Navigating the challenges of recruiting surgical technologists

The role of a surgical technologist is pivotal, especially in emergency healthcare units and surgical centers as they have a critical role throughout the surgical procedure. They assist surgeons and surgical assistants in successfully conducting surgeries. With the right skilled surgical technologist, facilities can minimize mishaps during surgeries and enhance patient outcomes. This has increased the demand for surgical tech hiring in facilities. However, high turnover rates due to staff burnout and an aging workforce population have made the surgical technologist hiring a challenging task. It is important to lay down effective hiring strategies to navigate the challenges associated with surgical tech hiring and retention. This blog details the challenges and the recruitment strategies that can be followed to navigate them efficiently.

Overcoming surgical technologist shortages

With careful planning, intervention, and strategizing, facilities can reduce surgical technologist hiring shortages to a greater extent. To begin with, the facilities must understand the reasons for the surgical technologist shortage. It can be due to heightened demand caused by the exiting workforce or seasonal due to increasing patient visits. Here are some recruitment best practices to overcome the surgical technologist shortage.

• Evaluate the staffing gap to find the number of surgical technologists required to support the surgeons. Have a clear conversation with your existing staff to understand the reason for the shortage and how it can be solved effectively.
• Understanding your budget and the job requirements is a crucial part of the surgical technologist hiring process. Considering these factors, you can either decide to hire a temporary contract worker to meet the fluctuating staff demand or a permanent worker to fill the staffing gap. For both these, proper market analysis should be followed to understand the prevailing market rates and salary expectations for surgical technologists.
• Create a compelling job description customized to the requirements of your facility to attract the right talent. A compelling job description can include the comprehensive compensation structure and the additional perks of working at your facility.
• Advertise the job opening in various social media communities, professional networks, and job portals so that it reaches the potential candidates.
• Build a strong employer brand by fostering a supportive workplace and prioritizing employee wellbeing. This will help your facility stand out in the competitive surgical tech hiring industry.
• To meet the staffing shortage, you can try associating with local surgical tech training institutions to hire newly graduated candidates. In such cases, it is important to ensure that proper initial level training and orientation are provided to the hired individuals to equip them to work in hospital settings.
• To streamline the surgical technologist hiring process, collaborating with experienced surgical tech staffing solutions providers is a good option. You can leverage their expertise and industry knowledge in the staffing domain to get the best surgical technologists for your facility.

Developing long-term recruitment strategies for surgical technologists

Developing long-term recruitment strategies starts with laying the foundation to retain the surgical technologists in your facility for the long term by building trust and inclusiveness. The following are some of the long-term recruitment strategies that can be followed to recruit and retain the surgical technologists in your facility.

• Offer a competitive compensation package that includes salary as per the industry benchmark and other additional benefits such as allowances and bonus.
• Offer other non-monetary benefits such as flexible shifts, paid leaves, etc.
• Cultivate a supportive and safe workplace culture where everyone feels heard and recognized. Establish proper diversity and inclusiveness policies.
• Ensuring culture fit while hiring surgical technologists can greatly help retain them for a longer time as the individual resonates with the ideas, values, and beliefs of the facility.
• Provide opportunities for career development by supporting continued education and upskilling.
• Set clear career advancement pathways and communicate the performance indicators clearly with the staff.
• Motivate employees by rewarding them fairly for their performances and have programs to recognize the people who have made outstanding contributions to the facility. 
• Regularly take feedback to understand the challenges faced by your existing staff. Also, it is necessary that you provide feedback to the employees based on their performance to aid their professional growth.