The following is a guest article from Brandi Kurtyka, CEO of myCNAjobs.com.
Home care agency owners understand the war for winning caregiver talent is here. We see the cost to recruit skyrocketing, turnover rates continuing to rise, and processes that worked in the past are starting to work less.
There have been countless discussions, conferences, think-tanks, and social media conversations on the shortage. We have the extreme privilege of serving thousands of companies across the country and helping millions of caregivers find work. My team has a front-row seat into seeing what’s working and what isn’t. Our biggest piece of advice to home care owners – act now and don’t be too wedded to old processes.
At the end of the day, companies that don’t compete, won’t survive. Here are a few highlights from our recent White Paper, “It’s Time To Compete”.
Assist, Don’t Eliminate
Take a step back and evaluate your entire recruitment process. Are you helping caregivers to get through your process and is it efficient? Or, are you potentially eliminating good candidates along the way? In our latest study, we learned that only 44% of caregivers report having an active CPR certification. Yet many agencies still list CPR certification as a hard requirement to join their teams and don’t offer to help caregivers get certified. Could you open yourself up to more talent if you used this as a strategy to assist candidates through the process versus eliminating them?
Get Your Recruiter On The Same Page
Oftentimes, what an owner thinks is happening from a recruitment perspective isn’t being executed in full based on their original vision. We’ve seen many home care recruiters highly focused on old, rigid processes that eliminate too many good candidates at the expense of not hitting hiring goals. This may work for some agencies. However, if you’re in high growth mode and turning away cases, it’s important to understand where you’re losing people in the recruitment process and coach your recruiter to think differently about helping you grow your business.
Evaluate Competition
Competition is no longer just about the agency down the road. It’s centered around a plethora of companies that could also hire caregivers. Retail, fast food, warehousing, and long-term care providers are also targeting your current and potential recruits.
Get Competitive
Do an analysis of your market to evaluate companies hiring your profile of worker. It’s important that your pay and benefits are competitive. Where you’re strong, use those benefits to sell candidates. Where you’re weak, learn how to sell around it. If you’re curious how your pay ranks against what caregivers are looking to earn in your area, you can run a free pay analysis.
To learn more, read the full “It’s Time To Compete” white paper.