You’ve finally decided to add another clinician to your group practice. And while salary is a sizable consideration, it is not the be-all-end-all for professionals seeking a new employer or launching their new Nurse Practitioner (NP) career. As you design the interview process and overall benefits package, here are tangibles to consider adding to your welcome basket:
-
- Specialization: Perhaps you’re looking for a general NP, but a great candidate presents as a board-certified pediatric NP. Allowing clinicians to expand to their practice interest can make up for salary differences between companies.
-
- Continuing Education: Show potential candidates that you value life-long learning by offering reimbursement or pay for their required CEUs. Or, better yet, offer incentives for additional certifications in their field.
-
- Charitable Work: Is your practice passionate about giving back to your community? Offer pay or time off incentives to those willing to put in their time and effort for charitable causes.
-
- Personalized Office Space: Work with a local design school to offer your new hire the option of designing their own office in your practice.
-
- Time Off vs. Pay: Practitioners such as Certified Nurse Midwives tend to accrue a lot of overtime. Giving people options for their overtime accrual could be the difference between which practice they choose to land in.
-
- Health and Wellness: Free gym membership, having a local massage school “practice” on your employees each week, or yoga and meditation sessions at lunch are easy and low-cost ways to promote why your practice is the best choice.
-
- Leadership Options: Strong leadership will always seek to promote leaders in their organizations. When interviewing candidates, ask what aspirations they have in leadership to foster growth (and retention).
-
- Scribe Support: Working with a well-trained scribe can make a significant difference in practice management. If a candidate is on the fence between yours and another practice without scribe support, offer for them to shadow a clinician/scribe team for a few hours and you’ll sign them in a snap.
There are many ways to attract top-quality clinicians to a practice and, often, salary is not the defining measure. Offering additional or unusual perks will not only make the difference in signing a candidate early, but also shows that you’re willing to make creative decisions in your practice model.