May 20, 2022 – A new survey conducted by Global Healthcare Exchange (GHX) found that senior healthcare leaders in the U.S. are most concerned about staff burnout and labor shortages when it comes to current workforce challenges. To address these issues, 80% of respondents indicated that increasing automation to reduce manual labor is a key strategy for their organization.
Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s estimated that the healthcare industry has lost 20 to 30 percent of its workforce. As a result, one in four hospitals in the U.S. anticipate critical staffing shortages according to HHS data from January 2022. Clinicians as well as non-clinical healthcare professionals across financial and operational departments cite exhaustion and burnout as reasons for voluntarily leaving the workforce.
Other workforce issues that are top of mind for healthcare executives include:
- Cost and time associated with recruiting and training new talent
- Wage price wars
- Ability to adapt to new operating models (change management)
- Loss of talent to other industries (e.g., Big Tech)
- Development of new skills required to move to value-based care (e.g., data analytics, complex logistics)
- Engaging remote staff
The survey also found that more than half of respondents are implementing initiatives aimed at improving the workplace experience for staff, including rewards and recognition programs, diversity and equity initiatives, improved benefits programs and providing greater access to behavioral health resources.
GHX hosted an executive roundtable discussion at its annual Summit in Hollywood, Florida on May 11, 2022, using the results from this survey to guide the conversation. Key takeaways from the discussion include:
- Increasing automation will help organizations maximize efficiency and lower costs at a time when hospitals and health systems are challenged to do more with less.
- The industry needs to ensure that technology is truly enabling people to work more efficiently and reduce the number of problems that require time-consuming workarounds.
- Support for diversity of thought is a strategic asset for many organizations. In addition to diverse hiring practices, having employees spend time in other departments can give them a new perspective on their work and help them connect the dots of the full healthcare experience.
- Fundamentals matter. Higher staff turnover rates highlight the importance of having processes in place to guide the work and reduce the potential for burnout among new employees.
- Ensuring employees feel connected to and are actively engaged with their work is an important step in increasing overall job satisfaction and retention. Some examples include asking supply chain applicants the right questions in interviews to understand their motivations for working in mission-driven organizations, as well as bringing veteran employees into the onboarding process to share collective wisdom and insights on how the supply chain connects to all other functions in the organization.