American Hospital Association Board of Trustees’ Task Force on Workforce

2022

This book captures strategies for strengthening the healthcare workforce. Additional self-assessment tools, resources, and guidance on the sustainment of these efforts are provided per section initiative.

The first section discusses supporting your team by addressing their well-being, supporting behavioral health, as well as workplace violence prevention. Key points from this section include:

• A need to identify an accountable leader within the executive team to lead and measure well-being efforts.
• The importance of the allocation of resources, including executive time and energy, to address well-being among employees and staff.
• Identify and promote ways your team can access the full continuum of behavioral health services.
• Build and sustain a culture of psychological safety. Consider providing training in mental health awareness or first aid.
• Focus on prevention by regularly assessing vulnerabilities, supporting violence prevention programs, encouraging reporting, and prioritizing education and training for your workforce.
• Support those experiencing trauma due to violence and recognize that trauma can impact those not directly involved with dangerous events.

The second section discusses how data and technology can be used to support the workforce. Key points include:

• The Identification of the workforce issues your organization is experiencing. Once you have identified the issues, you can identify the data you need to collect and track to assess the magnitude of the problem and the direction of your progress.
• Appoint an accountable leader within the executive team to lead a centralized, coordinated, and ongoing data collection and reporting effort.
• The allocation of resources, including executive time and energy to implement this data strategy.
• Change-management strategies will be critical to address the cultural shifts associated with this technology.
•  Partnership can help support your organization’s ability to implement solutions in the most effective and efficient way.

The third section focuses on how to build your healthcare workforce team by providing recruitment and retention strategies, diversity, equity, and inclusion, as well as creative staffing models. Key points include:

•  The landscape has changed; we can’t expect the same results with a one size-fits-all approach to recruiting.
• To build a diverse and inclusive environment, leaders must work to ensure their leadership is representative of the patients and communities they serve. 
• Hospital leaders effective at advancing equity are accountable for implementing goals and ensuring others in the organization are also accountable for building and supporting an inclusive culture.
• Many creative models were tested during the pandemic, now is the time to analyze and understand the keys to success.
• Technology can be a key player in supporting new staffing models, but only after you understand the work to be done and the team doing it.
• Make sure you are involving the full team, including patients and families, in evaluating care model shifts.