Staffing Robot - Healthcare Staffing Technology, Design & Marketing Blog

Healthcare Staffing Agency Website Design and Web Marketing Services

Eight years ago I had an idea and saw an opportunity. That idea was ShiftWise and over the last eight years the opportunity was realized. Today, ShiftWise is the largest provider of Vendor Management Services in the healthcare staffing industry, servicing over 1,200 hospital clients and 1,100 staffing agencies all across the nation. 

I'm incredibly proud of what ShiftWise has become and look forward to watching it grow even more successful over the next several years. However, I will be watching the success from a distance, as I have decided it's time to move on to a new venture.

Today I wanted to officially announce the launch of a new company appropriately called - Staffing Robot! The company currently has 5 employees and is being founded by me and my business partner, Ross Barbieri, who also helped me start ShiftWise.

Staffing Robot is a healthcare staffing web services company that provides the following services to hospitals and staffing agencies all across the nation:

• Website design
• Web software application development
  
• Mobile web platform development
  
• Search engine optimization (SEO)
  
• Pay Per Click (PPC) marketing management
• Social Media Marketing (SMM) campaign strategies
  
• Brand creation, rebranding and brand management
  
• Email marketing campaign management
• Traditional print marketing services
  

The Staffing Robot blog will become an extension of our new company's services and the blog posts will continue to provide you with relevant information from the healthcare staffing industry.

It's been great working with so many of you over the last several years and I look forward to working with some of you in this new capacity. If your hospital or staffing agency is looking to rebrand, create a new website, build a web application or improve your web marketing through SEO or social media campaigns - Staffing Robot is open for business.

Check out some samples of our work at Staffing Robot or contact us to get a free quote for your web project. As always, you can follow Staffing Robot on Twitter or call us directly at 971-533-8839.

Broadlane WFX Rebrands to Prolucent & Some Rebranding Tips

A couple of months ago I wrote about AMN's re-branding campaign. Now, another major player in the healthcare staffing industry has gone through a similar effort. Broadlane's Workforce Management Services has rebranded itself from Broandlane WFX to Prolucent.

If you're considering a rebranding campaign for your staffing agency now is the perfect time to do it. The trends in the healthcare staffing industry have been bleak over the last 1.5 years. However, as things start to pick up again hospitals will be re-evaluating their staffing agency partners. Approaching them with an improved identity, renewed focus and new service offerings can go along way toward keeping the attention of your clients or getting new ones to notice you.

If you do decide to rebrand I offer the following tips:

1. Make sure you understand what all is involved with this effort. A brand is more than a logo. You don't want to simply update your logo or website and overlook the rest of your promotional material. Promoting an inconsistent brand sends a bad message to the market. 
2. If you rename your company or product chose something that's easy to pronounce. Although 'Broadlane WFX' wasn't a great name, I'm not sure the name 'Prolucent' is any better. Many people are going to spend time trying to figure out how to pronounce it or just skip the exercise all together and continue to call them Broadlane. Further, if you change your company name to something in another language (say for example 'Concerro') be sure the name means what you think it does.
3. Do your homework and work with reputable companies that know what they're doing and won't overcharge you. If you don't know where to start contact me and I can help point you in the right direction.

Changing your brand can be tricky and if done incorrectly, it can be disastrous. There is a lot to consider, including the current equity your brand has or doesn't have, before going down this path. However, if AMN can pull it off with all the equity they had in their brand, most likely you can too too.

Broadlane Acquires Symbio Solutions

Symbio Solutions, a leading provider of healthcare Vendor Management Services was acquired by Broadlane this week. There were several bidders during the process but Broadlane was the highest bidder.

Symbio filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in January of this year after running into financial trouble and failing to pay their staffing agencies in 2009. 

In addition to gaining the Symbio VMS and core staff scheduling technologies, Broadlane secured agreements with Kaleida health, Baptist Health System of San Antonio, Henry Mayo Newhall Memorial Hospital and The Cooper Health System through the transaction. It's unclear if the creditors owed the millions of dollars will get any of their money back or if Broadlane now owns the debt to the staffing agencies.

