By Jennifer Patterson Lorenzetti
07/11/07

Staffing Secrets

Making Staffing Resources Work For You

For the human resources department of many healthcare organizations, recruiting therapists is the job that keeps them up at night. Caught between supply of and demand for qualified therapists, most hospitals, clinics and private therapist offices find themselves always on the lookout for the next addition to their team. And for some, bringing in outside resources is the best bet to ensure staffing success.

Knowing When to Outsource

Telly Telhan is president and CEO of Critical Connection, a staffing agency in Bethesda, Md., that specializes in working with healthcare organizations. He has seen a trend recently toward these organizations contracting his firm to handle all of their physical and occupational therapy staffing so that the organization itself can concentrate on growing the business.

“The (Washington), D.C. metropolitan market is one of the largest and most aggressive,” he says, noting that it often takes three to six months to find the right fit for a given position. Organizations outsource their therapist staffing to Critical Connection because of the difficulty of finding occupational therapists and physical therapists. Telhan believes this is a smart move, noting that it is important to call in an outside agency “before it has hit critical mass; before (a shortage) overburdens the other therapists and they start looking,” he says.

But even though Critical Connection is a problem-solver for healthcare organizations, the company takes the approach of letting the therapist be in charge of the search. “Only with (the therapist's) authorization do we send a resume to the client,” he says. The firm emphasizes its focus on learning about the therapist's ideal work environment, then finding openings that fit that profile, an approach that Telhan finds lacking in the staffing trade. “No one listens to what the therapist is looking for,” he says.

Focus on the Therapist

This focus on the therapist is echoed by Cindy Young, PT, recruiter for Infinity Rehab in Wilsonville, Ore., an organization that provides contract rehabilitation services. Infinity Rehab is run by a therapist, and it takes great pride in highlighting the aspects of positions that therapists will find most appealing. “The president of the company will still go out and treat a patient,” Young says.

Young notes that, in its search for therapists, Infinity Rehab will highlight the aspects of the position that it knows will be of interest to the therapist. For example, job ads placed by the company highlight the equipment and facilities available to the therapist who takes the job.

Additionally, if the facility looking to fill a job opening is managed by a therapist or has an experienced therapist on board to serve as a role model and mentor, especially in the same discipline, Young says the advertisements are sure to note this positive fact.

Young advises other organizations competing for the limited pool of therapists to “differentiate yourself” from others in the market. “Pretend you're the therapist looking for a job,” she says. In some cases, this may include factors outside the organization's control, such as location and distance of commute, a factor gaining importance with rising gas prices.

But other factors are well within the organization's ability to control. “Some hospitals have horrible online application processes,” Young says, remembering examples in which an online application system shut down in the middle of an application, forcing the therapist to begin the application process again. She also emphasizes the need for extremely prompt turn-around to job applicants. If a potential applicant calls Young, “I'll be on the phone within minutes, hopefully,” she says. “If I wait a day or two, they could have a job by then.”

Considering Trends

Gabe Heckt is vice president of Martin, Fletcher, an Irving, Texas-based healthcare recruiting and staffing company. Martin, Fletcher manages 200 interviews a month for permanent full-time positions, and this volume of activity has allowed Heckt to notice some staffing trends.

First, he echoes Telhan's assertion that outsourcing staffing operations frees a healthcare organization to perform other critical functions. Attempting to manage staffing in-house, he says, “takes away from other job functions, like taking care of and retaining therapists.”

He notes that there has been “a big shift over the past six to eight months” from openings in acute and in patient care to outpatient opportunities that “tend to be more attractive to therapists.” He also has noticed organizations moving to the use of physical therapy assistants to cover gaps left by insufficient numbers of physical and occupational therapists.

He also notes that therapists are still somewhat in the driver's seat, typically sitting for five or six interviews before choosing to accept a job. And, although some are willing to work for less because of mentoring possibilities and the caliber of their colleagues, others are looking for top pay.

Rural hospitals, he notes, are leading the way in becoming competitive on a national level. Offering bigger salaries, sign-on bonuses and tuition forgiveness, plus retention bonuses for staying on, these hospitals are very effectively compensating for a location that may be ideal for some and a compromise for others.

Heckt emphasizes this need to be nationally competitive. He notes that healthcare organizations tend to call in his firm when they have been unsuccessful recruiting locally, and that they urge their clients to be competitive in order to attract a wider range of applicants.

It is a notion also stated by Christine Washburn, director of marketing for CoreMedical Group in Salem, N.H. She urges her peers to use all of the resources at their disposal, from staffing agencies to Internet job board postings to more traditional advertising, to attract the candidate who is the best fit for the position. “Put yourself out there as many ways as you can,” she concludes.

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