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The Retirement Exodus: Three Things Healthcare Employers Can Do Today to Prevent Tomorrow’s Staffing Crunch
Baby boomers are reaching and exceeding retirement age, and as they do we usher in a dramatically shifting age median in our population. The expected growth of the older adult population over the next 50 years will have an exceptional impact on the country’s healthcare system, particularly in terms of supply of and demand for healthcare personnel.
We face a quickly growing proportion of older adults who need increased care. At the same time, these boomers are retiring, en masse, from the healthcare field. And there’s the irony: the same aging healthcare workers reaching retirement age need help from an industry being left understaffed by their leaving.
By the Numbers
According to the Census Bureau, between 2001-2021 the population over age 65 is
expected to grow 53%. By 2025,more than half of the American population will be 65 or older. To put it another way, starting next year, nearly 10,000 Americans will turn 65 every day. This is a massive number of people who, as they age, rely increasingly on a struggling, understaffed healthcare industry.
Compounding the problem is the rate at which current healthcare workers are reaching and exceeding retirement age. This is evident throughout the industry, and particularly troublesome for already strained nursing staffing levels. A brief reprieve in this retirement exodus has been influenced by our current economy; with a national unemployment rate hovering around 9% and a sluggish recovery, more and more professionals are delaying retirement.
This trend is evident in the nursing field, with experienced, retirement-age nurses staying in their jobs, holding onto their security while rebuilding 401Ks and waiting to see the economy level out. Subsequently, new graduates are having a more difficult time finding a job. This, however, is a temporary phenomenon, and many nurses are expected to leave the profession once the economy stabilizes.
Patricia Gonce Morton, Ph.D., RN, ACNP, FAAN, associate dean for Academic Affairs at the University of Maryland School of Nursing in Baltimore, explains, “This will very much impact the system, if we have a large number of retirees at the same time. It will exacerbate the nursing shortage and put additional pressure on schools of nursing to graduate more students.”
What does this mean for you?
As the talent pool shrinks, the already fierce competition for qualified candidates will only grow. How will the savviest Talent Acquisition professionals keep their pipeline full of qualified applicants?
1. IDENTIFY
Let’s get back to basics: who are the healthcare professionals that are most likely to work for you? You need not be a marketing expert to know that before you communicate your message, you must first know who your core audience is. 80% of your workforce is likely to reside within a 45-minute commute of your location, so these are the primary targets. Once you’ve identified your local talent community, it’s time to strategize.
2. DESIGN
The hallmark of a strong recruitment strategy is diversity. Designing a multi-strategy communication plan includes making the best use of web, print, ERPs, and social networking. Add some muscle to that by incorporating a direct-to-candidate strategy to capture the attention of the ever sought-after passive candidate. By updating your candidate database regularly, and ensuring you tag these candidates by experience, specialty, desired salary, etc., you can have a comprehensive list at the ready for even the most challenging hiring task.
3. MODIFY
A diverse recruitment plan is likely to generate significant interest from local candidates, but the reality is that you are not going to hire every candidate that you attract. What do you do with these folks? How do you keep them interested and on board? Start by treating every interaction with a candidate as an opportunity to gather useful information about them. What type of experiences have they had throughout their career? Would they be interested in part-time or per-diem work? How far would they be willing to commute for the right opportunity? By capturing this information in your database you’ll be able to send each candidate a unique message, which will greatly increase the likelihood of response.
Retain, Prepare, Recruit
As aging retirees exit from the healthcare industry, new strategies for attracting and keeping highly qualified personnel will always be at the forefront of the national staffing discussion. In one of the hardest-hit industries during this retirement exodus, employers recognize the dire situation. Marcie Pitt-Catsouphes, director of Sloan Center on Aging & Work at Boston College explains that hope is not lost. “The good news is that the health care sector is serious about investing in their employees.”
This sort of investment is far-reaching and designed to secure the future of American healthcare. While amplifying investments in training, recruitment and retention, many healthcare organizations are also seeking to retain experienced baby boomer workers as long as they’re able.
Sources:
http://www.bc.edu/research/agingandwork/archive_pubs/TM_HealthCare.html
http://www.nursezone.com/nursing-news-events/more-news.aspx?articleid=37086
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