My Interview on Staffing Talk

Last Friday, Gregg Dourgarian of Tempworks Staffing Software and the blog Staffing Talk had me on his call in show. We discussed several topics such as ShiftWise Healthcare Vendor Management, the current economic state of the healthcare staffing industry, the social media application foursquare, Social Media Marketing (SMM) and staffing agencies and my blog Staffing Robot.

Gregg is an active blogger and continues to try new things. He is definitely helping to further advance the use technology and social media in the staffing industry. Thanks for having me on your show Gregg.

You can watch the show here.

Symbio Solutions Files for Bankruptcy

Late last year I blogged about the struggle of several healthcare VMS companies in the industry. Symbio Solutions was no exception. As they began having trouble paying their staffing agencies, organizations such as the National Association of Travel Healthcare Organizations (NATHO) started calling them out.

It looks as though the situation has not improved for them and this week, Symbio Solutions filed bankruptcy. Symbio Solutions was started in 2003 and was a viable competitor, selling workforce management solutions, in the healthcare staffing industry for several years.

And then there was 1...

I do my best to remain objective and not overly promote ShiftWise on this blog but I think it's relevant and fair to point out that, in terms of vendor neutral healthcare VMS systems, ShiftWise appears to be the only company left in the industry. It will be an interesting year.

Top Healthcare Staffing Stories of 2009 and Predictions for 2010

Over the next few weeks both of my sons have birthdays and I plan on spending some down time with my family for the holidays. Therefore, this will be my last post until the new year.

I thought I'd use this post to highlight some of the big events that affected the healthcare staffing industry in 2009 as well as make a few predictions about the industry for 2010. (is it 'twenty-ten' or 'two thousand ten'?)

What the healthcare staffing industry looked like in 2009:

Major downturn in spending on healthcare temporary staff.

The biggest news in 2009 for the healthcare staffing industry was undoubtedly about the downturn in the economy. My second blog post ever was on the reasons hospitals were spending less on healthcare agency staff. The down turn in the economy even made people start asking the question: "is there still a nursing shortage?" From there, leading economists confirmed that not only was the economy bad but that it will take awhile for it to improve and return the healthcare staffing industry to pre-2009 levels. And finally, the Staffing Industry Analysts informed us that the nurse travel industry decreased by 44% this year and we saw this downturn reflected in the revenue loss reported by major public healthcare staffing companies.

Widespread adoption of healthcare vendor management.

In 2009 hospitals gave a big vote of confidence to vendor management as the preferred model for agency management. VMS has matured in the industry and delivered on its promise of saving hospitals both time and money on their staffing costs.

How healthcare reform will affect healthcare staffing.

The topic of how healthcare reform will affect healthcare staffing couldn't be avoided. Many debates about the pros and cons of healthcare reform occurred on my blog and many of us had the privilege of hearing former Senator Tom Daschle's view on healthcare reform at the healthcare staffing industry conference. AMN even produced results from a poll suggesting that hospital CEO's feel healthcare reform will benefit the healthcare staffing industry.

Technology VMS companies struggle.

Even though some healthcare vendor management technology companies thrived in 2009 as hospitals increased their adoption of VMS, many companies did not fair so well. A few healthcare VMS technology companies had to close their doors this year while some VMS companies struggled to pay their staffing agency partners. Additionally, some VMS companies found acquisition to be the best way to survive the turbulent year.

Increased use of social media.

2009 was the year that many hospitals and staffing agencies began to use social media. Many hospitals, such as Providence St. Vincents in Portland Oregon who found success with their 'pink glove dance video' that went viral, took full advantage of these tools. Some hospitals are still behind when it comes to social media while several hospitals are finding success with tools such as Twitter. Both healthcare staffing agencies and hospitals are now promoting and monitoring their brands online, as the online tools for brand promotion and management are starting to become more prevalent. I've even created some helpful tools for people to search for healthcare staffing industry information and follow companies in the healthcare staffing industry on Twitter.

As you can see, 2009 was a very eventful year for the healthcare staffing industry. So what will the next year bring?

My predictions for healthcare staffing in 2010:

More consolidation of staffing agencies and VMS companies.

