Innovative Initiatives Improving Retention and Recruitment

Baptist Health’s efforts to reduce the overall system turnover rate, improve recruitment metrics, and reduce staff vacancy rates found great success in 2023 thanks to a lot of work by teams and committees implementing innovative ideas to address staffing issues in a post-pandemic health care world.

The primary goals for 2023 included providing adequate staffing at the bedside and other key positions, reducing external travel staffing needs, improving employee retention and turnover, and conducting an employee experience survey to achieve a baseline score with resulting action plans.

During the pandemic, Baptist Health, like other hospitals and health systems across the country, experienced an attrition of bedside caregivers who chose to leave the bedside in favor of other areas of care outside the hospital setting that were perceived as having a lower risk of exposure.

Recruiting staff back to the bedside has been an important mission coming out of the pandemic, and Baptist Health has used a targeted approach with multiple strategies to address the need.

Retention of employees was also a top priority because successful recruitment of new employees will not provide adequate solutions without retaining the existing staff.

Baptist Health conducted an extensive review of market salaries as part of a new strategy to position the system as a salary leader for nursing and other allied health positions such as radiology. To successfully recruit, Baptist Health needed to pay in the upper range of the market rather than past approaches to pay closer to the middle.

This aggressive pay strategy was packaged with new advancement ladders to show nurses working in the units not only how they can advance their careers but also earn additional certifications and receive bonuses. The 5% pay increase across the board to all employees to kick off 2023 was icing on the cake to continue to lead the market for nurses.

This momentum in retaining and recruiting staff in 2023 in turn allowed Baptist Health to reduce the reliance on traveling nurses, whose use skyrocketed at hospitals across the country during the pandemic to address staffing shortages.

Recognizing that some nurses and other caregivers want traveling positions, and to capitalize on that pool of caregivers, Baptist Health created an innovative internal travel pool in which nurses, radiology techs, and respiratory therapists, for example, could take advantage of traveling within the system rather than staying at one hospital.

These positions are contracted employees just like an external travel company but are paid a premium in return for Baptist Health to send them to whatever campus or area is in greatest need. This has enabled Baptist Health to recruit a new, mobile workforce that is ready to be in North Little Rock one day and Conway the next if the need arises.

Another key recruitment initiative that is paying off has been new scholarship options at Baptist Health College Little Rock. One popular scholarship program pays for a student’s education if the student pays for the first semester and then commits to working for Baptist Health for two to three years after graduation.

Another program offered to senior students, Senior Assistance, was changed in 2023. The program provides financial help to students in their last semester of school. This program has allowed Baptist Health to target areas with large vacancies by offering the assistance to seniors who agree to work in areas where there is a larger staffing need for a commitment to Baptist Health.

A new and amazing program for Baptist Health has been the Reach for the Stars scholarship program through the Baptist Health Foundation, which is available exclusively to Baptist Health employees with

100% tuition and expenses paid to become an RN. This allows the student to attend nursing school without the financial worry associated with schooling and to graduate debt free.

Baptist Health has also hired recruitment and retention specialists whose sole focus is exactly what is in their titles –– to recruit staff and help to improve current operations in order to retain staff. The goal is for these specialists to talk to students during their clinical time and work with them while they are on a hospital campus as well as going to recruiting events. They also give the same attention to existing staff by talking to them about things that will keep them at Baptist Health and areas we need to improve.

To continue to find ways to improve the employee experience and improve retention, some campuses have put snack carts on the nursing units with items such as candy bars, chips, and other snacks to provide some quick options even when they don’t have time to get away to buy a snack elsewhere. The North Little Rock campus created a relaxation room with a massage chair to help find a place to reenergize during the day.

Many hospital campuses have started their own committees focused on employee appreciation and engagement, which also helps with retention. Shared governance is giving staff a voice in designing workflows and getting more input into improvements related to the workforce.

Thanks to this retention and recruitment initiative, Baptist Health beat its turnover rate goal for the year and is on the way to decreasing it to pre-pandemic levels. The vacancy rate also continues to decrease and is nearing the goal for 2023.

Decreasing the vacancy rate means that more staff has been hired, but it also means the turnover rate has decreased. Recruitment and retention go hand in hand in any successful staffing strategy.

In 2024, Baptist Health plans to expand its virtual workforce efforts that were under way in 2023. This new virtual workforce component consists of nurses and patient care techs who may not want the physical wear and tear of a 12-hour shift but can provide major relief to nurses in the units by relieving them of admission and discharge workflows, for example.

The expectation for 2024 is that virtual nursing will continue to expand throughout the system to take time-consuming and complex workflows away to give direct relief to nurses at the bedside and decrease some of their burden.

60 Baptist Health Employees Receive Full-Tuition Nursing Scholarships Making Career Dreams Come True

Since the Reach for the Stars scholarship program’s inceptions last year, 60 Baptist Health employees have now been given life-changing full-tuition scholarships to obtain their RN and BSN degrees –– and three employees have already graduated with their RN degree thanks to Reach for the Stars making this opportunity a financial reality.

The amount of funding received through the Baptist Health Foundation for these 60 Reach for the Stars scholarship recipients totals over $1 million –– all to make the health care career dreams of Baptist Health employees come true!

The Reach for the Stars scholarship program at Baptist Health is fully funded by an anonymous donor through the Baptist Health Foundation.

The scholarship provides these employees with a full ride that covers 100 percent of eligible costs including tuition, educational materials, uniforms, and other applicable expenses.

Additionally, all scholarship recipients qualify to receive full tuition and supplies if they enroll in a BSN program within six months of obtaining their RN degree.

