Healthcare has always been a growing field with abundant job opportunities. This is even more valid in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic because the healthcare industry was one of the hardest hit by the Great Resignation.
Many reports show that the healthcare field lost around 20% of its workforce, including 30% of its nurses. And according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, employment in healthcare occupations will grow 13% from 2021 to 2031, resulting in around two million new jobs.
Another problem is the increasing average age of the U.S. population, meaning more healthcare workers will be needed to meet the increased demand for healthcare services. The shortage is particularly critical for hidden healthcare workers, employees who have minimal contact with patients but whose services are essential to delivering high-quality healthcare. They work in clinical, administrative, and support roles as medical assistants, medical coders, health IT technicians, and laboratory workers.
While there are more job openings, there is a shortage of people with the right skills. This is a problem that has been growing for about 10 years. Organizations’ needs have changed due to technology upgrades and because they implemented digital transformation initiatives. However, many applicants’ skills have not kept pace.
Since there are many open positions and a relatively small pool of qualified candidates, it puts a lot of pressure on HR professionals who work in the healthcare industry. HR teams are often inundated with applications when they post a new job and must spend hours reviewing resumes and scheduling interviews.
To remedy the situation, healthcare organizations are implementing an industry-leading assessment solution like the eSkill Talent Assessment PlatformTM so they can use basic administrative skills tests and healthcare skills tests to streamline candidate screening.
How Basic Administrative Skills Testing Works
Adding pre-employment assessments to your hiring process helps you eliminate time-consuming resume reviews and streamlines your entire hiring process. With the eSkill Talent Assessment PlatformTM, you have access to a library that contains hundreds of validated job- and subject-based skills tests. You can choose assessments that are closely aligned with your hiring needs and use them as-is or create customized tests by selecting questions from multiple skills tests.
If you are hiring healthcare support workers, basic administrative skills tests enable you to assess essential skills such as data entry, typing, and basic computer proficiency. You can use questions from these and other tests to create an assessment that perfectly matches your needs.
For example, if you are hiring a customer service representative and the job requires solid clerical skills and good basic math abilities, choose questions from various basic administrative skills tests and add questions from the Customer Service and Basic Math skills tests.
When applicants complete and submit skills tests, you can rank results by score, quickly identify top candidates, and move them to the next stage of your hiring process. If you review responses to individual questions, you may also find applicants who did not score as highly as you would like but whose experience merits scheduling them for an interview.
Other Healthcare Skills Tests That Improve Patient Outcomes
The eSkill Talent Assessment PlatformTM also offers healthcare skills tests that can help you evaluate applicants for specialty support roles. For example, if you are hiring an employee to handle medical billing, you can use the Medical Billing Skills test and should consider including questions from the Medical Terminology and Medical Coding Skills tests since line items on bills are listed by medical procedure and frequently include codes.
Other practical healthcare skills tests include the Medical Transcription, HIPAA—Health Insurance Coverage, and HIPAA Privacy and Security Standards skills tests since they test for abilities that apply to many different healthcare jobs. You can also add simulations to any assessment to observe how applicants complete projects they would perform during a typical day. Simulations show you if candidates completed tasks correctly, how they performed them, and how quickly they completed them.
Get Started with Basic Administrative and Healthcare Skills Tests
When hiring healthcare support staff, HR professionals need tools for finding top candidates. This is especially important given the lack of qualified candidates compared to the increasing number of open healthcare support positions.
Even a single bad hire can hurt productivity, affect staff morale, and have a negative impact on overall patient healthcare outcomes. Basic administrative and healthcare skills tests help minimize bad hires, reduce hiring costs, and improve time-to-hire. Many eSkill clients have reduced hiring costs by 70% and decreased time-to-hire by nearly 60% by incorporating skills testing into their hiring process.
As a case in point, Vatica Health’s hiring process used to take about 30 to 45 days from job posting to extending an offer. By implementing the eSkill Talent Assessment PlatformTM, the team has reduced time-to-hire to less than 30 days (40%).
Are you ready to learn how basic administrative and healthcare skills tests can help you find the best candidates to fill healthcare support roles? Contact us to request a demo.