The Hire Connection: June 2014

Twitter @HireConnection

https://plus.google.com/+TheHireConnectionOsageBeach

Google+

LinkedIn

https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-hire-connection-llc

YouTube

Physician Opportunities Blog

Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Connect and Capture!

Recruiting a physician is possibly one of the most difficult challenges a CEO faces as strategies and projections are implemented from the top down. Until one has gone through a recruitment you can’t possibly appreciate the mental anguish that is created waiting for the right physician to come along and want to plant roots in your community. If it is a replacement to someone who has retired or relocated then there are issues of retaining the patient base of that physician while a new one is recruited. This obviously takes time and the longer it takes the more quickly the patient base you are attempting to keep in tact erodes. The patients are going to go somewhere and your biggest fear is they begin to utilize the services of a physician whose loyalty is with your competition in town. Many sleepless nights are spent trying to plug the holes while you search for the replacement. The unfortunate thing is there is nothing you can do until you get a replacement.

The other scenario is recruiting a physician because you are adding a new service. If the service does not require a lot of capital outlay you may not get worked up to much but if you have gone to the board and begged and pleaded for $8,000,000.00 to add cardiology services then you may get some heartburn if you have to wait to long for the physician. Especially if you have already built the new heart catheritization lab. Now you need someone in the cath lab seeing patients and generating revenue so you can pay the note. You have built in some lag time to get the physician there but most times not enough. In either of the scenario you feel under the gun and your job depends on the success of your recruitment.

Everyone hates recruiting but it has to be done if you are going to accomplish and fulfill the vision of your facility. All of the dreams, visions, mission statements, strategies, forecasts are meaningless if you can’t recruit the physician that is going to take you to the promise land.

So why do we pay thousands of dollars to recruitment agencies, fully expecting them to get the job done, but not give it the priority it deserves. There are many reasons why this happens. First of all we have been recruiting physicians for years and we have to go through the same dog and pony show, most times wiping out our precious weekends where you have a standing t-time that is once again going to get bumped for ANOTHER interview. An interview where there are no guarantees he/she is going to accept an opportunity. That is a difficult proposition. We jump through all the hoops to put together a solid itinerary, addressing every need you feel is important to the candidate and spouse only to learn that once again they are not interested because the town was not what they expected.

Here are the realities. People move to locations and accept opportunities for a variety of reasons. Compensation, politics, expansions, equipment, amenities in community, quality of schools, are just a few but the main reason why anyone would move to your community and it is the great equalizer if there are some deficiencies in the above reasons and that is your ability to connect. So what does it mean to connect and capture.

Here is one of the greatest simple truths in life that if fully understood will take you to heights you have never been before. Life is not about you, it is about the other person. That other person can be your spouse, close friend, significant other, or it could be the candidate sitting in front of you at a dinner table that just wiped out another weekend because of the interview. When you grasp this concept and take it to the next level you begin to understand what connecting is about. Once you get the connecting down the capture is simply a natural progression.

So how does one connect with someone. Remember it is not about you. We love talking about ourselves because first of all that is where our comfort level is. We know ourselves and therefore; it is easy to speak for hours about that subject. We are also very passionate about ourselves, most times, and therefore; we can add a lot of emotion and dynamics to the monologue. The problem is a candidate doesn’t care about you, they want you to care about them. So if you truly want to connect, express a genuine interest in someone by getting them talking about themselves. Don’t ask close-ended questions where you get one word answers. Ex. How many children do you have? How many years have you been married? Where are you from? All of these questions make you the center of the discussion because you are asking questions and he/she is giving you one word answers. How about taking the same questions and turning them into open-ended questions. Ex. So can you tell me about your children. How did you meet you wife? What was your childhood like?

These questions and many more will get the person talking about something they are very comfortable with and are very passionate about. This also shifts the attention from you to them. Remember, it is about them, not you. If you want to connect with someone you have to express genuine interest in the person, be attentive, don’t interrupt, look them in the eye, and let your body language reflect what they are saying.

