HR in Healthcare: 7 Helpful Tips

The healthcare industry is built on the physicians, nurses, clinicians, therapists, and support staff who dedicate themselves to doing what’s right for patients. It’s the job of healthcare human resources (HR) teams to hire and retain these people, and to support them as they work in very challenging environments.

Employee care drives patient care. The better the HR team supports employees, the better care patients will receive. For HR, that means hiring the right people, creating a positive workplace culture, providing paths for career advancement, compensating employees fairly, providing ongoing training, keeping their healthcare system compliant with laws, and much more.

If that sounds like a lot, that’s because it is. Healthcare HR professionals therefore need to find effective solutions to help with all those tasks. In this article, we’ll provide an overview of HR in healthcare, provide tips on how HR pros can be impactful in the industry, and explain how background screening can help HR teams make hiring in the healthcare industry almost seamless.

Table of Contents

1. What is HR in Healthcare?
2. Why It’s Crucial to Have HR in Healthcare
3. 7 Helpful Healthcare HR Tips
4. How Healthcare Background Check Services Support HR

What is HR in Healthcare?

Human resources professionals in healthcare handle typical HR functions such as talent acquisition, talent retention, and compensation packages. Healthcare HR, however, encompasses many challenges and opportunities that are unique to the industry.

Healthcare human resource management and staff have the opportunity to impact people’s lives in ways HR teams in other industries don’t. That’s because in healthcare, HR teams recruit and support the doctors, nurses, and staff who provide care to patients.

The job also comes with challenges that put added pressure on HR employees to perform exceptionally well at their jobs. Talent shortages and burnout are two very common issues plaguing HR in healthcare.

What is its Role in the Workplace?

Human resources employees in healthcare serve many functions. HR teams recruit highly sophisticated professionals in a market where there’s a talent shortage, meaning there’s fierce hiring competition.

For current employees, HR teams create safety and education programs that meet the needs of medical professionals. They work to build a strong culture that promotes innovation and talent retention.

Healthcare HR teams also play critical roles in areas such as:

• • Recruitment, hiring, and onboarding talent.
  • Defining compensation and benefits structures that satisfy both employees and management.
  • Collaborating with IT departments to ensure patient and employee records stay private.
  • Developing scheduling processes that reduce burnout.
  • Monitoring and addressing compliance issues spanning everything from employee licensing and certification requirements to safety rules to privacy.

How Does HR in Healthcare Differ From HR in Other Industries?

Perhaps the main thing that differentiates healthcare HR from HR in other industries is the sheer impact that healthcare HR can have on people’s lives.

Internally, HR interacts with a medical workforce that faces highly stressful situations every day. HR teams need to provide safeguards for these employees to support their mental and physical health.

Externally, the decisions an HR team makes end up having an impact on patients. For example, patient satisfaction is improved when HR has an effective onboarding process and training programs for doctors and nurses. Employees who feel supported are more likely to feel comfortable asking questions, allowing them to deliver high quality care to patients.

Do Small Practices/Facilities Need HR?

Absolutely. Small medical practices face challenges in attracting and keeping talent. These small practices don’t have a big brand name to leverage. They also may not have an applicant tracking system or other software to make hiring and onboarding more efficient.

A small practice might have a busy clinician or business owner trying to do HR tasks. That only distracts them from what they should really be doing. Having an HR person, even on a part-time basis, adds value by freeing up others to work on their core jobs.

Why It’s Crucial to Have HR in Healthcare

The importance of human resources is hard to overstate in an industry where attracting and keeping talent is so hard. Plus, constantly changing regulations are hard to keep up with, and it’s crucial for your business to follow all laws and regulations. And to top it off, medical employees face safety and stress issues that HR needs to help them navigate.

Let’s dive deeper into five reasons HR is so important in healthcare.

Maintain Proper Staffing

By 2034, the U.S. could have a shortage of 86,000 physicians, including shortfalls in both primary and specialty care. This is estimated by the Association of American Medical Colleges.

HR will need to embrace new methods of attracting talent, such as evolving compensation policies and using technology to accelerate hiring and onboarding.

Have a Safe Work Environment

HR must have policies that comply with the Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act (PSQIA), which protects healthcare workers who report medical errors and unsafe working conditions. You’ll also make sure staff is properly immunized, is free of drugs or a criminal history, and has the proper qualifications to perform the procedures and patient care needed.

There are many more federal and state laws designed to foster a safe workplace, and they all need to be complied with.

Manage Burnout

The Centers for Disease Control reports that healthcare workers are suffering mental health issues and burnout at alarming rates. HR teams can reduce worker stress by improving their access to schedules and encouraging proper work-life balance. Strategies like limiting extended shifts and providing access to mental health resources should be pursued.