After struggling through the economic downturn of the last 1.5 years many companies are now really feeling the effects. I see several staffing agencies closing their doors and many more acquisitions in 2010. I wouldn't be surprised if we even see some consolidation with some of the major players. In addition, I expect we'll see some more acquisitions of healthcare VMS companies.

Continued adoption of vendor management.

Hospitals will continue to choose vendor management for their agency management solution. As the rate of adoption continues to increase, I expect we'll see hospitals still choose vendor neutral healthcare vendor management companies over agency run managed service providers.

New technology players.

The industry has gotten a bit stale in terms of innovation and new technology options. In addition, we've seen a decent amount of consolidation of industry technology companies. Both of these facts suggest to me that new players will enter the market and hopefully they will bring with them some exciting and innovate technologies. As these players enter the healthcare staffing industry I expect we'll see more and more hospitals and healthcare staffing companies embracing technology to improve their staffing process. Stay tuned!

New marketing methods and opportunities.

As budgets tighten many hospitals and staffing agencies will look for more inexpensive and effective methods for marketing their services. Many more healthcare staffing organizations will turn to SEO/SEM and social media for company/brand promotion. 

The market will come back slowly. Kind of.

Even though there are some positive signs for the economy overall and there has been some slight improvements in the healthcare staffing industry I don't see anything that suggests we should get too excited. Earlier this week the Staffing Industry Analysts (SIA) hosted a webinar about the economic outlook for 2010. Their predictions suggested that every industry will improve in 2010 - except healthcare staffing. In fact, they are predicting an overall decline of -1%. Therefore, unfortunately, I believe 2010 will still be a year of struggle. There will be some positive bumps here and there but we won't start fully pulling out of this down turn until early/mid 2011.

What are your predictions for healthcare staffing in 2010? Please share them here if you have any.

I wish you all well - happy holidays - happy new year. See you in 2010!

How Much Can VMS Really Save You?

Recently, the Staffing Industry Analysts (SIA) put out a report on how much Vendor Management is saving companies that have adopted VMS as a management solution for contingent labor. According to the SIA "The results were based on findings from the 2009 Contingent Buyer Survey, conducted in September 2009, and reflect the opinions of buyer respondents from 171 large (1000+ employee) companies." Again, the report is only available to paying members of the SIA but I've listed some interesting findings from the report below.

What was most interesting to me about the report was how much the overall savings on contingent labor costs was underestimated by buyers that do not use VMS systems as an agency management solution.

According to the SIA report:

• Contingent workforce buyers who have not implemented VMS greatly underestimate the savings achieved by its adoption. Among such non-VMS users, the median projected savings from implementation was 5%--half the savings reported by those who had actually implemented VMS.
• Roughly a third of non-VMS users had “no idea” how much VMS would save; an additional 11% thought it would save neither time nor money, and 13% more thought it would save time but not money.
• The median estimated savings of contingent buyers working with a VMS model was 10%.
  
• Buyers reported that in the first year of implementation VMS saved a median of 10% of contingent workforce spend. However, buyer perception of savings varied widely, from 0% to over 25% savings.
  
• Almost all buyers—85% of them—thought VMS saved at least some significant percentage of spend (2% or more). About a quarter of buyers thought VMS saved 16% or more. Of the VMS users who did not think it saved money, almost all thought it saved time.

It's clear that the adoption of a vendor management model saves buyers of contingent labor both time and money. Depending on how it is implemented and the model chosen, the amount saved can vary.

Vendor Neutral Healthcare VMS Not So Neutral Anymore

A couple of weeks ago I blogged about the recent acquisition of the healthcare vendor management company Medefis by the private equity group Welsh, Carson, Anderson and Stowe. What I didn't realize is that this private equity group also owns a very large healthcare staffing company called Onward Healthcare.

This definitely changes the game for Medefis and the companies working with them. Being owned by a staffing agency or a company that owns staffing agencies definitely negates your vendor neutrality. This private equity company, as well as Onward Healthcare  will now have access to all the data within Medefis including bill rates, pay rates, job order and candidate data.