A candidate can determine if they can make a living in a hospital or practice very quickly. They can also determine if they will like the community or if the community has the amenities the family need very quickly. They can typically get that information off the chamber of commerce website. What they can’t determine by looking at websites, mailers, speaking with recruiters, etc., is weather they can connect with someone in your community. There are a lot of reasons why someone would reconsider relocating but the number one reason is going to be you and anyone else that is part of the process. You have to be able to connect or that amazing piece of equipment you just purchased won’t amount to a hill of beans.

When you connect your odds of capturing a candidate go through the roof. So if you want to free up some weekends and get back to your standing tee time then eliminate 3-4 interviews to get one candidate and start connecting with the candidate and spouse. At The Hire Connection, we know how to connect and capture your perfect candidate. Give us a call so we can help you!

Let the Hire Connection help you find the Right person, for the Right place, for the Right time who will stay with you!

SUBSCRIBE TODAY!

The Hire Connection Team

Let's Connect!

Facebook

Twitter @HireConnection

https://plus.google.com/+TheHireConnectionOsageBeach

Google+

LinkedIn

https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-hire-connection-llc

YouTube

Physician Opportunities Blog

Thursday, June 19, 2014

Are Rural Hospitals Spread Too Thin?

More than 51 million Americans live in areas classified by the US Office of Management and Budget (OMB) as non-metropolitan. This comprises one-fifth of the US population. This population is generally older, poorer, sicker, less educated and in worse health than those living in metropolitan areas. They also are more likely to need health care, have fewer hospital beds, lower physician per capita, lower access to health care and are less likely to have adequate health insurance.

With at least 20 percent of the population living in rural areas, why is it that less than 11 percent of the nation’s physicians practice in rural areas. Is it because rural health facilities are trying to compete with urban facilities and spreading themselves too thin?

When people think about the health care infrastructure in many rural areas, they think about physician shortages, isolation, struggling small hospitals, aging equipment, lack of capital for investment, high uninsured population among residents and the list goes on. This is certainly true in some rural areas. While physical isolation and economic circumstances certainly play a role in rural community challenges, they do not pose insurmountable challenges. Healthy does not require advanced medical technology such as open MRI and CAT scan capacity in every community. What is necessary, is to make major inroads to ensure that rural communities have adequate access to those primary health care services which can address the major health needs of that community.

What are the health needs of small communities? More often than not health is acknowledged more in its absence than its presence. However, when a family member, a friend or a colleague does become sick what is the expectation of care for a rural community resident? To a large extent unrealistic and inappropriate community expectations are often driven by media reports that focus on expensive state-of-the-art equipment and promote dependency on immediate 24 hour-a-day services. The notion of better health care is different from simply providing more health care. Bearing in mind that resources are finite and relatively scarce, it is important for hospitals to target those services that are likely to yield the greatest health gain for their community.

Health promotion and illness prevention programs that fall within a public health approach can complement the provision of primary care in a small community. Some of the greatest improvements in health status result from simply changing human behavior. Mandatory wearing of seat belts has drastically reduced the mortality rates associated with rural road trauma. Annual checkups, cancer screens, lower alcohol consumption and taking greater responsibility for ones own health can minimize preventable ill health. These efforts combined with primary care services enable a rural community hospital to cater realistic health care to its residents.

It is safe to say that rural health care has made significant strides in recent years with telemedicine providing greater access to specialists, managed care providing more affordable care, and recruiting efforts and incentives to increase the number of physicians practicing in rural areas. Health care is a lot of things but it is also a business… big business. It must look for its niche just as other big business does.

Maybe this niche is to provide the best primary care possible for its small town residents. Rural hospitals don’t have to compete with their urban counterpart but rather focus on a solid, long-term positioning in its community as the best and preferred place to receive primary care.

Let the Hire Connection help you find the Right person, for the Right place, for the Right time who will stay with you!

SUBSCRIBE TODAY!

The Hire Connection Team

Let's Connect!

Facebook

Twitter @HireConnection

https://plus.google.com/+TheHireConnectionOsageBeach

Google+

LinkedIn

https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-hire-connection-llc

YouTube

Physician Opportunities Blog

Tuesday, June 17, 2014

The Hire Connection Difference!

