The last several years since I graduated from residency have been a deliberate adventure for me, as I sought to gain experience in a variety of different hospital environments. During this time, I’ve worked in every type of hospital up and down the east coast, ranging from large urban academic medical centers, to more rural community outposts. How I’ve gone about finding these jobs has also varied enormously, from personal recommendations, to going through traditional physician recruiters.
At this particular point in time, with the ageing population and shortage of physicians, most generalist specialties find themselves in enormous demand. The physician recruitment industry has therefore gone into overdrive as well. And even though I’ve used physician recruiters myself, my negative experiences with many of them (and the jobs that result) have led me to question a lot of what goes on in this industry and the tactics employed. With pay-offs for recruiters ranging from a hefty 10-30% of a physician’s yearly salary for a single placement, the aggressiveness of many recruiters is going through the roof.
Most physicians have had experiences of being approached by recruiters, and most will tell you how some of them come across as nothing more than glorified car salesmen, with little in-depth knowledge of the medical profession and tacky one-liners about how “awesome” and “amazing” their job opportunity is. Give your contact number to any agency, and expect a barrage of phone calls and emails for the next several months or years. Sometimes physicians inadvertently do it during medical conferences, unaware of what will happen next. I’ve done the same, and have been totally unprepared for the amount of soliciting that has resulted. Despite blocking countless numbers from my cell phone (an easy thing to do on an iPhone), I still receive at least 2 or 3 messages on most days asking me if I’m interested in additional opportunities. Now don’t get me wrong, it’s nice to be in demand, but not if it gets to the point of being bothersome and almost bordering on absurd at times. A few stories to tell of the unscrupulous tactics being used:
1. If you receive a call that’s from one particular number, and you know it’s a recruiting company and block the number, frequently another extension will call you back within minutes. When you do the same with that extension, sure enough, yet another extension immediately starts calling! Do these people just sit at their phones all day playing this game?!
2. Some messages left by both email and phone are rather comical, from recruiters who appear to be imploring me in a pleading voice to “PLEASE” call them back “AS SOON AS POSSIBLE” to hear about all their opportunities.
3. I have a colleague who is in private practice, and was recently called by a recruiter telling him that there was “wonderful local opportunity” that he couldn’t miss. When he asked for more details, he realized that this was his main competitor across the street! He then berated the recruiter for not doing his research before calling him.
4. As well as phone calls, many physicians find their email inboxes full of messages on a daily basis from recruiters, as well as a deluge of handouts and flyers in the regular mail. The same recruiter will often leave multiple messages a week, despite no response from the recipient
5. The incident that took the biscuit for me actually happened a couple of weeks back. I was busy seeing patients in the hospital and was pulled out of a patient room because there was an announcement that I had an urgent phone call. Rushing out of the patient’s room, and picking up the phone, instead of it being an urgent medical issue like I expected—I was met by a recruiter who claimed that he knew some great jobs that I should learn more about. When I asked how he knew where I was, he casually admitted that he found which hospital I was working in through an online search. It takes a lot to get me angry, but I told him that it was unacceptable to ever be calling me when I was working in the hospital. He was then evasive when I asked for his name and who exactly he was working for.
As for the two or three positions that I’ve found through a recruiter, as I look back, these have unfortunately been my worst and unhappiest jobs. I have been very underwhelmed as well with the sincerity of those I’ve worked with, and it’s become evident to me that most of them view their clients just as dollar signs. Case in point, one recruiter who I worked with for several weeks in order to find a job in my town of choice, appeared to be all about frequent communication and contacting me all the time. After I secured the position and had signed the contract, I was concerned about something and attempted to contact him. I left a couple of messages, but no call back. The question then answered itself, and everything was taken care of. I was genuinely excited by the job, and sent him an email to say thanks for his help. I also left a phone message saying the same. Can you guess what happened? Not one reply. Not one message of good luck or saying that it was his pleasure working with me for the last couple of months. Everything went stone cold after he presumably got his payment. That was the last time I ever worked with a recruiter.
