Hiring Practices for Home Healthcare Agencies
It goes without saying, recruiting the best talent into your home healthcare business is one of the most important investments you can make. Qualified caregivers can be tough to find, but with a few best practices in mind, you can make the search a little less daunting. Let’s dive in with some hiring practices for home healthcare agencies.
Rethink Your Mindset
The homecare agency is growing at a tremendous rate. In fact, it’s been reported that by 2030, there will be more senior citizens in the United States than children. What does this mean for the industry? That top caregiver talent has its pick of the litter when it comes to employment. First things first, you might need a mindset adjustment. Turnover at any business can tend to be on the higher side if management views their employees not as an asset, but as dispensable—and it’s expensive. If you treat your staff as the professional, capable, and talent folks they truly are, their overall satisfaction will increase—and they’ll be less likely to call it quits. Your team will be happier, your clients will be happier, and you’ll be happier because you don’t continually have to go through the grueling hiring process.
Rethink Your Requirements
We’ve all been there – we’re a perfect fit for a job, except that one required certification we just don’t have. This happens far too often in the recruitment process. Great candidates are discouraged by requirements of minor certifications, some that could be obtained with a few hours of training, so they don’t apply at all. Take a good look at your job listing and think about what is truly needed in a quality caregiver (the things you can’t teach, such as compassion and empathy), and what can be taught (CPR, for instance). If you have a great training program in place it’s easier to lean more on those key personality traits.
Rethink Your Advertising Strategy
A great job description is certainly an asset, but when it comes to recruiting candidates for your homecare business, posting location is just as critical. Be sure to post your job listing on credible job sites related to the healthcare industry, like care.com and careervitals.com. Tried-and-true job boards, such as monster.com or indeed.com, shouldn’t be discounted either. Of course, your social media channels are a top place to post job listings. And don’t be shy about casting your net out to job fairs, GED classes, or local colleges, either – great candidates can be found all over the place, not just online.
Finally, think about offering referral bonuses to employees. The chances are high that your best performers wouldn’t steer you in the wrong direction when it comes to hiring.
Home care is an industry that is just starting to see its full potential—and we predict even greater things are to come. Get your recruitment mindset, requirements, and strategies in line so you can ramp up your staff with the best talent in town with these hiring practices for home healthcare agencies.