“Peace of mind. Vote of confidence. Investment in the future. I could use any one or all these statements to interpret the feeling I felt on hearing I am an awardee of this extraordinary scholarship. It gives me peace of mind to know I will have all the resources I need to complete my nursing degree debt free and worry free. It tells me that Baptist Health supports me and is confident in my success. It also shows that Baptist Health is serious about the future of health care by their investment in the people who choose to serve in this most noble field. I can focus on my studies knowing that Baptist Health is here for me, and that at the end of my studies I have a place to work and grow for years to come.”

Meloney Harris, Patient Care Tech II, BHMC-Little Rock

“Receiving this aid has meant more than one might think –– it means support, stability, and opportunities. With this scholarship, Baptist Health has demonstrated their trust and respect in my potential. And because of that, I hope to repay that faith and generosity in the years to come. Thank you again for this incredible opportunity.”

Taylor Morgan, Patient Care Tech, BH-Fort Smith

First Year of Medical Sciences Academy at Southwest Opened New Doors of Learning

Baptist Health’s strategic priority of developing the next generation of caregivers reached into new territory for the 2022-23 academic year with its first venture into a medical sciences academy program at Little Rock Southwest High School.

Thanks to the work of many staff members from Baptist Health who were involved in the program during the past year, students at Southwest had a benefit no other high school in the area had –– a new avenue to pursue an interest in a health care profession at an earlier age and one that would help them be more prepared for their next steps in pursuing a health care career after high school.

Students were exposed to a wide variety of health care career options through guest speakers from Baptist Health as well as gain hands-on experience through a project-based learning curriculum with a specialized classroom set up with equipment specifically to learn about patient care.

Within the Baptist Health Academy of Medical Sciences at Southwest, there were 95 students participating in the health and nutrition track, 101 students in sports medicine, and 78 students in biomedical sciences.

Baptist Health sent a diverse group of 40 guest speakers who provided their expertise during 75 classes throughout the year. Baptist Health was very intentional about providing speakers who covered a vast array of health careers including clinical, administrative, research, education, and community outreach. Licensures, certifications, and various degrees were also discussed.

Baptist Health also provided extensive health care tours on the BHMC-Little Rock campus to 38 sophomores and 32 juniors during the year, and Baptist Health participated in a career exposure fair that included the recruitment team to provide career information, the Baptist Health College team to provide education information, and the Baptist Health Mobile Health Unit to experience community outreach.

Baptist Health Named as One of 'America's Greatest Workplaces'

Baptist Health was grateful to be nationally recognized in 2023 as an organization that truly values and celebrates the unique contributions of employees when Newsweek named the system to the list of America’s Greatest Workplaces.

The initiatives that earned this recognition are important because a supportive and welcoming environment for employees in turn results in a better overall experience for the patients we serve.

In addition to being named one of America’s Greatest Workplaces, Baptist Health also earned a place in these Newsweek award categories:

• America’s Greatest Workplaces for Women

• America’s Greatest Workplaces for Parents & Families

• America’s Greatest Workplaces for Diversity

• America’s Greatest Workplaces for Job Starters

Baptist Health maintains a number of benefits to help parents and families, including on-site child care, tuition assistance, loan forgiveness, a credit union, an employee food pantry, and an abundance of company-provided benefits and discounts.

Baptist Health has a number of ongoing initiatives that are dedicated to celebrating the health care organization’s diverse workforce. An annual survey asks employees for valuable feedback, and a diversity and inclusion committee comprised of employees meets monthly to assess this area. System leaders are trained in unconscious bias to further foster an inclusive work environment.

Baptist Health UAMS GME Program Celebrates More Resident Spots and Trained Physicians

New ARHOME Project Preparing to Do Big Things in 2024

In 2023, Baptist Health received approval to contract with the state Department of Human Services to provide ARHOME (Arkansas Health and Opportunity for Me) services for maternal and rural programs. These services focus on improving the lives of three at-risk populations:

• Women with high-risk pregnancies, new mothers, and babies

The Baptist Health-UAMS Medical Education Program continued to tackle physician shortages with the announcement of more resident spots and the completed training of more physicians into the medical field.

In 2023, the program increased the number of internal medicine residents admitted from 12 to 15 per year while the psychiatry program increased the number of residents from four to six per year.

The Baptist Health-UAMS Medical Education Program also celebrated the completion of residency requirements for 24 physicians in addition to commissioning 12 other physicians for fellowship training in specialty fields.

The Baptist Health-UAMS Medical Education Program welcomed 43 residents in 2023 for training in internal medicine, family medicine, psychiatry, and transitional year programs. Within the next two years, it will grow to a total of 117 residents once all four programs have reached full maturation.

Baptist Health and the UAMS College of Medicine partnered in 2018 to create the four residency programs in response to an ongoing national shortage of primary care physicians and the expanding health care needs in Arkansas. Programs began resident training in 2019.

Studies show that physicians are more likely to practice close to where they did their residencies ––75% stay within 75 miles of where they trained.

• Arkansans living in rural communities facing mental health and substance-use disorders

• Young adults who are at greatest risk for poor health outcomes

ARHOME replaced Arkansas Works last year and uses Medicaid funding to buy private health insurance for patients. ARHOME also encourages patients to be an active partner with their health care plan and work together to reach health and well-being goals.

Toward the end of 2023, Baptist Health worked on applications for maternal and rural programs, coordinating contracts with providers and community organizations, and building out the operations for this program, which included hiring a system director to run it.

Look for big things from this new initiative to help better serve populations in need in 2024.