MGMA Business Solutions: Cracking the Code on Healthcare Workforce Retention
Download MP3Well, hi, everyone. I'm Daniel Williams, senior editor at MGMA and host of the MGMA Podcast Network. Today, we are back with another MGMA business solutions podcast, And we are gonna be diving into a new workforce study from locumtenens.com and the advisory board. And, some interesting revelations, some interesting statistics came out of this. And to help us unpack it, we've got Chris Franklin, president of locumtenens.com, and also Alison Sawyer, vice president of strategy and innovation.
Daniel Williams:So, Chris, Allison, first of all, just welcome to the show.
Chris Franklin:Thanks for having us.
Daniel Williams:Yeah. And Chris is a repeat guest, so it's good to have him back, and it's good to have Allison on here and learn from her as well. So to get us started, I'd like to hear from both of you. I think we talked about this offline. So, Chris, I'll let you kick this off to tell a little bit about yourself and to share a little bit about locumtenens.com.
Chris Franklin:Absolutely. I'll I'll I'll start with the interesting exciting part about locumtenens.com. So we specialize in optimizing health care staffing operations. So we serve 90% of the nation's top health care organizations and are the largest locum tenens staffing agency. So our objective is to help our customers provide exceptional and uninterrupted care, and we accomplished this by offering a suite of staffing and workforce solutions delivered both on-site and virtually, on a full time or fractional basis, partnering with physicians and advanced practice providers.
Chris Franklin:So for more than thirty years, we've been a strategic partner connecting clinicians with the health care organizations that that need them most. I've been in the staffing industry for nearly thirty years. I've spent the last seventeen years with locumtenens.com, serving as president for the last ten. And, really, my role is to make certain that we're positioning, the company and aligning its resources to meet the current and future needs of our customers.
Daniel Williams:Alright. So, Alison, if you wanna share a little bit about yourself as well.
Alison Sawyer:Alright. Yep. As you mentioned earlier, I lead strategy and innovation for locumtenens.com, and today is actually my sixth year anniversary with the company. So I'm celebrating a little bit of a milestone this morning. In my role, I oversee, our strategic initiatives.
Alison Sawyer:As an organization, I lead our innovation efforts through which we're trying to continually source ideas for ways to improve our business in the way that we're delivering services to our customers, and then I oversee customer experience. I always tell people I think I have the best job at LocumTenens. I get to work with virtually every leader, every team across the company, to really think about how we adapt to some of the changes in the health care workforce and better serve both our clients and our clinicians.
Daniel Williams:Okay. For our next question, Alison, let's stay with you. As I mentioned earlier, there are some really interesting findings from this study, so I want to get this right. One of the things that it revealed even satisfied clinicians are leaving their jobs. So let's talk about that first.
Daniel Williams:What is going on? What is the dynamic where, hey. I like my job, and I'm leaving? I mean, that just those those don't always mesh. So let's talk about that a little bit.
Alison Sawyer:Yeah. And I I think it is that counterintuitive finding that probably was the most surprising thing to have come out of this research effort with the advisory board. I I think what was surprising about this was that there were generally two assumptions about the market that have been commonly held around clinician employment that were completely challenged in the findings or the outcomes from our research. The first is exactly what you just said. The assumption that clinicians are dissatisfied with their current jobs.
Alison Sawyer:I think a lot of the narrative around clinicians over the past few years has centered on things like burnout
Daniel Williams:Right.
Alison Sawyer:The stress of the pandemic, increased administrative burden, and some of the challenges that clinicians are just facing with their day to day management of their patient volume. But what we found in our survey responses was that despite some of these global challenges, which are certainly very real and things that our clinicians are experiencing, the majority of the respondents, in fact, 76% actually told us that they were in fact satisfied with their current job. The second assumption that I think was challenged by this research was that that satisfaction would directly correlate to loyalty or a reduced likelihood that those clinicians would then be seeking alternative employment. But what we found is that is actually not the case. Nearly a third of the clinicians who responded to our survey saying that they were satisfied also stated that they cons were considering leaving their current role within the next twenty four months.