So here’s 3 pieces of advice for any (especially new) physician who is contemplating their next career move:
1. Avoid physician recruiters completely if you can. Go directly to the hospital, clinic or group that you want to work with and do your own networking. Browse direct advertisements in medical journals and online. It’s easy to find contact information yourself nowadays. You’ve reached this far and are by far the best person to sell yourself and negotiate what you want.
2. In-house direct recruiters are completely fine to work with (recruiters who work for the organization you want to join). In contrast to what I describe above, they have only ever been excellent. It’s the third party recruiters who typically work for big companies, charging high fees to the institution for their services, who are the ones to avoid.
3. When trying to find the right job, nothing beats a personal professional recommendation from someone who already works there. Their opinion trumps any non-medically trained recruiter who is trying to sell you the “best job since sliced bread”.
I suppose I should also finish by leaving some advice for recruiters. I don’t think you are all bad people by any means, and I’m sure many of you believe yourself to be very genuine individuals who are just doing your job to the best of your abilities. Remember that doctors are intelligent people, and tacky salesman-like tactics won’t work in the medical profession. Treat us with respect, don’t harass us, and be sincere. Gain an intricate understanding of what doctors do, and what we are looking for. Finally, when you’ve successfully found a position for your “client”, they shouldn’t just cease to exist in your mind. Wish them good luck and stay in touch with them. Who knows, if you develop long-term relationships based on trust and understanding, you will probably gain more business and success than you could ever imagine.
Suneel Dhand is a physician, author, speaker and healthcare consultant. He has experience in a number of different healthcare environments, having worked up and down the East coast and also internationally. His specialty areas include hospital QI, optimizing healthcare IT, and improving the patient experience. He is the author of 3 books, including most recently “The Ultimate Patient Advocate in Your Pocket”, designed to help hospitalized patients. He is also the founder of HealthITImprove, an organization dedicated to improving and optimizing information technology at the frontlines of healthcare.
Oh My God! Finally someone willing to address how we buy and trade physicians in this country!.
We are asking basically someone with a non-medical degree to help an organization with their STAFFING needs.
Often these guys and gals will accept the job description at face value and have no understanding that the requirements are way out of proportion to what is physically doable-or else the organization would not be searching for a replacement/candidate in the first place.
Recruiters are unable to extrapolate the needs of the position to be able to find a physician to fill the slot or they resort to slimy tactics showing the highest bidder the CV’s of interested candidates.
Here are some reviews from an actual recruiting company illustrating some of their frustrations internally that highlight how they operate:
its 830-430 m-f the commission scale stinks you make 10% until 150k and then after that you make 40% but resets at your end of the year , billings are from 20-29k but you have to split it between the job holder and you . so you most likely make 1200 each placement. it takes along time to place someone and some people will only push on their docs and not yours to.
Cons
very childish adults you can cuss while on the phone and nobody will care ~Alpha Medical Group Employee Reviews for Physician Recruiter in United States
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Medical schools are not teaching their students on the business model that exists
in medicine so these graduates are very vulnerable and may sign contracts that they later regret.
Here are some excellent references regarding recruitment best practices for review and should be mandatory reading for any medical student/resident/fellow as part of their studies.
1) https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/contingency-physician-recruiting-what-scam-gary-a-roth
2) http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2011/09/physician-recruiter.html
I have been physician recruiting for 15 years. No I am not a physician so I cannot speak in depth clinically however, I am very knowledgeable about the placements I make. I can say that I have many rewarding placements and have made many valuable relationships through the years. If you are “bombarded” by calls (and I can say the market has become very saturated since I began) simply ask us to remove your contact info and will be happy to do so. Also with email I mean if someone emailed me hundreds of time I would simply click on the opt out link at the bottom of the email.
