Sometimes there is no way to avoid bad news that impacts your company and your staff. No matter the nature of the information, it is important to share it as soon as possible with your employees. How you go about doing it ultimately affects your organization’s ability to properly react and recovery.

Let’s take a look at some ideas on the right way to share bad news with the team at your office.

Never Delay the Delivery of Bad News

It is important not to put off the delivery of bad news. Maybe you think things will improve or the situation will simply go away? Don’t fall into that trap, as your employees might react in a worse manner if they realize your company delayed letting them know the truth — no matter how bad.

Always be Upfront and never hide the Truth

Never be less than upfront when relaying bad news to your staff. Don’t hide any bit of information, unless there are extenuating circumstances requiring you to keep some things under wraps. Once again, expect your staff to have a worse reaction if they ever realize you weren’t completely upfront with them.

Leverage both Verbal and Written Forms of Communication

You need to let your employees know any adverse news in person during a company meeting. Also make it a point to issue an internal press release so that same information is documented in writing. This gives your staff something to refer to if they have any questions, as well as providing legal cover depending on the nature of the issue.

Always treat your Employees with Respect

Ultimately, no matter the level of bad news, you need to treat your staff in a professional manner while delivering it. Simply sending an email with no face-to-face meeting won’t suffice. Give your staff the respect they deserve and your company morale will stay strong despite the news.

If you need any additional insight on building a winning team in the medical industry, talk to the experts at Pinnacle Workforce. As one of the top healthcare staffing agencies in the country, we can help your organization’s ultimate success. Schedule a meeting with us today!

The onboarding process takes valuable time and resources from any organization’s HR staff, especially considering the extremely busy nature of the healthcare industry. On the other hand, it is vital to get new hires up and running as quickly as possible so they can start making a positive difference for the team.

This is one area of human resources role that stands to benefit from streamlining procedures. For example, it makes sense for your HR team to provide a standardized new hire packet ready to go on an employee’s first day. With that in mind, here are four must-have documents for a new employee’s welcome packet.

Employee Information Form

It’s a good idea to provide a new hire with an employee data form to collect any relevant information like their address, home and mobile phone numbers, emergency contact data, and their birth date. An electronic version of this form delivered over the company intranet also suffices.

Tax and Direct Deposit Forms

An obvious requirement is any federal tax forms, including the W-4 used to set an employee’s tax withholding allowance. Additionally, include the I-9 form that verifies an employee’s eligibility to work in the United States. Finally, make sure any direct deposit forms to help set up the employee’s payroll deposit info are part of the packet.

Don’t forget the Employee Handbook

Your organization needs to author a robust employee handbook detailing all rules and procedures as well as information for accessing the intranet, company email, and other relevant software applications. Have someone in HR take the time to review the handbook with the new hire, and have them sign a sheet acknowledging they’ve reviewed the content.

Insurance Information is a Must

Finally, include application forms for the company’s health, life, and any other insurance offered in the corporate benefits package. This includes beneficiary information for life insurance, as well as the data for any partner and dependents that are to be covered by the organization’s heath insurance provider.

If your organization needs any additional input on developing an easily managed onboarding process, talk to the staffing experts at Pinnacle Workforce. As one of the nation’s top healthcare staffing agencies, we offer the business insight and the quality candidates to help ensure your organization’s success. Schedule some time with us today!

In the medical industry, there is no underestimating the need for empathy from your staff. With patient care as a prime directive, employees in healthcare need to provide a sense of care and understanding to what are essentially their customers. But how do you know whether or not a job candidate boasts empathy as a soft skill?

What follows are a few strategies for detecting an empathic nature within the candidates for a position in the healthcare industry.

Finding Empathy on a Résumé can be Difficult

Finding candidates with empathy by perusing the résumés sent in for a job posting isn’t an obvious process. A simple keyword search will find any job applicants that mention it on their CV, but additional verification during an interview is still a good idea. Any recommendations or endorsements from a candidate’s references that mention exemplary patient care is a good bet, so make sure to follow up on that question with those references when you contact them directly.

