What Is Vendor Engagement?
While many hospitals have staff dedicated to staffing and recruitment, it’s still a massive time-sink. Vendor engagement resolves this issue by partnering with a third-party vendor. Through a healthy vendor relationship, facilities receive experienced nurses, physicians, and other healthcare professionals who have been carefully screened and background checked. By minimizing time spent recruiting new staff, hospitals are empowered to improve patient care.
• When Do You Need a Vendor Engagement Strategy?
Hospitals should consider vendor engagement for times when they are short-staffed, or when the demand for healthcare services is high. It helps you fill the gaps in care teams quickly and effectively. With a solid management system, you have the resources to operate during peak times, such as holidays or weekends, when there may be a shortage of healthcare staff.
How Does Vendor Engagement Impact Strategic Staffing Plans?
Creating a staffing plan can be a challenge, but implementing vendor engagement can open a wide variety of opportunities. Hospitals can reduce staffing costs by scaling their care teams up and down efficiently, as well as better meet both the needs of the patients who use their services and the changing demands of the healthcare market. Other benefits include:
• Optimize Your Supply Chain
Vendor engagement can help hospitals reduce time and resources spent on recruiting, onboarding, and managing external staff. It also allows for better communication between vendors and hiring personnel, making it easier to ensure that all parties are aware of their obligations and responsibilities.
• Identify Gaps in Service Delivery
Hospitals become empowered to recognize where care teams may be disadvantaged, allowing them to adjust as needed. This is hugely beneficial for understaffed facilities that are stretched too thin, as a lack of qualified staff can lead to decreased patient outcomes and high employee turnover rates.
• Monitor Staff Performance
These services allow hospitals to ensure their staff members meet their standards. This can significantly optimize operations and improve the organization and efficiency of care teams.
• Streamline Recruitment
Vendor engagement can also help to refine the recruitment process, making it much easier for hospitals to find qualified applicants for open positions. Recruiters no longer have to sift through hundreds of applicants or sort through paper applications; instead, they can search for candidates that meet certain qualifications directly through vendor management software.
• Evaluate New Hires
Vendor engagement allows hospitals to evaluate new hires quickly and accurately, which can help to ensure that only the best candidates are selected for open positions, maintaining quality assurance. This saves time and money for hospitals and improves employee retention rates by addressing potential issues before they cause significant problems at work.
Engagement Into Your Strategic Care Staffing Plan?
Before beginning, it’s vital to consider a few key factors. To start, you should assess the needs of your hospital. This includes identifying roles that need to be filled and the necessary qualifications. You can then look for vendors specializing in supplying the positions.
It is also valuable to learn what type of data needs to be collected from potential candidates and how you can share this data with vendors. You should also establish a timeline, expectations for the vendor recruitment process, and any follow-up steps.
An effective strategic staffing plan enhanced by vendor management tools should include these steps:
Identify staffing needs - It is important to determine the issues the hospital must address both now and in the coming future.
Develop a recruitment strategy - This includes outlining job specifications, deciding on the best staffing sources, and developing a recruitment timeline.
Implement vendor management software - One can streamline managing vendors and their staff utilizing vendor management software. This will help ensure timely payments, compliance with regulations, and better communication between internal and external personnel.
Monitor performance - Regularly tracking performance allows for better decision-making regarding staffing levels and vendor engagement. Performance should be monitored in terms of compliance with standards and safety protocols, as well as customer satisfaction levels.
Review results - After implementing a strategic staffing plan using vendor management software, it’s essential to review the results to evaluate the strategy’s success. This can be done by analyzing vendor performance, customer satisfaction, and financials.
• Introducing the Vendor Management Platform
Vendor management platforms are designed to streamline the process of engagement. These provide a centralized hub for hospitals to manage their vendors, allowing for more accessible communication and collaboration.
By having critical information like contact information, job descriptions, and performance metrics in one place, vendor management platforms help make the recruitment process more efficient and cost-effective. They can also provide data-driven insights into performance, allowing hospitals to better understand the effectiveness of different partners.
Expedient VMS Enhances Your Healthcare Staff Planning Process With a Robust Vendor Management System
Our qualified team offers a robust management platform that helps hospitals accelerate and optimize their vendor engagement process. By partnering with an experienced vendor management system (VMS) provider like Expedient VMS, you can access a team of highly trained professionals who have the tools and experience to help your organization achieve staffing goals.
We support you with a centralized database of vendors, allowing you to find candidates for positions across your departments easily. Our platform is designed for rapid people placement, leveraging software, content, service, and analytics to help you pursue your organizational goals. Whether you want to develop your existing staff or find short-term assistance, our strategic planning ensures you can clear any professional obstacles in your path.
