But Jenny never complained about it. She talked about the kids in Mount Isa. The teams that rallied around their communities. The moments that reminded her why she got into nursing in the first place.

She told me that someone once asked her how she connected with patients the way she did. She thought about it and said: “Because I believe in people.”

I’ve placed hundreds of nurses in my career. I will never forget that line.

She loved the west coast.

Of all the places Jenny worked over 31 contracts, Western Australia stayed with her. She told me: “People from the east coast need to go to the west coast.”

A place called Busselton was her favourite. Geraldton also kept pulling her back – she told me there’s something about WA that gets under your skin once you’ve been there.

Photos from Jenny’s trip to Eagle Bay while on contract in 2021

Agency nurses change agencies all the time. A different pay rate, a different overall package. It’s the nature of the industry, so I asked Jenny what made her stay with Affinity all these years?

She told me about a message Affinity sent out during COVID. It said: if you get sick on contract, we will support you. If you need to get home, we’ll put you on a plane. If a family member is sick and you need to leave, we’ll get you home. If you’re paying rent at home and can’t afford it while you’re stuck on contract, we’ll cover it.

Affinity started as a small family organisation and Jenny said we’ve never lost that. The consistency. The phone calls that weren’t just about filling a contract. The feeling that someone actually cares.

“You look after us,” she said. “That’s why I stayed.”

The last call

Almost all of our conversations ended with a laugh. Even when a contract was hard, even when something went sideways, she’d find the one thing that made it funny. I reckon that’s half the reason she lasted 31 contracts. She never took herself too seriously.

I told her it had been an absolute pleasure. And I meant it. Three years of watching someone genuinely love what they do, show up for communities that needed her and treat every single contract like it mattered.

Because to Jenny, it did.

She’s getting a sunroof. The grandkids are going to see a lot more of her. The garden’s finally going to get the attention it deserves. And knowing Jenny, she’s already got a few ‘pots on the boil’ – her words, not mine.

If you’re a nurse thinking about trying agency work, I can’t promise your experience will be exactly like Jenny’s. But I can tell you that the nurses who get the most out of it are the ones who show up the way she did: honest, curious and willing to make friends with the accommodation officer on day one.

31 contracts. 10 years. One of the best nurses I’ve had the privilege of working with.

Thanks, Jenny.

Andrew is a Senior Placement Specialist at Affinity Nursing. Jenny worked 31 contracts across QLD, VIC, WA, and NSW with us before retiring in May 2026.

If you’re thinking about agency nursing, or just want to know what’s available right now, join Affinity Nursing here.

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