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Recruiters in health care: hiring and the patient experience

Posted on August 15th, 2013 Read time: 1 minutes

Recruiters often deal with the intangible in their profession. No matter how good a candidate looks in a resume, there are other facets that must be addressed.

For example, recruiters in the health industry often overlook a crucial part of a doctor's role, according to health executives. It is not uncommon for human resources professionals to hire a candidate with great background and experience whose skills in patient interaction are nonetheless sub-par, according to recent research by HealthCareSource and Planetree. While the majority of recruiters believe they assess this factor during the hiring process, only a minority of healthcare executives agree that this is true.

Those who are in charge of acquiring talent, whether as permanent or contract workers, also believe they have a large amount of impact on the patient care experience. Executives and clinical staff do not agree. They do not feel the role of the human resources administration community is closely related to how patients are treated in health care. A resolution to this unspoken dispute on the part of the HR community may simply be education. It may also behoove recruiters to research candidates as thoroughly as possible to ensure the patient care they provide is of the highest quality.

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