Alison Sawyer:And that's a shift from the past where I think satisfaction has been a stronger predictor of retention. So what we've really uncovered is that I think these two findings in tandem signal a much more fluid labor market than what we think most organizations are prepared for. And what we're finding in conversations with clinicians and through this research is that satisfaction just simply is not enough anymore. Clinicians expect more from their employers.
Daniel Williams:Okay. Let me just follow-up then. What is more? What does more sound like?
Alison Sawyer:It's a variety of different things. So we we actually provided all of the clinicians that responded to our survey with a laundry list of items that they could select in terms of what they were prioritizing when they sought alternative employment. Not surprising, compensation was at the very top of that list, but what we found is that compensation alone is not enough to compete for the clinician market anymore. Things like nonpay benefits, work life balance, sketch flexible scheduling, adaptability within the roles, the ability to practice the way that they prefer are all things that clinicians prioritize as being critically important when they are considering whether to stay or leave a current position.
Daniel Williams:Okay. Chris equipped with that information that it's pay, but it's also flexibility, and it's also work life balance, like three legs to the stool, that can bring on not only satisfaction but keeping those clinicians in place. What can medical practice leaders do with that information then knowing that?
Chris Franklin:Yeah. And, you know, and as as Alison said, not surprisingly, compensation kinda remains the top priority across kinda all all age groups and employer types. Right? So across w two, across ten ninety nine. But I but I think what was surprising and maybe surprising in a good way was the weight that, clinicians place on the value of those four other priorities that Allison outlined, around work life balance, schedule flexibility, geographic location, and non compensation benefits.
Chris Franklin:So if we kinda unpack those a little bit, work life balance is is all about time. It's about time off. It's about time with family. It's time for interest. It's time to time to decompress.
Chris Franklin:Scheduling flexibility or schedule flexibility is is not about working less. It's it's about managing when they work and kinda taking control of that of that piece. In fact, 83% of respondents indicated that that schedule flexibility was highly important to them. Geographic location, self explanatory, and then non compensation benefits, things like malpractice insurance, flex flexible working arrangements, health insurance, time off, expenses, things along those lines. And so, you know, I think takeaways based on the data is that, you know, we suggest being competitive on compensation, kinda gets you to the table, not necessarily having to pay over the top of the market, because that can create a more transactional relationship.
Chris Franklin:But, using compensation tool to get you to the table and then really being a champion of flexibility, I think, is the key to to being able to unlock some of these other, things that are highly critical and important. And to the latter point on flexibility is, you know, we see many clinicians kinda change roles or gravitate towards locum tenens work so that they can take more control of their Thing that we hear oftentimes, we confuse as for the need for flexibility with the thought that that means that clinicians wanna work less and what the study uncovered that that's not actually the case. It's more about being able to take control of of when they work
Daniel Williams:Mhmm.
Chris Franklin:And and taking control of that direct schedule. So I think, you know, a takeaway is the simple step of clarifying when somebody says, hey. I'm really looking for a more flexible environment. Well, what does that mean exactly? Yeah.
Chris Franklin:I think the other thing that's that's interesting, especially in the financial environment that most health care organizations that is kind of their operating reality is that some of these things that that can really help them be more effective in attracting talent and maybe equally or more important in retaining talent, I would put in the bucket of almost kind of nonfinancial strategies and really championing flexibility, prioritizing workload life balance, and really empowering autonomy are things that are more kind of philosophical shifts that they can make within their organization that aren't direct dollars that are, coming out of their pocket in order to attract and retain people. So I think a lot of really good learning around that.
Daniel Williams:Yeah. As you were talking, I was thinking about that flexibility of time. It could be anything from, if they are a parent, being available to see that child's sporting event or performance or whatever it might be. Or maybe they're getting a graduate degree. Maybe it's an MBA or something along those lines or an MHA, and maybe the courses are taught during that work time, and then they can fill that time back in.
Daniel Williams:Are those some of the things you think about as well, or am I forgetting things here?
Chris Franklin:Yeah. No. Absolutely. And I think having systems in place so when somebody is off, they're off. Okay.
Chris Franklin:Right? Or, you know, leveraging tools that might allow them to avoid pajama time where they're at home in the evening when they're, you know, ostensibly with their family, but they've got their face buried in a laptop trying to get caught up on charts and things along those lines. Those are all super important and allow people to really take control of and and find that work life balance that they're looking for.
