Job ads promise to recruit skilled workers as quickly as possible. In the healthcare sector in particular, however, the shortage of skilled workers is so great that companies have to make a special effort with their ads to attract attention.
The auditing firm PwC expects 1.8 million unfilled positions in the healthcare sector in Germany by 2035.
So companies need to look carefully at where they place ads and how they are designed and written. In this context, digital communication is becoming increasingly important, whether through career websites or social networks. Here, graphic design is also crucial. Nonetheless, it is ultimately the text that says who is wanted and on what terms.
So what are the best strategies to quickly attract the right healthcare staff?
Precise job description
The headline is the first eye-catcher that attracts the attention of the right prospects.
In the headline, you can also mention certain conditions, such as the working hours: No shift work, no weekends immediately distinguishes itself from other ads for nursing professions.
The company description should be kept as short as possible. Long continuous text reduces the attention span.
The career field you are looking for should be quick and easy to find. For career websites, it is beneficial to distinguish the occupational groups from each other either by a tab or by a quickly visible touchpoint.
The more appealingly the job advertisement is designed, with clear text passages, the easier it is to read.
Design of the career website
The question of design applies especially to career web pages. The pages should be designed in an appealing and intuitive way, and in terms of customer experience, they should guide the reader easily through the page.
These websites present clear and detailed information about the company, culture, and career opportunities. They use authentic images to convey the company's "look and feel" rather than relying on generic stock images.
To show the work atmosphere, videos of the company's own employees or medical procedures are a good way to advertise. The Charité even offers a Virtual Tour
to introduce the hospital.
The last decisive point is contacting the hospital. The contact person should be named, at best with a picture, but in any case with an e-mail.
Even easier is a button that leads directly to the application modalities, such as in the short ads of the DRK Kliniken Berlin. Here, the professional certificate can optionally be uploaded.
It can be advantageous to specify the application period.
This may benefit users who are often on the road and constantly online. Interesting are therefore also Whats - app - numbers, which allow an application quickly.
Attractiveness of the employer
A decisive feature of the employer can and should already be mentioned in the job advertisement. Thus, the advantages and employer branding can be positioned. What benefits does the company offer? Is it family-friendly and does it offer daycare places or makes it easier to relocate? Are health care or pension costs covered and are there flexible working hours? Not everything can be mentioned in the brevity of a job ad, but keywords should be used to succinctly describe the most important features.
Benefits also include supervisor behavior and regular feedback. Salary opportunities are also always a point of interest. Sinceritas has published a survey and an article on hospital benefits. In the survey, doctors as well as nursing staff and hospitals as a whole are questioned. This makes it clear that different professional groups prefer different benefits.
It can be advantageous to address this in the job advertisement. However, it is also clear that the ideas differ from what the hospitals offer or consider important.
In any case, benefits should be concrete and tangible and communicated both internally and externally. This is how a hospital can set itself apart from the broad competition.
Requirements and additional qualifications
The requirements for the applicant should be clearly described. Tasks that are too complex could scare off applicants. On the other hand, a certain quality or standard must also be visible in the advertisement. In the case of specialized professionals, specialized language can also be appealing.
In general, an active approach should be chosen. "You have...." is personal and immediately appeals to potential applicants inside.
The prerequisites, which must be given by degrees or internships, should always be mentioned. They are supplemented by the qualifications that may also exist. In this way, the company's wishes can already be mentioned in the job advertisement, thus providing insight into the job. In addition, candidates who are, for example, multilingual or have additional qualifications are addressed even more.
At the same time, it is also possible to hold out the prospect of these additional requirements, for example through qualification opportunities or a naturalization with language acquisition made possible.
In any case, it is important to address international skilled workers as well. Precisely because the governing coalition wants to make immigration easier for skilled workers, they should also be reached.
Job ads can therefore also be posted on international networks such as LinkedIn and should always be available in English as well.
Job portals and active sourcing
Career portals are important to post ads and are also used, as visible in the survey of Sinceritas. Examples are indeed or Stepstone in addition to Xing and Linkedin. Medi-Karriere is also interesting.
Here it is visible how quickly and intuitively it is possible to search by occupational group, place of residence and position, and this in different, intuitively findable touchpoints, tabs or the immediately visible form. Employer branding can advertise the company in the respective job ads.
These job portals and also social media can in turn be used well for active sourcing to actively approach candidates and address them directly. In this way, highly qualified specialists can be recruited for the company.
The advantage of active sourcing is also that the company's own ideas and corporate culture can be incorporated into the selection of candidates. They are more likely to feel addressed because they may have the right additional qualifications or fit the company's profile.
In this way, a pool of interesting specialists can also be formed in the long term, thus supporting the personnel policy.
Conclusion
In order to place a job ad as effectively as possible, best practices should be followed. The attractiveness of the company, benefits and corporate culture should be clearly included in the ad. A young and mobile generation will be increasingly online and mobile accessible. Being able to read the ad on a smartphone is a prerequisite. In the best case, the application documents can be linked to one's own profile on Linkedin and thus be retrievable in a few minutes. This can be supported with the use of job portals.
Active sourcing can also be carried out by an experienced headhunter. Just as with videos, the candidate can then be addressed directly. The more individual the approach, the more likely the specialist will be interested in the company. The future of job advertising could lie in the personalized approach. Thus, with the right design and positioning of the job description, much is done for the future of the company.