The Interview is the Best Place to screen for Empathy

Ultimately, you will need to use the interview to truly verify the level of empathy of your job candidates. The résumé screening process will narrow down the number of applicants, but it is vital to earmark one or more interview questions for finding out more about a candidate’s empathy. Pay close attention to how they answer these questions.

A good question for this purpose can leverage a real word patient care scenario to see how the candidate would react when placed in that situation. If an applicant is fresh out of school, frame a similar question around a family situation. Additionally, questions about working in a collaborative environment also help to verify their empathic nature.

If multiple staff members are involved in the interview process, collect opinions from all of them regarding the empathy of the candidates before making that final hiring decision.

If your organization needs additional staffing assistance, look no further than Pinnacle Workforce. As one of the nation’s top healthcare employment agencies, our knowledgeable staff can help your medical business with a robust supply of quality, empathic, candidates. Make it a point to meet with us as soon as possible.

Empathy is one of the most important attributes for any medical professional. The best healthcare employees put patient care and happiness at the forefront of their thoughts when they are working. On the other hand, disengaged members of your team, providing less than quality care, run the risk of ruining your organization’s hard-earned reputation.

How should you handle members of your medical staff that are disengaged? Let’s take a closer look at some ways to deal with this important issue.

Take Steps to reduce Stress and Increase Employee Happiness

If your staff feel overworked and overstressed it may impact their patient care. Make it a point to ensure each employee isn’t working too many hours each week or even an extra long shift. If an employee has accrued vacation time, make sure they take it, as it will help them recharge and reengage with the patients under their supervision.

Consider hosting a team lunch or an after work event to help improve employee morale. In many cases, poor worker morale leads to disengagement, so it is better to nip any issues in the bud before patient care begins to suffer.

Communicate Regularly with your Staff

It is vital that you and your managerial team regularly communicate with your employees. This could be formally within the context of the workday, but also casually during the team events mentioned earlier. Employees need to be reminded of their daily expectations on the job, and also that they are valued members of your staff.

Champion Employee Development

A key factor is employee engagement is their personal career development. Offering tuition reimbursement and a robust training program helps to keep your staff engaged in both their career as well as their daily duties at the office. Once again, this ties into the simple fact that employees need to know that they are valued.

If your organization needs any additional advice on building a top notch healthcare team, talk to the experts at Pinnacle Workforce. As one of the nation’s top medical staffing agencies, we offer the business insight and vetted candidates to help ensure your company’s success. Schedule some time with us today!

In the competitive modern business world, it is important for your company to consistently attract the top candidates, and the healthcare industry isn’t an exception to this rule. Sure, a competitive salary and a generous benefits package help in convincing the top talent to work for your firm. In many cases, however, corporate culture plays a large role in determining where the best go to work, especially when compensation packages are equal.

With that in mind, what steps can your organization take to ensure its company culture is the envy of the competition? Let’s take a closer look.

Offer Employees a Chance to Grow Professionally

The best talent needs to know that they will thrive as an employee with your firm. This means offering them a good supply of interesting project work, inspiring bosses and coworkers, as well as the opportunity for professional growth and advancement. If all they perceive is a dead-end position, chances are the top candidates will look elsewhere to further their career.

A Flexible Work Environment gives a Good Work/Life Balance

Your company’s work environment needs to be flexible to attract top candidates, especially those from the millennial generation. Don’t strictly enforce a 9 to 5 schedule. Instead, offer flex time and judge employees more on the quality of their project work as opposed to merely looking at whether or not they are at their desk at exactly 9AM everyday.

Remember that Word about your Company Culture gets Around

You can be sure that your current workers keep their friends and colleagues informed about what it’s like at your organization. Give your workers a chance to grow, a flexible work/life balance, and a fun and active office environment, and watch how your company culture becomes the envy of the competitors in your area. Do all this and watch the résumés from top candidates arrive in droves!

If your organization needs additional input on developing a winning corporate culture, talk to the experts at Pinnacle Workforce. As one of the top staffing agencies in the healthcare industry, we can supply your firm with great business insight and top candidates. Schedule a meeting with us today!