Daniel Williams:Okay. I wanna jump ahead. I I I'm looking at some of the notes and the questions I had put together, but I really think this is important to touch on so we can get a better understanding. Sometimes we will slot people based on their age. Alison, I want to direct this first to you.
Daniel Williams:Generational differences. When we hear that, we're going, okay. This age group does it this way. This age group does it a different way. What did your findings show?
Daniel Williams:What how much is important? How much is plays out exactly as maybe our brains and stereotypes go to those generational differences? Tell us about that.
Alison Sawyer:I have to say this is an area where we went into the survey with, I think, some assumptions expecting to see a a pretty wide range of responses based on generational factors. And I, as a millennial, was completely disappointed when we found out that we're not unique at all. And, really, what our research uncovered was that, as I mentioned before, we we provided a laundry list of potential, factors for clinicians to choose from. You know, tell us tell us what you prioritize when you are searching for a new job. What are the things that keep you satisfied and and engaged in your current role?
Alison Sawyer:And I think we were very surprised to find that across all of the groups that responded, the same five factors rose to the top for almost every single, demographic that we surveyed. Chris has mentioned this before. It was compensation, the non compensation benefits, geographic location, work life balance, and schedule flexibility. There were only two nuances on both of the opposite ends of the spectrum of demographics. So the first was for clinicians who were 30.
Alison Sawyer:We found that they were swapping preference for g or excuse me, preference for geographic preference with, culture. And this isn't surprising if you think about some of the things that I think have been generally talked about, regarding gen z and maybe even starting to get towards gen alpha in terms of what they prioritize. They are looking for work opportunities that allow them to be connected to purpose, connected to the culture of an organization. And so they they wanna feel deeply embedded in the community, and that did come out in this research. The opposite at the end of the spectrum was our clinician respondents 60
Daniel Williams:Right.
Alison Sawyer:Who told us that they preferred, clinical autonomy, subbing that in, I believe, over, non compensation benefits. And if you think about that demographic or that age group, these are likely individuals who came up initially through private practice. And so we we believe what this is likely telling us is that there are just deeply ingrained practice expectations in terms of being able to make autonomous decisions around how to practice, when to practice, that that clinician group has held throughout the duration of their careers. But beyond those two nuances, respondents were were largely aligned in terms of what they prioritize and the things that they're looking for in new job opportunities. I think, the good news here for employers is that if you are thinking about your recruitment, your retention strategy, you prioritize these top five things.
Alison Sawyer:And as long as you do those top five things well, you're going to come up with a strategy or come up with a set of solutions that is hitting every demographic that you may be targeting from a rec recruitment or retention standpoint. The bad news is if you're failing on any of these five things, you are failing universally across every demographic. And so I think that's something that's, really a critical factor for anyone who reads this survey or this research to consider as they're coming up with their employer value proposition, as they're coming up with strategies on how to go out and find new clinicians. You you have to have a plan for how to solve for each of these five factors if you wanna be successful with any age group in the market.
Daniel Williams:That is remarkable that what you're saying there, that they're those different factors are weighted together then. So if you've got four of them in some situations, the lack of that fifth could be the deciding factor, and they'll keep looking. Is that what I'm am I hearing that right?
Alison Sawyer:Yeah. I think that's a fair assessment, and I think it's a potential opportunity for one of your competitors who's competing for talent to win them in a different way. And so you have to keep all five of these things top of mind as you're working with different clinicians who might have different preferences.
Chris Franklin:Okay. Hey, Daniel. One other thing I would add kinda going back to to the the initial question around intent to leave. Mhmm. To me, one of the things that was that was somewhat surprising in the data was that that intent to leave is not limited to earlier career or mid career physicians.
