Healthcare organizations are coming up with creative ways to tackle ongoing workforce challenges.
Whether companies are trying to find the right people for open positions, ease employee burdens, boost internal engagement or strengthen the staffing pipeline, leaders at Modern Healthcare’s Workforce Summit last week said lasting success requires long-term, innovative strategies.
Here are three staffing-related trending topics executives discussed at the event in Nashville, Tennessee.
Related: 2024 Best Places to Work in Healthcare winners announced
Recruitment and retention
Filling positions and keeping talent are some of the biggest challenges in the healthcare industry, forcing providers and vendors to get creative in hiring and retention.
Memorial Hermann Health System is finding workers before they are even entering the job market, said Lori Knowles, senior vice president and chief human resources officer. The Houston-based healthcare system is using a $31 million grant from Bloomberg Philanthropies to create what it calls a healthcare high school.
In August, Memorial Hermann partnered with Aldine Independent School District in Houston to create Health Education and Leadership High. Students who enroll at HEAL High select one of six career tracks and receive training, internships and mentoring that will help them transition to a healthcare job at the health system following graduation.
iMPROve Health is being more intentional these days when it comes to recruiting staff, said President and CEO Dr. Leland Babitch. He said the Grand Rapids, Michigan-based nonprofit that helps healthcare companies make quality improvements is advising its managers not to rush to fill openings, but to take the time to hire those who have the appropriate qualifications and align with the company's culture.
Ensuring the company finds the right fit for a role can reduce turnover, added Babitch.
Once employees are on board, some companies have created touchpoints to keep them engaged during their first year on the job. For example, Nashville, Tennessee-based HCA Healthcare tries to understand career aspirations of each new employee during their early weeks on the job, said Laura DeMotte, vice president of human resources American Group and workforce development. The company then tries to help them reach their professional goals through educational opportunities and chances to shadow staff in other departments.
“Keeping [engagement] in the forefront creates incredible stickiness with the employee,” DeMotte said.
Companies such as FreeMarket Health say they allow staff to be entrepreneurial in the hopes of getting a leg up on larger competitors. CEO Joe Cardosi said the Pittsburgh-based technology company encourages software engineers to develop new products and “put their own imprint on the platform.”
Mergers and acquisitions
As companies scale up, leaders must often merge two distinct workforces into one cohesive team.
Combining teams smoothly is particularly important since the industry has returned to a pre-pandemic level of dealmaking, said Therese Fitzpatrick, senior vice president at the healthcare consultancy Kaufman Hall, which helps with post-merger integration work. During the third quarter, 27 deals have been announced, including four mega-merger transactions with sellers’ annual revenues exceeding $1 billion, she said.
Supporting company morale in the medium term after a merger is vital, Fitzpatrick said.
“There is oftentimes tremendous enthusiasm on day one. What we find the most critical day is day 120, and by then, folks are getting tired,” she said. “Keeping folks interested and enthused past 120 days is really, really important.”
Froedtert ThedaCare Health has successfully pushed past that 120-day mark, said Maggie Lund, chief human resources, culture and integration officer. The combined health system, which brought together Milwaukee-based Froedtert Health and Neenah, Wisconsin-based ThedaCare, began blending workforces and aligning goals before the deal closed in December. For example, about 250 clinicians and leaders from both organizations have created a report about the joint health system’s path forward and top 10 priorities.
“I don’t think that there's anything that supplants leaders talking to their teams, making people feel valued, having a voice and being part of this,” Lund said.
Engagement from leadership is particularly important among organizations spanning various states and including smaller sites, said Annette Morgan, chief administrative officer at City of Hope Orange County. For instance, while virtual meetings are an effective way to broadly reach staff members, leadership will make rotations to various locations to hear from workers about their own experiences at the company and to help employees feel seen.
“We have helped connect with our employees in-person across the network, and really make them feel like they're part of the larger family,” Morgan said.
Artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence holds potential for an industry rife with tedious administrative tasks driving burnout among clinicians, leaders say.
Aramark Healthcare+ is using AI tools to speed up the hiring process. The Philadelphia-based company’s approximately 13,000 employees provide food, environment and facilities management to partners in 47 states. The company uses a chatbot to interact with job applicants and keep them engaged before hiring managers start interviewing them. Aramark Healthcare+ President and CEO Bart Kaericher said AI has cut recruitment time to five days from 25 days.
WellBe Senior Medical, a Chicago-based senior primary care provider, is using AI to document clinician visits with patients at home. While some employees were initially skeptical, they have found that the tool captured insights that they may have missed, said Denise Hatzidakis, chief information officer at WellBe Senior Medical.
SureTest, which automates information technology testing processes, is using AI for small tasks, such as organizing data. Founder and CEO Laura O’Toole said the Franklin, Tennessee-based company is taking a measured approach to using AI and completed a governance review before adopting the technology on a limited basis.
“It’s a little concerning to me that a lot of people are jumping into AI without enough governance [reviews],” O’Toole said.
Down the line, incorporating additional use cases for AI into the workflow could attract more people to healthcare and keep people working in the field longer, executives said.
“The biggest impact, but it will take time, is when they start seeing that they're getting to do what they went to school to do, which is take care of patients,” Hatzidakis said.