As the Millennial generation begins to make up more of today’s workforce, their influence affects how companies conduct their business, within the healthcare industry and elsewhere. Finding great workers is arguably the most important aspect in any company’s overall success. Thus the challenge still remains for the modern hiring manager — what are the most desired qualities of today’s employee?

What follows is a look at three must-have attributes in the modern employee.

Technology Must be Second Nature for Today’s Worker

Today’s employee needs to be completely comfortable when working with technology. Desktop computers, laptop computers, tablets, and smartphones, as well as the applications and apps that power them, should all be second nature. The top companies leverage Cloud-based service platforms and mobile technology to gain a competitive advantage, especially those in the ever changing medical world. The best workers — those who are technically adept — thrive in this always-connected environment.

The Modern Worker Expects Change and Embraces It

Sometimes it seems like the pace of change in the world is only increasing. The best employees in today’s age are the ones who don’t merely roll with the changes. Instead, these top notch modern workers accept and embrace change, no matter if it involves technology, day-to-day business operations, or even the macro changes affecting society as a whole.

If you require flexibility from your staff, these are the kinds of workers that have no problems leveraging new ideas and paradigms to support the needs of the organization.

Understands the Importance of Teamwork

In the information technology world, the Agile and DevOps movements place a strong emphasis on teamwork and communication. Embracing these philosophies also benefit companies in other industry sectors, especially in healthcare. Today’s top talent understands that, while their own abilities and opinions do matter, working on a winning team allows everyone to accomplish more together than what was ever possible independently.

If your organization is searching for best modern talent to work in your medical office, look no further than Pinnacle Workforce. As one of the top staffing agencies in the healthcare industry, we can help your company grow into a success. Make it a point to meet with us as soon as possible.

More than almost any other business sector, the medical industry demands excellence. When the public’s health is at question, nothing less than exemplary performance is expected. Developing and leading a top notch medical team should be the goal of any manager in the industry.

Let’s look more closely at building a medical team that commits to excellence.

Start with Well-Educated Workers with Proven Professional Competence

When adding workers to your medical team, focus on those candidates with a top notch educational performance that offer a work record displaying a consistently high level of professional conduct with progressively increasing responsibilities. Sure, employees can develop superior abilities when on the job, but in the medical industry, it’s best to start with proven workers when building a superior team.

Consistent Clear Communication of Responsibilities and Current Status

The Agile and DevOps movements in Information Technology rely on nearly constant communication and collaboration which builds superior teamwork. The success of these team-building innovations can definitely translate to the medical industry. Clear communication of responsibilities and regular meetings to ensure everyone remains on the same page definitely benefits a team’s overall excellence.

Demand (and reward) Accountability and Personal Accomplishment

It is vital for you to demand accountability from your medical team. Professional responsibilities must be met with a consistently high level of performance. Rewarding those team members that always provide top notch service to patients as well as the others on their team is a great way to keep everyone’s performance level as high as possible.

Encourage your team members to earn additional professional certifications and advanced degrees related to the medical profession. Offer tuition reimbursement to incent their educational efforts and reward them for successfully completing their studies. This is a great way to continue developing an excellent medical team.

If you want further input on the best ways to build a winning medical team at your company, talk to the experts at Pinnacle Workforce. As one of the top medical staffing agencies in the country, we offer both the industry insight and a hearty supply of great medical candidates to grow your team. Schedule some time with us today!

Ensuring your employees stay up to date on their medical and technical skills is vital for the competitiveness of your organization. If a skills gap develops between your company and the competition, your overall operational efficiency and eventually your profitability ultimately suffers. Staying on the forefront of medical technology is a must.

Here are a few ideas for minimizing any skills gap at your medical organization.

Implement and Emphasize a Training Program for your Staff

One’s education doesn’t end on graduation day. Continuing education is important for any professional, especially those working in the medical industry. New equipment, medications, and procedures are a regular occurrence in most organizations.

Implement a training plan for your employees and ensure everyone takes part. Consider rewarding those workers who successfully complete a training program. Incentives for training will help your staff maintain a state of the art skills set.