Reduce Hiring & Onboarding Costs

It can cost tens of thousands of dollars to recruit and onboard a physician or clinician. HR can help control these costs on the front end by using high-quality applicant background checks, including automated employment verification, to avoid hiring the wrong people. Then, make sure you have a standardized onboarding process that’s thorough yet streamlined as much as possible.

Stay Compliant & Reduce Liabilities

HR must have a working knowledge of the assortment of employment, safety, and healthcare laws governing the industry. These include the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), the Affordable Care Act (ACA), and the rules created by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

Failing to comply can lead to heavy fines, sometimes into the millions of dollars. For hiring specifically, failure to perform all required background checks can open you up to liability and accusations of negligent hiring.

7 Helpful Healthcare HR Tips

HR managers need to have clear strategies to succeed in an industry facing high employee turnover, emerging technologies, and regulatory change. Here are seven best practices to help guide you.

1. Have a Clear, Supportive Training & Onboarding Process

Healthcare professionals have high expectations of their employers. These are highly skilled, intelligent people. To satisfy them, make sure you start strong.

Give new hires access to any technology they need for training and onboarding. Have a well-defined orientation process that explains benefits enrollment and explains how to get support both from technology and from HR.

After the initial onboarding, provide ongoing training opportunities to help employees keep their skills and licenses up-to-date. You can offer training onsite or offsite. Some HR teams partner with training institutes to develop programs.

2. Offer Safety Training

Speaking of training, no training is more important than safety training. Provide training related to both workplace safety and patient safety. These trainings can focus on proper equipment use, emergency procedures, how to handle hazardous materials, and how to recognize and report dangerous workplace conditions.

3. Maintain Up-to-Date HR Records

Accurate employee records help ensure that your healthcare organization stays compliant and is prepared for any audits that may arise. Beyond that, up-to-date records can help you:

• • Track performance and productivity
  • Build talent profiles
  • Keep compensation competitive
  • Pinpoint issues that are causing talented people to leave

4. Stay Up-To-Date on Industry Compensation Standards

The healthcare talent shortage means organizations need to be prepared to offer highly competitive compensation to the small pool of candidates that do exist. Many of those candidates will have multiple offers to choose from. HR needs to stay on top of salary trends for all healthcare roles.

You could also consider offering signing bonuses to candidates for certain critical positions. A strong bonus can help someone choose you over another organization and positively impact how the candidate views your organization.

As a practical matter, a bonus can be used to cover relocation expenses if needed. This will make it easier for a talented person who lives elsewhere to accept your offer.

5. Address Employee Burnout & Other Staff Concerns

As we’ve mentioned, employee burnout is a real concern in healthcare. People who work directly with patients have high-stress jobs and face very emotional situations. It’s important to use every opportunity to reinforce that they need to care for themselves as well.

Other staff concerns should also be listened to and responded to. This helps employees feel supported, even if their ideas aren’t implemented.

6. Encourage Employee Engagement with Real Perks

When you think of compensation, think beyond salary and bonuses. Physicians and other medical employees expect all the usual benefits, such as medical and dental insurance, paid vacation, and retirement plans.

Additionally, you should create a bona fide perks offering that demonstrates thoughtfulness. Perks could include childcare subsidies, paying for commuting costs, gym memberships, and financial planning and wealth management resources.

7. Run Detailed Background Checks

Thorough background checks protect both your organization and your patients. Effective screening is essential for guaranteeing the safety, integrity, and quality of patient care.

Use a background check service that’s specific to healthcare and includes criminal background checks, drug checks, verifying licenses and certifications, exclusion screening, and sanction screening. Failing to run a check can open your business up to accusations of negligent hiring in the event that someone is harmed by a staff member.

PreCheck healthcare background checks cover all the bases while keeping you compliant with all applicable regulations. Plus, it can be customized to fit your operating model.

How Healthcare Background Check Services Support HR

Companies are competing for scarce talent, and existing talent continues to suffer from burnout. You want your application process to be as efficient as possible to get new people hired quickly. The earlier they start, the faster they can begin supporting your team and patients. This will help prevent burnout and help to keep your organization staffed properly. 

Background checks are a key part of efficiency. If the screening process is slow and clunky, you risk alienating your talented candidates and having them withdraw from consideration. Using a proven service like PreCheck for healthcare screenings helps you provide excellent applicant experiences — while also ensuring you have a thorough and accurate candidate history.

 PreCheck has specific background checks designed for healthcare employees. This includes both medical staff and medical students. Investing in these services means you’ll increase the accuracy and speed of your background checks. You’ll also stay in compliance with all applicable laws, because PreCheck monitors it.

Choose PreCheck to Support Your Healthcare Hiring & Onboarding

HR in healthcare is full of challenges. Don’t let background checks become a stumbling block in the high-stakes healthcare hiring process. Instead, solve your healthcare employee background check and hiring challenges with PreCheck.

Speak with an expert to learn more about how PreCheck can help with background checks, license monitoring, exclusion screenings and more.