6 Reasons to Hire an HR Manager for Your Urgent Care Clinic

Managing costs, finding qualified doctors and mid-level providers, keeping staff for the long term, training, and keeping up with regulations and compliance—these are some of the most pressing challenges facing urgent care clinics today. For physicians that own and operate clinics, and for larger urgent care chains, hiring an HR specialist to handle the day-to-day human resources management functions can be just what the doctor ordered.

Why take a risk?

Many urgent care clinics are reluctant to hire for a position that doesn’t actually generate revenue. But in many cases, slicing and dicing the HR responsibilities costs time and money in the long run. A qualified HR professional can help an urgent care organization operate more effectively for the following reasons:

1. Physicians and care providers can spend more of their time and efforts on patient care, ensuring better outcomes and a positive patient experience.
2. Sensitive employee information should be kept private and shared only on a need-to-know basis, not with multiple staff with multiple work responsibilities.
3. HR professionals can more effectively and efficiently handle obligatory legal and compliance legwork. They have the human resources knowledge and experience that you or your staff may lack.
4. Employees have a trusted, go-to expert with whom they can discuss payroll, personal issues, and benefits.
5. Workers’ comp claims are best handled by someone who understands the claims process and takes ownership of the follow-up.
6. As the number of employees grows—think 10+—so do the HR responsibilities. An HR specialist can handle onboarding, training, personnel issues and workforce management—taking the load off of owners and admins.

Still not convinced?

Consider the cost of one mishandled wrongful termination lawsuit? How well do you as a physician or even non-physician owner understand FMLA? Do you know what to do in the event of a DOL complaint?

If you’re lucky, those situations will never occur in your urgent care, but what about just the simple management of employee records? Are you keeping up with training documentation and other necessary licenses and certifications? And how about as your grow? Do you have the time or knowledge to recruit or even conduct a proper “legal” interview? Do you know what you can ask and what you cannot?

Perhaps you’ve delegated these tasks to some of your departments leads. Can you be sure that they are aware of the rules and will not inadvertently cause any risk to the organization?

A good HR professional can keep you compliant and make sure your urgent care business is abiding by current rules and regulations, avoiding any potential fines, and reducing the risk of complaints and legal action while successfully promoting you to the best candidates.

Finding, hiring, retaining ” and taking care of ” your employees is key to your success in today’s competitive urgent care industry. If you’re struggling to make that happen, your staff feels it, too. As your urgent care business grows, consider the benefits of adding an HR professional to your team. While running lean will always be the mantra of a successful urgent care operation, hiring and retaining the best talent enables you to focus your strengths where they’re needed most and where they are most beneficial.

This is the first post in our HR Series. You may also be interested in the reading about Recruiting, Employee Retention and Terminating Staff.

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