Offer Tuition Reimbursement for College Level Degrees

Your company should also offer a tuition reimbursement program to encourage employees to either acquire a Bachelor’s degree or to even reach further to earn an advanced degree. This extra brainpower helps to ensure your company doesn’t suffer from a skills gap. Additionally, other employees might become inspired when they see their coworkers earning their Masters.

Leverage the Skills of a Temporary Contract Worker

Consider bringing in a talented worker on a temporary basis if a short-term need arises. This could be due to bringing in some new medical equipment that no one at your firm has used, or even the latest in medical informatics software. The temp worker can train your current employees in the new technology, and maybe they’ll even warrant a permanent job offer.

Your local medical staffing agency is a great source for top notch temporary medical workers.

If you are looking for any additional insight for closing the skills gap at your healthcare organization, talk the experts at Pinnacle Workforce. As one of the leading medical staffing agencies in the country, we offer both the industry know-how and the vetted candidates able to make a difference at your firm on their first day. Schedule a meeting with us as soon as possible!

No matter your industry, the health and wellness of your employees is an important factor, as absenteeism plays a major role in hampering your firm’s overall efficiency. This becomes even more important if your company is in the medical industry, especially when your employees are on the front lines in hospitals and doctor’s offices. A healthy medical staff is a productive medical staff; helping your company compete in the local market.

With that in mind, here are some ideas for promoting health and wellness within your own medical staff.

A Weight Loss Challenge is both Fun and Healthy

Hold a weight loss challenge with your own workforce. This is an especially great idea after the holidays, assuming your employees were like everyone else and indulged a bit too much over the past few weeks. Reward the employees that successfully met their weight goals with a gift card from a local sporting goods store or maybe even some comp time.

Leverage any Wellness Programs offered by your Health Insurance Company

Health insurance companies also hold a vested interest in the overall health and wellness of their policyholders. Take advantage of any wellness programs offered by your health insurance providers. Many of these programs have been vetted by health professionals, and those on your staff can also provide meaningful input on what programs provide the most bang for the proverbial buck.

Start a Hiking or Exercise Club at your Office

A hiking or regular exercise club at your office is another great way to promote a healthy workforce. Instead of a company outing at an amusement park, plan a corporate hiking day at a local state park. Regular strenuous activity is an important part of any wellness program and exercising with your coworkers also helps to build teamwork and camaraderie.

If you need any additional advice on improving your staff’s health and fitness or even their technical abilities, talk to the staffing experts at Pinnacle Workforce. As one of the top staffing agencies in the medical industry, we can help you find the best employees or offer advice for improving your current staff’s skills and abilities. Make it a point to schedule some time with us today!

As 2015 is just around the corner, this gives us a chance to take a look back at some of the most meaningful posts from 2014. With the economy continuing to improve throughout the year, hopefully your organization also saw an uptick in your own business prospects. With that in mind, hopefully you will find some insight in the following top posts from 2014.

What Unconventional Benefits could you provide Employees?

As the job market becomes more competitive with the improving economy, your organization needs to go the extra mile to engender loyalty from your current employees or to attract the best possible candidates. Leveraging unusual benefits helps to make your company stand out in the local market. This article looks at a few unconventional benefits to consider adding to your organization’s compensation package.

Tips on boosting Overall Workplace Morale

A happy workplace is an efficient workplace which is good for your company’s overall success. Keeping your staff’s happiness quotient near its maximum is a great way to improve your firm’s operational efficiency. This article looks at a few tips for boosting workplace morale in the hopes of improving your company’s bottom line.

Addressing the Importance of a Retirement Plan for your Employees

Maintaining a robust retirement savings account is vital for your employees. While your organization can help things as part of your benefit structure, it is also important for your staff to contribute to their own retirement plan. This article looks at the importance of talking with your workers about successfully planning for their own retirement.

Partnering with a top notch staffing agency is a good idea for your company. As one of the top employment agencies in the healthcare industry, Pinnacle Workforce is a great choice as a partner for your firm. Make it a point to schedule a meeting with us early in 2015.