The digital-driven ‘War for Talent’ has now reached the healthcare sector. The drive to recruit and retain the very best staff is going to become a pressing issue for healthcare providers in the next few years. What’s behind this? And what can you do about it?
In the digital age it’s not just consumers and patients who are more informed, better-connected and more demanding. Employees too have raised expectations of their workplaces and how digital fits into it. At a time when the very best IT-minds are increasingly attracted to start-ups or to Big Tech global players, it is becoming harder for healthcare companies to identify, attract and retain top talent.
But it’s not just IT: doctors, nurses, administrators, and specialists and consultants of all types are also far more digitally clued-up and demanding. This means they expect more from their workplace. Which means healthcare companies need to provide it, or risk losing them.
Attracting and retaining top healthcare talent
It’s critical the industry has the tools which will not only encourage new staff to join, but also keep existing staff happy and engaged. VMware research involving public and private healthcare sector employees in EMEA suggests most agree that the flexibility of tools (e.g. apps & devices) that they need at work would influence their decision to apply or accept a position at a company.
The experience of front-line staff is vital, as it is often these individuals who have the best ideas on how to improve patient services – but they need to feel empowered to do so. Equipping staff with the right digital tools will make their lives easier, reduce the monotonous tasks with which staff often find themselves burdened, and transform their ability to provide better patient care.
The “innovation-execution” gap identified by Cass Business School and VMware in a recent report can have a dispiriting effect on staff morale. VMware help bridge this gap, helping organisations focus on putting the right people, process and technology into play and fostering an environment where individuals can come up with ideas themselves.
Cloud can empower users to be innovative – the speed and simplicity allow access to cloud native applications and delivers the heightened, intuitive experience employees have come to expect from the digital tools they use outside of the workplace.
Leveraging medical best practice
Improving clinician productivity helps healthcare companies take care of patients everywhere. Medical professionals can access patient records in real-time, rather than hunting for paperwork. Automating processes and manual tasks to free up people to focus on more valued-adding innovation tasks moves them away from admin tasks that take up resource and labour.
Too many medical staff often consider IT as an inhibitor rather than enabler, with multiple passwords and complex systems to navigate – some nurses report spending up to 45 minutes each day to simply log in or switch between workstations. A solution giving doctors and nurses a single sign on and virtual desktops can help reduce overall complexity of accessing IT systems, increasing the mobility of staff, saving thousands of wasted hours a day.
Accelerating digital transformation and modernising legacy IT is critical in order to improve employee experience. Hybrid cloud can deliver an integrated mix of environments with consistency at its core, providing the digital foundation to unlock rapid results using the right technology, in the right location, at the right time.
Technology partners like VMware can ensure IT is driving transformation that reduces complexity, lowers costs, improves engagement and modernizes service delivery. VMware enables digital transformation through an intelligent digital foundation available across any app, any cloud and any device, driving innovation across the care continuum and payer lifecycle with the goals of continuously improving outcomes – not just for the patient and for the Finance department, but for employees. And future employees.
Future-ready platforms for a changing workforce
Städtisches Klinikum Braunschweig is one of Germany’s leading hospitals and recognised pioneers of the “connected hospital”. The hospital’s 35-strong IT team was suffering under high-volume IT operations, slow data flows and applications and a chronic lack of time. A foundation had to be laid for mobile work and for the digital future of the hospital.
VMware helped them move to a modular and flexible IT model which also had the great benefit of improving workforce experience and efficiency. Today, medical findings are available faster and mobile apps are available to hospital staff. The new infrastructure has injected “tremendous momentum” into the development of apps, virtual reality applications and digital care models.
Städtisches Klinikum Braunschweig’s CIO Norman Lüttgerding says: ““Hospitals in Germany are suffering from increasing cost and time pressure. IT needs to contribute to improve the daily work of our nursing professionals and doctors … Thanks to VMware, we no longer just operate a healthcare system: we are also a driver of innovation and employee satisfaction.” You can read more about how VMware helped deliver a better environment for employees here.
At VMware we’re committed to ensuring for our partners and customers a future-proof technology investment delivering better quality of lives. If you’d like to discuss more about how we can help you create a company that attracts and delights the workforce of tomorrow, please get in touch.