Chris Franklin:If you look at the demographic group that's between 51 and 60 or basically 50 and over, one third of those clinicians indicated that they would consider leaving. And so if we think about a lot of our our clients, groups, hospitals, and health systems, typically retention programs, if they even have a formal retention program, are are pointed more towards those earlier stage physicians, whereas it could be physicians who are a bit more seasoned who are also likely your most productive physicians. You hear if you look at the studies from the AAMC and attrition of physicians and having to replace retiring physicians with one and a quarter, one and a half, 1.75, almost a two to one ratio from a productivity perspective, that that group of productive physicians based on the day is at risk as well. And so I think it's kind of reframing how we think about retention and where those programs are really pointed is is another piece of key learning from the study.
Daniel Williams:Yeah. I I think that's a remarkable point you make, Chris, because if we make assumptions, if we go, well, someone's between 51 and 60, maybe they have a family life that's embedded, you know, in a certain way where, well, I don't wanna disrupt the kids who are about to graduate from school or whatever that might be. But we're hearing here from the data that maybe they will make different decisions, and maybe if there is that opportunity, they will uproot even if Billy or Janie is in the tenth grade. We're going to move because this opportunity means this much, and we're going to do that. So that is really something important to look at.
Daniel Williams:Okay.
Chris Franklin:Absolutely.
Daniel Williams:A couple more questions in. Chris, we'll stay with you. There was one notable stat here. It says clinicians who use staffing firms were more likely to report a positive work environment. So talk about that.
Daniel Williams:What's going on in that situation that there is more satisfaction in those in those areas?
Chris Franklin:Yeah. I think a a great, staffing partner can really help a health care organization focus on and and not just fill. So if you think about, you know, the average clinician is only gonna change jobs a couple, maybe maybe three times, you know, throughout their career. So they're typically aren't really practiced in effectively isolating, you know, all of the little nuance things that might be critical to their to their long term success. And many health care organizations, especially groups, don't have a, you know, kind of a well oiled talent acquisition function, let alone a retention program.
Chris Franklin:So I think a staffing partner can be a great bridge to help understand both clinician and organizational priorities. And done well, this just helps create a better match. It was the process is really relationship based taking into account what's important on all sides and what's really critical, you know, not just for the clinician but also for the organization versus it being just more of kind of a transactional type of type of approach. So I think that's why, you know, there's there's generally, you know, higher satisfaction and retention in those roles. Okay.
Chris Franklin:I might be a little bit biased, but
Daniel Williams:That's okay. Thank you for that. So, Alison, the last question I've got for y'all, this one I'm excited about because we're going to partner together. We've got an upcoming MGMA webinar, Cracking the Clinician Code. So tell us about that.
Daniel Williams:What can attendees expect to learn? What are some of the takeaways they might find in that webinar?
Alison Sawyer:Well, I hope today's discussion has been a little bit of a teaser for what to expect in that webinar. We're gonna deep dive into the research. We'll we'll cover, you know, what's really driving clinician decision making in today's environment, talking about what matters most to clinicians beyond just compensation. So we'll we'll go through all of the research report. We'll share all of the facts and findings that came out of that partnership with the advisory board.
Alison Sawyer:And then hopefully offer some practical takeaways for anyone who's listening, health care leaders, who wanna improve recruitment, engagement, and retention for their organization. I think any single one of our tell our clients would tell you that this is a very timely topic. We are finding that health systems are facing mounting workforce challenges, and and traditional tactics just simply aren't working anymore. So if we wanna stabilize the workforce and reduce churn as an industry, we really have to better understand the motivations and the expectations of today's modern clinician. And I think that starts by listening to what those clinicians are telling us they need.
Alison Sawyer:So our research in or or excuse me. Our research study aims to do just that. And I really hope folks will join us and hopefully take away a few strategies that they can immediately employ within their organizations.
Daniel Williams:Yeah. Well, Alison, Chris, I wanna thank you so much for joining today on the podcast. Thank you so much. Thank you.
Alison Sawyer:Absolutely. Thanks so much.
Daniel Williams:Alright. And as Alison was just saying, everybody, let me give you that date, July 29. It's an MGMA webinar where we're partnering with lt.com. Again, it's called Cracking the Clinician Code Insights to Attract and Retain Top Talent Today. What we're gonna do is we're gonna put direct links to that in the episode show notes.
Daniel Williams:You can also go to mgma.com/webinars, and you can register right now while you're listening to this. So until then, I just wanna tell everybody thank you so much for being MGMA podcast listeners.
