Rehab

Article of the week: Creativity is vital to recruit and retain qualified therapists

Rehab Regs, December 21, 2007

A shortage of qualified therapists to fill staffing voids continues to be a problem that plagues the outpatient rehab industry. From hospitals to private practices and rehab agencies, many facilities are constantly operating at less than optimum staffing levels.

 

Whether the cause is a shortage of therapy students, more students getting doctorates and taking longer to graduate, or lower reimbursement rates resulting in therapists leaving the profession at younger ages, facilities must find ways to attract new therapists and retain the ones who are already on staff.

 

Although offering large signing bonuses when you can afford it works well to recruit new therapists, it doesn't offer much of an incentive for a therapist to remain loyal for several years. Even common requests such as health insurance, flexible schedules, and lower patient loads don't always separate your facility from others. However, with a little creativity, you can build up that loyalty, while also improving the functionality of your facility, says Ed Ramsey, DPT, president and owner of Ramsey Rehab in Leominster, MA.

 

"It's always cheaper to keep the employees you have than to recruit new ones," Ramsey says. "If you can find ways to make your employees benefit from working harder and staying with you, it will benefit you greatly in the long run, while showing prospective hires that people like working there."

 

Money in the bank

 

The best incentives you can offer your staff are ones that benefit the facility as well as participating staff . Examples of symbiotic incentive plans include

 

patient arrival rate bonuses

patient referral bonuses

physician referral bonuses

positive patient feedback bonuses

offering salaried employees a fixed rate for treating patients beyond an established baseline

 

"Therapists like incentives that are more immediate as opposed to annual bonuses," says Lynn Steffes, PT, president of Steffes & Associates Consulting Group, LLC, in New Berlin, WI. "When you tell people they can add money to their yearly salary on a weekly basis, you'll certainly get their attention."

 

Showing up is a bonus

 

Patient cancellations are the bane of most rehab facilities. They drain productivity and also make for less effective patient care because appointments are scheduled as part of a plan of care.

 

If therapists can help cut down on patient cancellations, it's worth offering them a little extra cash, says Ramsey. Ramsey gives therapists with a 90%-95% patient arrival rate (i.e., the number of patients who show up for their appointment divided by the number of scheduled appointments) an extra $50 per week. Those with more than a 95% patient arrival rate receive $80 per week. The amount of the bonus can vary and still make a difference in your organization because each 1% rise in arrival rate pays for itself, according to Ramsey.

 

"One important aspect of any incentive plan based on performance is to set baselines," says Steffes. "Find out how you are performing now and pay people to exceed those standards."

 

Cash referrals

 

Although you could never offer a physician money for referring a patient, there's nothing wrong with rewarding therapists who help to bring in new patients or referrals. You can offer incentives to therapists who directly bring in a patient or who speak to a physician and thus increase referrals from that office.

 

Both referral strategies are fairly easy to track by asking all new patients where they found out about your facility and creating baselines for the number of referrals that local physicians normally make to you. "It's basically paying your staff to talk about your company and do self advertising," says Ramsey, who offers staff $25 per new patient whom they are directly responsible for bringing in for their first visit.

 

In regards to physician referrals, Steffes says that if a physician normally refers five patients to you per month and then after a therapist visits and speaks with that physician you begin to see eight referrals, you could figure out a way to compensate that therapist for the extra three referrals.

 

Survey says . . .

 

Some incentives can improve your facility even if they don't directly increase income. Offering therapists bonuses when patients give them positive reviews on satisfaction surveys or write up success stories for you to use in marketing can be helpful.

 

Staff at Ramsey's facility who receive high scores or the most success story write-ups are offered trips to conferences, and the entire facility gets a free lunch if surveys and scores are up overall, he says.

 

"Patient satisfaction is an important aspect of any business," Ramsey adds. "If you have ways of showing that patients are enjoying their experience, you should celebrate that."

 

Dealing with shortages

 

The one shortcoming with the above incentives is that they don't actually help fill the void if you have a staffing shortage. More patients arriving on time and being content with their treatment is great, but if you don't have the staff to treat them, it might not matter.

 

By offering salaried staff money on a per patient treated basis past a set baseline, you can help make up for some shortages. "It's tough to ask someone working 40 hours a week to stay longer to treat extra patients, but if there an incentive to do that, it makes it much easier," Ramsey says.

 

More than 40% of Ramsey's staff have picked up extra patients due to this opportunity. However, there are limits to how many extra patients a therapist can see so that no one is overworked.

 

Alternative incentives

 

The above incentive options are based on performance and results that can be tracked. However, plenty of other options are out there for facilities looking to make staff feel appreciated.

 

Try hosting yearly administrative meetings during which half of the day is spent going over the company's long-term goals, new programs, and other training exercises, and the other half is spent on a fun activity, Ramsey says.

 

"Our staff appreciate knowing what is going on with the facility and having the chance to speak their minds about what is going right and wrong. But they also have a lot of fun going out and doing off-site activities together," he says.

 

Activities that Ramsey has done with his staff include

 

rock climbing

laser tag

go-cart racing

mini golfing

sporting events

 

Weigh the risk of liability for these activities, however, and avoid paintball because administrative staff wind up being a constant target, he jokes.

 

The most successful event Ramsey has organized is the 10-year anniversary celebration for which he took his entire staff on a cruise to Bermuda for seven days. Full-time staff were even allowed to bring a family member.

 

"The cost of the trip is actually pretty nominal when you factor in everything," he says. "The most expensive cost of any company trip is not having the facility open at full capacity, but the experience can be so beneficial that it's worth it in most cases."

 

An added benefit of any incentive program is that it tends to attract the most ambitious therapists, Steffes says. "Creative incentives are great for recruiting young therapists who want to work hard to make money and do their job correctly. You'll wind up with people who realize that if they help your business grow, you'll help their career grow."

 

However, no matter what the incentive is, Steffes advises training the therapists on how to improve in order to reach the facility's goals, otherwise your efforts may prove fruitless.

Most Popular

Related Articles