John,
Thanks for your comment and for reading my blog. I am glad that you are passionate about your work and value relationship-building. As I said in my article, I don not think all recruiters are bad. However, my experiences (and many of my colleagues) have been overwhelmingly negative, and I think there are many people in your industry who have questionable ethics and sincerity. Here’s hoping that will change one day! Best Regards, Suneel Dhand
Oh John, if only it were that easy. As the author said, even when we block recruiters, they continue to harass us from another internal or external number. They make so many calls a day, they can’t remember who they’ve bothered. We are presently dealing with the worst recruiter we’ve ever encountered. He was blocked by one employer and asked never to recruit for them again. Under an alias, he did it anyway, we fell into his trap, next thing we know a different recruiter has our CV and has presented it to an Employer without our permission or knowledge. We get all the way through to the offer phase, to find out that the advertised sign-on bonus would go to a recruiter (one we’ve never talked to and who did not have our permission to submit our CV ( a bait-and-switch trick from the shunned recruiter). So obviously that was a waste of everyones time. I’m not about to let that jerk get 100% of what would have been my sign on bonus $30K!!!! This is a small group with no-one tech savvy enough to post their own social media ads…so the recruiters have been poaching Dr’s sign-on bonuses with no disclosure. When we asked about the advertised sign-on bonus, we were told that it would go to the recruiter. We said what recruiter? You contacted me? There is no recruiter. So I guess some guy named Ray is gonna be pretty disappointed. We’re not taking a job without a sign-on in this hot market. Worst unethical and manipulative recruiter ever. YUCK.
Dr. Dahn,
I really enjoyed reading this blog and found it extremely insightful as a person that recently started a new career as a physician recruiter.
Thank you for your perspective,
Joe Montoya III
I work as an in-house physician recruiter for a large healthcare system, and I unfortunately experience the same phone calls and emails from outside agencies. We do not have a bonus or commission structure outside our salary so even if I wanted to (and was a horrible person) it would be completely pointless to lie about an opportunity and unjust to a doctor and the facility for which you are recruiting. Not working with 3rd party agencies has proven successful in our team by improving our recruitment methods internally.
Thanks for the read Dr. Dhand.
Anit, thanks for your comment. Those phone calls and emails are indeed extremely excessive! I think most physicians these days have had very negative experiences with certain recruiters. Appreciate you reading. Best Regards, Suneel Dhand
I am an outside recruiter, and my company rarely emails candidates because the majority of our referrals are repeat business. Many of the doctors we’ve worked with over the years have become friends. It hurts my heart to see the hostility towards people in my profession. There are quite a few annoying recruitment firms out there who ruin it for the good guys.
Here’s how to sort a good recruiter from a bad one:
Pick an agency that specializes in your medical field. The recruiters who recruit every kind of physician will not have time to become knowledgeable about the intricacies of your specialty. They also will lack inside knowledge on the practices in your field.
Pick an agency that’s been around a while. I’d say at least 15 years. The agencies that engage in underhanded practices or place a lot of doctors who leave after a year or two will not be in business for long because no client/employer will give them a contract.
Ask for references. We are able to provide potential candidates and clients a list of the placements we’ve made.
Ask your colleagues if they know of a good recruiter (although I wonder if physicians are embarrassed to let others know they are using a recruiter?)
I understand where you are coming from with the aggressive marketing and calls. Some agencies expect their recruiters to make X amount of calls per hour and they have software that monitors how much they are on the phone (sort of like telemarketers do). Usually, these are large agencies that recruit everything. They generally have a high turnover rate so their recruiters aren’t very knowledgeable about the business of medicine. For that reason, my guess is that the small agencies would be less aggressive, but I can only speak to my company for sure. We only have 3 recruiters and the only one monitoring how many calls we make or emails we send is ourselves.
None of the above is foolproof, but I’d say that if an agency checks all the boxes, you’ve probably found yourself a decent recruiter.
P.S. In-house recruiters are not inherently more professional. Many large corporate firms who own multiple hospitals give bonuses for each doctor they place, and some of them can be just as aggressive as an outside recruiter. I’ve nothing against them, I work with them every day. The point is that you can’t lump everyone together or label one type of recruiter “good” and another “bad”. Every type has its pros and cons.
