Talent Management

Hospitals are struggling to recruit and retain qualified staff, particularly nurses, physicians, and other clinical professionals. This is leading to increased stress on existing staff and impacting the quality of patient care.

Three years into a post-COVID world, it looks like remote work is here to stay. Some organizations have employees who work remotely full-time, while others spend part of the time remote and part of the time in the office.

Either way, a remote workforce presents particular challenges that require careful management. Here are some best practices to mitigate the risks and challenges for remote workers.

During the unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic and its aftermath, organizations had to come face-to-face with the strengths and weaknesses of their leadership skills. Emotional intelligence (EI) emerged as a crucial part of effective leadership when leading hybrid and remote teams.

Here's how you can approach, develop, and apply EI going forward.

In the United States, most clinicians must be licensed in each state in which they intend to practice and serve patients. This can limit the availability of health services, contribute to provider shortages, and restrict job opportunities for providers. It can also be a financial burden for nurses, due to the fees associated with licensing.

The COVID pandemic disrupted healthcare as we knew it. But healthcare systems are taking advantage of the pandemic-driven upheaval to accelerate changes to the way they work. According to a report from Deloitte, only 9% of healthcare employees indicated that employers were innovating new ways of working before COVID-19, compared with 78% since the pandemic began.

The number of nurses experiencing burnout is trending up and has been since before the COVID-19 pandemic. That burnout comes with a hefty price tag. The National Taskforce for Humanity in Healthcare estimates that nursing burnout costs hospitals $9 billion every year. Disengagement and lost productivity drive frequent turnover and can result in lost reimbursement from failing to meet patient-satisfaction and quality-care outcomes.

HR leaders are very familiar with company audits, risk assessments, and gap analyses for skills, talent, and hiring needs. However, you don’t always take the time to audit your own department, identify potential risks and opportunities to strengthen resources, and ensure compliance best practices.

The areas within HR that create the greatest risk are likely the same areas on which you and your team expend the greatest amount of time and energy, such as: 

Healthcare systems in the United States have been feeling the effects of the workforce shortage for years now, but a more dire impact is still to come. The Health Resources and Services Administration predicts significant increases by 2030 in the demand for respiratory and physical and occupational therapists, among other allied health professions.

The advent of COVID-19 reminded us that we can’t afford to be complacent. The world is evolving all around us, and if we want our organizations to thrive, we have to be willing and ready to embrace disruption and innovation regularly.

There’s always room for improvement, especially when it comes to healthcare processes and patient care. A continuous improvement strategy can have a significant impact on patient outcomes and your organization’s bottom line. Intermountain Healthcare measured the impact of a continuous improvement strategy on their spending and cut costs by 13%, a $700 million savings in 2016 alone.