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RECRUITING BEST PRACTICES

An agency’s caregiver recruitment process affects the quality of its caregivers’ services. Because of this, a good hiring system benefits the agencies and the family members who are looking to place their loved ones with an agency. Hiring the best talent helps with reducing staff turnover.

Accessing a Large Candidate Pool

The bigger your applicant pool, the more likely you will end up with a “right fit” employee who will perform and stay for the long term. Finding as many potential applicants as possible helps you market the open positions to a large number of people. In order to reach a large pool of applicants, one must know where to post job listings in order to get the most traffic. Using an online applicant tracking system (ATS) can enable faster interview scheduling, easier job advertising, and more. An applicant tracking system is a software that automates most administrative duties that are utilized in recruitment and hiring.

Offering High Quality Training

Training and development programs provide a tremendous amount of benefits. They enhance employee performance, increase employee productivity, reduce employee turnover, and improve the company culture overall. When caregivers know that an agency is invested in their career, they will be more likely to stay with said agency. Offering online training ensures that the caregivers are ready for their roles. In addition, offering online training throughout the year for caregivers to learn new skills is a way to increase their productivity and better care for their patients. Having a clear, organized, and interactive training and onboarding process can help the caregiver’s introduction to the agency be helpful and encouraging.

Implementing Caregiver Referral Programs

The goal of a referral program is to get current caregivers to reach out to their friends, family, and other caregivers and tell them about the excellent opportunities at the agency. Encouraging caregivers to refer other qualified caregivers takes the recruiting process away from the agency, and in the hands of the caregivers themselves. Offering bonuses to the current employees incentivizes them to refer as many qualified candidates as possible. For example, when a referred caregiver works for over a month, a cash reward is given.

Automating Employment Screening

Automating candidate selection allows recruiters to fast-forward the right-fit candidates through the recruitment process. Background checks and references are essential in ensuring the welfare of the patients and upholding the agency’s reputation. Although necessary, this can potentially become cumbersome and can require a vast amount of resources and time. With certain software, agencies can utilize pre-employment testing that gives the opportunity to check the applicant’s references, qualifications, and background prior to being contacted or considered. With the software, applicants can supply contact information for their references and a survey can automatically get sent to them. When the survey is completed, the answers can get sent to the hiring manager for review. This allows the opportunity to hire top quality caregivers and save time and money with hiring costs.

Providing Transparency in the Interview Process

By being upfront and honest with candidates, the right caregivers can’t help but feel drawn to the position. Explaining the difficulties associated with the job, especially the work hours and assignments are helpful. This is beneficial because it can vet out caregivers that may not be compatible for the job. Potential caregivers should leave the interview with a full understanding of the job description, and should be excited about the positive and negative aspects of the job. When finding the right candidate, it is important to include information about the agency. Caregivers should feel like they are working for someone that they know and trust, as opposed to a typical corporate structure. Building a connection on the frontend will go a long way in creating a deep bond. These are just a few ways to recruit the best talent.

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