The Hire Connection is unlike any other healthcare recruiting company in the country. Our model has provable results and several guarantees to make sure your search is successful for your hospital or other health care facility. Here are just a few of the differences The Hire Connection offers you!

Guaranteed physician placement within 12 months or less. Result-Driven business model.

Maximum service with minimal financial risk.

The industry’s most comprehensive range of services. Services range from opportunity discovery, national sourcing, candidate screening, site visit preparation, contract negotiation and relocation.

Easily budgeted, All-Inclusive, flat monthly billings (professional fees) are guaranteed to result in placement or 100% of your professional fees are refunded back to you.

Multi-search discount pricing. Discounted pricing allows you to lock in on the industry’s lowest recruitment rates, thus easing your upfront investment and allowing you to activate searches over an extended period of time.

Where traditional retained firms will profit greatly whether your search is filled or not, THE HIRE CONNECTION staff is careful to eliminate searches that are impossible to fill or are not competitive with other like opportunities. This ensures your time and recruitment dollars are not wasted on a firm that is simply going through the motions.

Because THE HIRE CONNECTION does not practice hourly billing and professional fees are protected by our guarantee, our recruiters are only compensated when your search is filled. This creates a tremendous amount of incentive for the recruiter to fill your search as quickly as possible and remain committed even when professional billing has ended.

Many times when THE HIRE CONNECTION gets involved in the recruitment process, our clients already have some “hooks” in the water to source physicians. Should our clients fill search on their own or through another source, THE HIRE CONNECTION allows its clients to roll half of the professionals fees incurred into a new search of their choice.

THE HIRE CONNECTION insures candidate will report to work and remain at opportunity for a minimum of six months.

THE HIRE CONNECTION’s technology is like no other in the industry. It’s because our unique approach to sourcing candidates we can fill searches at a rate that is unparalleled in the industry.

Most reputable recruiting firms are going to have what we call a back-end guarantee. We have that back-end guarantee as well. Our back-end guarantee is going to be very similar to the industry standard that simply says, “If the physician we place with your opportunity falls off for any reason within 6 months of the physician’s start date, we will replace the physician at NO cost to you”. That means if you terminate the candidate or the candidate resigns in the first 6 months of the start date, we will replace the candidate.

We also have what we call a front-end guarantee. This is our Money Back Guarantee that says, “If we don’t fill your search in 12 months or less we will refund your professional fees back to your facility”.

So we actually protect your investment in the event we don’t fill your search and we protect your investment on the back-end if the candidate falls off.

Let the Hire Connection help you find the Right person, for the Right place, for the Right time who will stay with you!

The Hire Connection offers its clients the industry's most comprehensive range of recruitment services. Coupling technology, expertise and accountability, The Hire Connection services are designed to source, screen, qualify, present and place the RIGHT providers to satisfy recruitment goals and improve provider retention. Give us a call today!

SUBSCRIBE TODAY!

The Hire Connection Team

Let's Connect!

Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/thehireconnection
Twitter @HireConnection
https://twitter.com/hireconnection
Google+
https://plus.google.com/+TheHireConnectionOsageBeach
LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-hire-connection-llc
YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/user/HireConXion
Physician Opportunities Blog
http://thehireconnection.net/hirers/blog/

Friday, June 13, 2014

Retained is NOT a four letter word

Retained is not a FOUR letter word….Unless you are a clinic or hospital who has been fleeced for 30k at least once over the years by a retained approach. I have been recruiting healthcare providers for over 20 years and if I had a dime for every time a prospect (in-house recruiter or hospital CEO) asked me if my approach was retained, I could finance this country’s national debt. In other words, do we have to make an upfront investment for your services? That question is “code” for, we don’t use retained firms, we have tried that before and got taken for 40k, our Board has a policy in place that we don’t use retained firms, we only use Contingent, and the list goes, of statements after you answer the question emphatically, YES!!