What does this really mean? Keeping the new ownership ties between Medefis and Onward Healthcare quiet was probably wise. Most likely if they're smart, Medefis will continue to bill themselves as being vendor neutral. However, the acquisition will also provide a huge benefit to Onward Healthcare in terms of being promoted to hospitals, as well as increased access to job requisitions and candidate profiles.

This isn't necessarily bad for the hospitals, depending on how much distance exists between them and Onward Healthcare and as long as they continue to get their needs met by quality, cost effective staff. The biggest losers are the staffing agencies that entered into a relationship with Medefis under the guise of vendor neutrality. Staffing agencies typically participate with vendor neutral companies more than working through a MSP delivered by one of their competitiors because they have equal chance at filling requisitions, and the company won't be attempting to recruit their staff with the data they have in the system. What happens when this all changes?

I guess we're about to find out.

Hospital Acceptance of VMS and MSP Models Predicted to Continue Steady Growth

Earlier this year the Staffing Industry Analysts (SIA) put out a report suggesting that 50% of buyers (hospitals and health systems) in the healthcare staffing industry now manage their agency usage through a VMS or MSP model. In an earlier blog post I discussed this in more detail and showed that more hospitals are choosing a vendor neutral VMS technology solution than they are an agency led MSP model.

Yesterday, the SIA released another report suggesting that by 2011, 93% of healthcare buyers in the U.S. will be using a VMS or MSP. The numbers come from a survey they did of 171 healthcare buyers. The survey results also suggested that the breakdown of these accepted offerings will be:

• 55% MSP
• 42% VMS

According to my estimates of hospitals using a VMS or MSP model, the 50% current adoption is probably pretty close to accurate. This adoption of VMS by hospitals is up 24% from last year according to the SIA. The SIA is partially basing their prediction of a jump to 93% in 2011 based on a similar growth pattern from the previous two years. However, I don't think this jump is accurate because I think there previous year (2008) estimate of 24% was much too low.

Further, in terms of the number of hospitals, the vendor neutral VMS technology model has been much more widely accepted than agency MSP offerings. Therefore, I don't see how in two years the MSP model will overtake the VMS model by 13%.

So, place your bets on who's crystal ball is clearer. We'll see what 2011 brings.

Side note: I would love to share the entire SIA report with you. However, the SIA does not allow for redistribution of their data and you can only access it if you're a corporate member. I won't say anything about this being an outdated business model or how much more success they would have and members they would earn if they allowed for a more free distribution of their data. At least, I won't say any more than that.

Healthcare Vendor Management Company - Medefis Acquired by Private Equity Group

Medefis, a technology vendor management provider to the healthcare staffing industry announced that they were acquired this week by a private equity group called Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe.

Medefis was started by three individuals who were former employees of the healthcare staffing agency Aureus in Omaha, Nebraska. Their approach to the market has been to deliver a light weight VMS solution whereby hospitals place open positions online and staffing agencies respond by submitting candidates.

I've watched Medefis for several years and have always thought their model was interesting. I believe it has several pluses and minuses:

The pluses:

• Light weight solution requires little to no training
• Quick process for sign up and adoption
• Low overhead and little maintenance for the application

The minuses:

• Many staffing agencies complain about the model because there are no set rates and they have to bid on each position.
• Staffing agencies are billed directly by Medefis and there are many complications around the billing. For example: Medefis charges the bill rate (x) the number of weeks in the assignment. Call off and cancellation issues cause a lot of confusion when it's time for billing.
• When a hospital uses Medefis it's not the entire hospital. A single unit manager could be using Medefis. This reduces the value to the staffing agencies as well as the hospital and complicates things for everyone by introducing multiple systems.
• The Medefis system lacks several features such as credential screening and compliance. Recently they added time keeping an billing to their application as separate services but it's unclear how this is working. I have yet to find anyone using the features.

It's been an interesting year for healthcare vendor management companies. Some vendor management companies have declared bankruptcy while others have been suffering through major financial issues. It will be interesting to see how this acquisition plays out for Medefis and their model.

You can read the full article on the Medefis acquisition on their web site.