Many practices have come to realise that they should promote their employment offering just as much as they promote their services.
While many practices are on the front foot when it comes to recruiting active job seekers, a vital source of qualified candidates is often neglected: passive job seekers.
Passive GP job seekers are individuals who are currently employed in a GP practice. They are not actively looking for a new job but always keep an eye out for better opportunities.
According to TalentNow, 73% of job candidates in Australia are “passive job seekers”, yet only 49% of companies focus on recruiting passive candidates.
Why should you focus on passive job seekers?
Since these doctors are already employed it means they are more likely to have the necessary qualifications and experience to do a good job at your practice. They also know what they are exactly looking for which reduces the risk of someone changing their mind last-minute.
We have put together a list of the 8 best strategies you can implement to attract passive job seekers:
- Make your vacancy and workplace stand out from the crowd – The four most important factors for GPs to consider a job are % of billings, how busy your practice gets, the work environment and your practice location. Standing out from the crowd means to make your vacancy attractive with regards to these factors.
- Add an employment section to your website – Many GP practice websites don’t have an employment section on their website. Adding a page about job opportunities gives you the chance to attract passive job seekers who browse your website. It also allows you to convey that your practice is always interested and open to speak to GPs who are actively or passively looking for a job. Even if you don’t have any positions available you can start building a network of suitable doctors for future vacancies.
- Promote your vacancy in job alert emails – Passive job seekers often sign up to regular job alert emails with job boards and recruitment agencies. We notice great interest in our own GP job alert email that we’ve introduced a short wile ago. Email open-rates are almost always higher than 45%. At Alecto we typically include positions in our job alert email that stand out from the crowd. If you have a vacancy that is above average and would like to have it included in our next GP job mail, please get in touch.
- Encourage your existing GPs and previous employees to put the word out. – Candidate referrals usually happen naturally if your existing employees are satisfied with the work conditions and environment. But sometimes a little encouragement for referrals goes a long way. While referral rewards work best, it might just be enough to mention your appreciation for candidate referrals in private conversations with your staff. Even staff members who don’t work for you anymore are a good source of candidate referrals – provided they left on good terms.
- Promote your practice as an employer of choice – Create an ongoing content series in form of blogs where you interview your current GPs on why they like working for you. These blogs should be published on your website and can be shared and promoted on your social media channels. It strengthens your employment brand and promotes your practice as an employer of choice.
- Make your job ads shareable – If you have a job vacancy that needs to be filled it’s likely that you or your recruitment company posted job ads on several job boards. Many GP job ads get plenty of impressions but a lot less applications. It is therefore advisable to make it easy for people to share the job ad with someone they think could be interested. For example, you could add a call-to-action at the end of your ad stating “Not the job for you? Go ahead and forward it to someone you know.”
- Post your job in social media groups – Over the years many GP Facebook groups and pages have emerged and some of these have a decent audience size. If you can make your way into some of these groups, you can promote your practice as employer of choice and post specific job ads in there. But remember don’t spam the group with too many posts as it might be annoying to some individuals, especially if it appears to be too promotional and salesy.
We hope you found our list useful and that you can apply some of these techniques in your practice.
If you need workforce advice or recruitment assistance, please don’t hesitate to contact us.