How to Reduce Staff Attrition with an Effective Healthcare Staff Retention Program
Across the healthcare industry, staff attrition rates are still rising year over year in an exodus fueled by COVID-19, competition for labor, employee burnout, and retirement. From home health agencies to hospitals to private practices, at a time when rehab providers are already under pressure to do more with less, they must also find cost-effective methods for keeping employees engaged and satisfied in order to improve staff retention rates.
In this article, we provide key strategies for developing a strong healthcare staff retention program that disrupts the cycle of staff attrition and cultivates engaged, highly skilled, and dedicated employees. Whether you’re looking for hospital, home health, hospice, or private practice retention strategies, the information here will help you get started.
How can a healthcare staff retention program help my organization?
A good staff retention program takes a systematic, holistic approach to the problem of staff attrition, starting with onboarding and continuing throughout the employee lifecycle. Your program should include the following four key elements:
- A strong onboarding program that sets new hires up for success and reduces turnover by identifying skill level and assigning customized training.
- Ongoing career development that improves staff engagement, satisfaction, and expertise with access to career ladders and specialty training.
- Leadership development to help support and empower new leaders and equip established ones with effective, scalable leadership programs.
- Targeted training to help you identify and remedy skill gaps to boost clinical expertise, quality, and outcomes.
By investing in your staff in this way, you can build a positive, employee-first culture and a virtuous cycle that promotes employee satisfaction, clinical competency, high quality of care, and staff retention.
What is healthcare onboarding?
Healthcare onboarding helps orient new hires to an organization, giving them the foundational information they need to adapt and thrive within their new environment. Onboarding helps employees understand best practices and protocols for care, organizational standards, work environment and culture, and professional expectations.
Onboarding in healthcare is a critical time period in an employee’s work experience, and employees who receive a comprehensive, quality educational program will be more equipped for success. However, many healthcare organizations don’t have the infrastructure to efficiently and effectively onboard new hires when trying to manage the competing demands of a fast-paced environment. This leads to a costly cycle of new hire onboarding followed by high rates of attrition that can ultimately impact reimbursement and patient outcomes.
That’s why a strong retention game plan should begin on day one. With a purposeful onboarding process in place, you can standardize knowledge of the company, culture, and how an employee’s position fits into the mission. A well-onboarded employee is more comfortable and motivated, leading to a higher chance of retention.
How can MedBridge help with onboarding and retaining healthcare staff?
MedBridge offers a targeted, proven approach that deepens staff retention and engagement by focusing on each stage of the employee lifecycle, allowing your organization to drive higher engagement, staff retention, and clinical expertise by investing in employees from day one throughout their careers.
We offer dedicated staff retention solutions for hospitals and health systems, home health agencies, hospice organizations, and private practices. Our staff retention solutions have helped organizations reduce attrition rates by 75 percent, improve new-hire time to productivity by 7 days, and experience significant cost savings as a result. Our onboarding programs have a 100 percent participation and employee satisfaction rate.