Of course, they have heard all of the Retained firms new twists on the word Retained. Replacement words like Hybrid or Accountable are used in place of Retained. But let’s call a spade a spade. If a recruiting company demands one dollar before they launch a search for your organization, they are part of the FOUR letter dictionary. Of course, I get a chuckle when the powers to be ask me if there is an upfront investment for our services. I like to answer that question with a few questions of my own. How long have you been looking for the provider you are seeking? Have you invested in any Job Board to source a candidate for your opportunity? Have you conducted any semblance of a marketing campaign such a snail mail or email campaign? Does your organization pay you a salary for your efforts? Have you brought some Panera bagels to a residency program? Have you been to job fair and set up a booth representing your organization?

If the answer is YES to any of these questions, you have already made an upfront investment into the process and your particular search. So the issue is not, will there be an investment made into the search, but how will the investment be used and how will dollars be spent. The larger question is…how much is too much of an upfront investment? Only you can answer that question and determine how your time is best spent.

There are four legs any recruitment process. Sourcing, Screening, Presenting, and Closing. Sourcing is without a doubt, the heavy lifting, and the ditch digging of recruiting. If I could line up 50 qualified candidates daily for each recruiter I employ to speak to about their cadre accounts, I would have applicants lined up around this building seeking employment. An organization has to make a decision and that decision is how much is too much to spend on the actual effort. It’s actually a simple formula.

Past Revenue Lost + Continued Revenue Lost + Future Income - Upfront Investment = ?

There are a lot of firms out there promising you the moon. Both, large firms, all the way to the one man shop that sits at home with ESPN Sports Center playing in the background with the dogs barking in the background. Before you ultimately make a decision, ask a couple of questions. What exactly is done to source candidates for their practice opportunities and what financial safeguards are they willing to put on your upfront fees.

Four Pillars to Sourcing

1) Exposure

2) Repetition,

3) Method

4) Execute

If there are 10,000 candidates that fit the parameters of your provider you are seeking, then you have to ask yourself, how effective have you been in getting the opportunity message to those 10,000 candidates. Now we can all accept the reality that it is impossible to reach all 10,000 providers with your message. You can certainly order names from a list company and conduct mail campaign on your own. The challenge with that approach is MAIL is another FOUR letter word that has run its course. The USPS is not 16 billion in the red because this service is being over used. Sooo, Mr. Smarty Pants, if sending out 5000 mailers and sitting around like the Maytag guy waiting for a call is not the answer, then what is it?

I propose, if you have the budget, utilizing in part, technology to get the opportunity message out to the masses is a large part of the sourcing answer. That includes but is not limited to, voice blasting, text blasting, PURL’s, job boards, E-Blasting, Landing Pages, YouTube videos and acquiring additional data points on your candidate pool, just to name a few things you have to engage in order to be successful. If you are considering a recruiting firm and all they want to talk about is their database that is old and worn out and the mailer they want you to purchase for $2.10 each times 15,000 pieces, when they have .38 in each one, you are going to be part of the group of people that say Retained is a Four letter word. Mail is DEAD. Put a fork in it.

The other piece to this decision process is, what safeguards is the recruiting firm putting on my investment. If they truly believe they can filly your opportunity, then it’s time to put their money where their mouth is. If your organization was purchasing a brand new GE Open MRI and you wrote a deposit check for 75k, I bet you would expect GE to drop off that piece of equipment. If they didn’t you would probably call your legal counsel and begin deliberations on how to get your money back. I believe if a recruiting firm believes in the heart of hearts, they can fill your search then they should place financial guards on at least part of your upfront fees. A true partnership is forged when both parties share in the risk. If you are considering a firm that only guarantees on the back end if the candidate never shows or gets fired within 6 months from employment start date, then you may be part of that screaming cussing group that swears off Retained firms once again.

The Hire Connection offers its clients the industry's most comprehensive range of recruitment services. Coupling technology, expertise and accountability, The Hire Connection services are designed to source, screen, qualify, present and place the RIGHT providers to satisfy recruitment goals and improve provider retention. Give us a call today!

SUBSCRIBE TODAY!

The Hire Connection Team

Let's Connect!

Facebook

Twitter @HireConnection

https://plus.google.com/+TheHireConnectionOsageBeach

Google+

LinkedIn

https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-hire-connection-llc

YouTube

Physician Opportunities Blog