MED e-care Blog
It's a Tough Job - Recruitment Challenges
By Alana Rennie | 24 January 2018
There is tremendous competition for qualified staff within the health care industry. The causes are many:
1. The ballooning of more and more Retirement Home sites, the increase in the number of long term care beds, the expansion of community support services, and the conversion of acute care beds to alternate levels of care have all placed pressure on organizations to maintain adequate staffing.
2. Although colleges and universities are generating health care workers at all levels, this profession takes a toll. It is all too common when graduates hit reality that they decide the job is not as glamorous or easy as they expected. They drop out of the workforce to look for something else.
3. Job hoppers are costly and disruptive. Important to clarify. Some hop jobs because they move frequently or they have been unfortunate to work for poor organizations and know that there are better, more supportive locations out there. Unfortunately, there are the other Job Hoppers. Those who jump from one workplace to another because they are poor employees, or looking for happiness in a profession that they are not capable of doing or a “grass is greener” mentality where they are looking for a utopia that does not exist.
Recruiting initiatives are necessary and costly. However, you do not know who you are getting and the investment of time and resources into a new employee can be staggering.
Retention is the key! People stay for a number of reasons:
Respect – they feel worthwhile, are spoken to as an equal and are valued regardless of their position.
Training – they are provided the skills to manage an ever increasingly complex clientele.
Tools for the Job – they have the equipment and resources necessary to do their job safely and efficiently.
They are heard – they know that someone with influence in the organization will listen to what they have to say and act on what needs to be done.
Your investment to keep the people you have has a greater return than gambling on the people you may get.
