| Sumario: | Significance & Background: Preceptors play a critical role in onboarding new oncology nurses, yet they often face challenges due to the complexity of oncology care and a lack of formal support. Traditionally, preceptors are selected based solely on experience and convenience rather than interest or ability, which can impact the quality of orientation. They are also expected to take the same ratios of patients, which leaves less time for education. Purpose: The purpose of this project was to explore the experiences, challenges, and needs of frontline oncology nurse preceptors through key informant interviews, with the goal of developing future training and support initiatives. Interventions: Sixteen registered nurse (RN) preceptors from three outpatient oncology settings participated in nine virtual or in-person key informant sessions using standardized questions. Inclusion criteria required participants to have precepted within the past 12 months. Results: Themes emerged around both the benefits and challenges of precepting. Benefits included relationship-building, trust, pride, and the opportunity to share expertise. Challenges involved lack of incentives, time constraints, unclear expectations, and difficulty providing feedback. Participants emphasized the need for consistent training, structured resources, and better alignment between preceptors and new hires. Discussion: Findings highlight the importance of recognizing diverse learning styles, improving recruitment and matching processes, and fostering a culture of mentorship. Limitations include the exclusion of licensed practical nurses (LPNs) from the respondent pool. Next steps include implementing recurring training, developing checklists and resources, offering incentives, establishing a mentoring program, refining hiring practices, and conducting yearly revalidation and continuous evaluation. Current work is being done to develop quarterly workshops, train-the-trainer sessions and pre-orientation refreshers that include a checklist of expectations and hands-on walkthroughs of documentation requirements.
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