Hi Laura, appreciate you reading my article and thanks for your great comment. You seem like a very professional recruiter, and I’m sure you take your job very seriously. It’s good to know there are people like you out there! As I said in my article, I do not think all of you are bad. Sadly though, my own experiences (and also those of many colleagues) have been very negative– hence I wrote the piece. I am approached on a daily basis by very annoying recruiters who sound more like car salesmen unfortunately. I hope people like you can improve the system! Best Regards, Suneel
There’s no such thing as a “good” recruiter. You are middlemen driving up the cost of healthcare while suppressing physician salaries. The worst part is that we let you do it. You help no one, heal no one, and produce nothing. You’re a slave trader. Get a real job.
Ah…YES-Headhunters! I got a LOT of offers when I was a naive Senior Resident. One was in Rural Indiana, one small-town Southern Missouri. You get the idea. I actually was vulnerable to this because, to be Honest:
1. I wasn’t Board Eligible (let alone Certified) back then, and:
2. I’m an American-Born IMG.
One of the firms that HAD been around a long time, when I stupidly voiced concerns about my New Jersey job, said:
“There THERE Doctor! We’ll roll out the Red Carpet for you in Hibbing, Minnesota (WAY up in the Arrowhead..Siberia!)
Martin Fletcher hires a bunch of kids who are VERY unprofessional. I don’t think they’re around anymore.
Locum Tenens must be addressed here: In THAT case, you usually needed a recruiter. But, Nomad Health on the WWW can help you avoid those “pimp fees.”
Thank you for sharing such an informative information,
Keep Sharing!
Hey man, I’m really fond of articles on your blog. They are made well, easy to consume and understand, regardless of English being my 2nd language. Greetings.
My brother is 57. hes had 25 years in the recruiting business. He has given up at this time. The management teams at these businesses are leaning on the recruiters so hard many just walk away.
150 calls a day minimum. recording and stat driven job requirements has crushed all but the extremely desperate.
To compound the issue. recruiting companies have forced them to have random degrees that are completely worthless and to make it ever worse, extremely low wages to the point you cant survive as an adult in 2019. 40 k in 2019? it isn’t going to happen. I just s scanned salaries on 3 job sites. 40k is the common #. it’s as if these management teams decided to stop offering compensation at 1995 levels and not move forward for 25 years.
40k with the debt of of 25k means your eating alpo. We have moved into an area of complete greed and unrealistic expectations. And it’s not just medical recruiting. It’s infected every business model in the united states.
wages across the board have become completely unfeasible. However at the high end they are great. middle and low are crushingly poor. But I don’t see anyone protesting so I guess your all going to suck it up and live on peanut butter and jelly. Get used to your neighbor being being impoverished yet employed full time. So don’t be surprised when your home is broken into and someone is killed.
Just tell your self they are all losers. It will be comforting to you so you can keep feeling good about your self so you can have cradle to grave transparency with a high level of cadence. Right?
Have a great day.
Hi Dave,
Thanks for your comment. Of course, like with any profession, there are good and bad apples (inc doctors). I’m sure your brother was a decent one for many years. My article reflected my bad experiences, that many others in the profession have also had. Hope the industry only picks good ones and raises its game in the future. Best Regards, Suneel Dhand
Could not agree more! I would venture to say that part of the reason we are collectively becoming disgruntled, burned out coding/billing machines is because hospital systems and insurance companies have conspired with these staffing and recruiting agencies to trade our services like a commodity! They are trading on our names and getting paid for lying and manipulating. It has happened to me every time I’m looking for another job. This is just the tip of the iceberg. We are no longer independent entrepreneurs. We are seen as the most expensive, and consequently most abused and disrespected, part of the healthcare industrial complex. These agencies are modern day slave traders for physicians. You may not think of yourself as a slave, but when you are contractually bound to terms that are so absurd, all for the false sense of security or autonomy that an employed position purports to provide, you’ve been bamboozled and enslaved! I’ve been out of residency for 13 years and I can only hope the pendulum swings back the other way before my career is over.