October 31st, 2008 by khart
At the risk of seriously dating myself, I am going to describe the position control process as it existed in the ‘old days’ before extensive use of computers in recruitment and HR. In my last position as Director of Nurse Recruitment for a large Midwest hospital, each nursing manager had a position control book, I had the master book sheets for all units, and we collaboratively reviewed open positions, pending transfers, new hires, etc. on an every two-week basis.
The book was developed from budgeted positions by unit. Each position had a space on the sheet and the position number was indicated. The sheet was divided by shift, so that at a glance, you could see openings by unit and shift, whether they were full time, part time or per diem, and notes in pencil indicated transfers in and out, pending hires, etc.
This handy little tool was my ‘Bible’ as it could be used to run open position lists, and showed clearly what was happening with each position.
Division directors and their managers could tweak their positions if these tweaks maintained adequate staffing. For example, in the ED, we had a variety of 12-hour shifts designed to meet the needs of the busiest times in that unit. We had 10 am to 10 pm, 11 am to 11 pm and other similar positions. Similarly, we were able to develop job-share positions. However, these decisions were made collaboratively, not in a vacuum and careful study was made as to what the impact would have on staffing the unit.
Contrast those halcyon days with the situation in many organizations now.
What we find as we consult with many of our clients is that position control as a tool to assist with staffing and recruitment doesn’t really exist anymore. Hiring managers have a budgeted amount of positions and in many cases, they play with their number to meet the needs of those they want to hire, instead of what they need to staff their units. Sometimes recruitment doesn’t even have access to this information. All recruitment may know is that 6 east has an allotment of 36.5 positions, not which positions are on what shift and what the full time/part time breakout looks like. To say nothing of which positions are open, which filled, where transfers are in process, who are potentially leaving positions, etc.
Kind of like the proverbial blind men trying to identify an elephant. Everyone touches a different part, and thus, their descriptions are totally different. The manager has one view, the recruiter quite another.
Often the recruiter must rely on just the requisitions to fill positions. With no overview of all the positions (filled, open, soon to be open, etc.), no planning can be done and recruitment becomes reactive.
A resume that may be a perfect fit for a position languishes because the recruiter has no idea that particular position is opening.
This situation is a gap crying for a solution and solutions do exist! There are commercial software and web-based applications that will provide position control, and many HRIS systems have a position control component.
The first recommendation is to find common ground. Decide who ‘owns’ position control, then, work together to make sure everyone is on the same page. Communicate, communicate, communicate. Recruitment absolutely needs to know where openings are, where folks are transferring to and from, and what will be needed in the near and distant future.
We may not be able to go back to the ‘old days’, but surely we can make our technology work with us rather than against us.
Next week we look at the requisition process.
Posted in Process | To leave a comment, click here »
October 24th, 2008 by khart
One of the most common projects we undertake in the Health Care Division is called a Process Diagnostic, where we assess clients’ recruitment processes and deliver gap analysis and recommendations for improvement. Recruitment has evolved in the last ten to twenty years, and the technology we now have at our disposal, new roles in recruitment, more complex and larger health care systems, and the increasing lack of face-to-face communication with candidates, have all coalesced to create a perfect storm.
This perfect storm has led to a lack of customer care (both external customers and internal customers), recruiter frustration (after all, recruiters want to recruit and that means human contact), increased length of time to recruit, and constant churning.
Marketing dollars are being spent to attract candidates and in many cases the volume of resumes resulting from these efforts is crippling recruiters’ ability to sift through the resumes and deliver viable candidates to hiring managers.
Lack of effective processes extends from position control to requisition management, to open position report generation/availability, to redundancies and lack of integration in technology. Recruiters often have to duplicate work because the applicant tracking system doesn’t interface with the HRIS system or they have to develop tracking and sourcing documents in Excel or other applications.
Communication both to candidates and with hiring managers is an issue. In many cases automated communication is fraught with problems.
Recruitment roles and responsibilities are also a huge factor. As systems have grown and expanded, little emphasis has been placed on taking a real look at who is doing what, volume and candidate flow, where recruitment ‘sits’ (centralized or decentralized), duplication of responsibilities, and consistency in sourcing, interviewing and reporting.
Competition is fiercer than ever for health care professionals and the race will go to the swift. Now more than ever, it is vital that all recruitment departments tighten up their processes so that they can stay ahead in this ever-competitive environment and win the war for talent.
In the next few posts, we will examine the process piece from beginning to end and provide some tips for improving your process.
Next week, we take a look at position control.
Posted in Process | To leave a comment, click here »
October 17th, 2008 by jrussell
Podcasting is very unique and with the advent of the iPod, it has enjoyed tremendous popularity and growth. ITG Group says almost 60 million people will listen to podcasts by 2010. Three out of every four college students own an iPod. With the evolution of iPhones and other smartphones the use of this media will only become more popular. As you can see from the graph below Podcasting had an audience of over 18 million in 2007 and is projected to have 28 million this year.
You would expect that the demographic reach of people downloading podcasts would tend to be teenagers but as you can see from the information below, the 35-44 year old group is not far behind.
A podcast is a series of audio or video digital-media files which is distributed over the Internet by syndicated download, through Web feeds, to portable media players and personal computers. (Wikipedia) How can this media benefit you in your health care talent needs?
Since this is a relatively new space, there are limited uses at the present time. One site that has been around over a year now is “Jobs in Pods”. This site will help you in the production of any podcasts and also allows you to place the podcast on your career site as well as their site.
One of our clients – Exempla (see screen shot below), has received over 16,000 downloads in less than thirty days. With a cost of less than $1000, their three podcasts resulted in a ROI of 0.16 cents per download.
Mobile advertising is just starting to take off, so we all expect to see an increased use of podcasts via mobile marketing. Oh my goodness, do we really want our phones receiving ads, podcasts and video clips??
As you can see, traditional advertising of print ads has certainly taken a dramatic turn. Today’s media is more interactive with the audience and therefore more engaging to the passive candidate. Best of all, methods such as Podcasting are much less expensive than a traditional print ad.
Posted in Social Media | To leave a comment, click here »
