Thursday February 9, 2023
Learning Sessions
Carefully curated healthcare-focused education only at ASHHRA23.
The ASHHRA23 Annual Conference and Exposition provides trusted knowledge and critical education to healthcare human resources professionals dedicated to creating and maintaining healthier communities by advancing healthcare through HR excellence. Explore the learning sessions below to help you plan your conference experience.
SUNDAY, April 23
12:00 - 1:00 p.m.
Derek Carpenter
Executive Vice President, Hueman
Jennifer Weigold
Assistance Vice President, Adventist HealthCare
Daniel Mormak
Director of Recruitment Hueman RPO/Adventist HealthCare
Adventist HealthCare, a health system with five hospitals, struggled with increased travel nurse usage and many unfilled RN job openings due to a lack of available RNs.
In 2022, Adventist worked with its long-term recruitment partner, Hueman RPO, to devise and implement creative tactics to decrease traveler usage, decrease open RN roles, and increase full-time RNs. The tactics included:
- An aggressive ‘Welcome Home’ campaign to target and convert RNs who left the health system in the last few years and were eligible for rehire.
- An agency conversion campaign to target and convert current travelers, engage them in the organizational culture, and ultimately convert them to full-time employees.
- Trial implementation of two internal agencies to support the ED and behavioral health – the two departments that have faced the most challenges hiring full-time nurses.
- Ramping up an international nurse staffing program.
Join this session to hear how, in nine months, Adventist, in partnership with Hueman, more than doubled their RN hires and decreased open RN roles by 35%. As a result of the welcome home/agency conversion campaigns alone, they made over 50 RN hires. Finally, discover how they decreased traveler usage by 61%, resulting in over $48M savings per year in premium labor costs.” Hear how Adventist HealthCare and their long-term recruitment partner Hueman RPO implemented four creative strategies that decreased traveler usage by over 60%, decreased open RN roles by 35%, and more than doubled their full-time RN hires in just nine months.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand the talent landscape and challenges that Adventist HealthCare faced related to RN talent acquisition and traveler usage.
- Learn about the four creative strategies that Adventist and Hueman RPO implemented to decrease traveler usage and increase full-time RNs.
- Understand how to implement these creative tactics in your own organization to help decrease travelers and increase your full-time RNs.
Laura Flynn
Director of Career and Technical Education, National Healthcareer Association
Career Technical Education (CTE) health science pathway students are the future leaders of the healthcare industry, and they’re also qualified to serve in the most vital front line roles needed today. Join this session with National Healthcareer Association (NHA), who partners with over 2,000 CTE programs nationwide, to learn more about the quality, rigor and abilities of CTE health science programs and the steps to take to access and maximize these graduates as part of the talent pipeline.
OBJECTIVES
- Discuss training requirements and provisional certifications offered within CTE programs and how they can impact the workforce talent pipeline.
- Identify steps to access dynamic CTE candidates and what to expect from a talent pipeline partnership.
- Describe ways to remove barriers between CTE programs and employers.
Susan Driscoll
President, Crisis Prevention Institute
National Nurses United reports 20% of nurses are experiencing an increase in workplace violence, and Hospital IQ says 71% of nurses with more than 15 years of experience are thinking about leaving the workforce. Violence in the workplace is having a significant impact on our already strained healthcare workforce.
As you struggle to retain talented workers, the cost of recruitment continues to spiral, creating a cycle that makes it harder to fulfil your most basic promises to patients and their families. It’s leaving human resources teams looking for solutions.
In this session, we’ll explore strategies you can employ to engage everyone—from receptionists to directors—in creating a peaceful, non-violent workplace so you achieve immediate results in work and life. We’ll discuss how de-escalation creates the meaningful change healthcare workers deserve and review a free downloadable e-book that helps you apply these methods in your own organization.
Learn how to create alignment with common language and shared values; spark behavioral change that makes de-escalation a natural part of your work culture; how to recognize micro-aggressions before they turn into violence; and how to create meaningful, personal connections that reduce the fear and anxiety that lead to violence.
OBJECTIVES
- Learn how evidence-based de-escalation strategies create an immediate reduction in workplace violence.
- Learn how to secure commitment from key decision-makers—including the C-suite—to implement organization-wide workplace violence prevention programming.
- Understand how to build and motivate teams and employees around a common language and shared values.
Sara Wingfield (Moderator)
Managing Senior Director, Health Enterprise Client Relations, Bright Horizons
Analisa Eaton
VP, Total Rewards and Well-being, Children’s Health
Jamie Payne
CHRO, Saint Francis Health System
Sheila Coggins
Interim Human Resources Director, Houston Methodist Baytown
UPDATED DESCRIPTION
Every healthcare organization is confronted with workforce challenges. Absenteeism, burnout, and turnover are not only costly, they also negatively impact the quality of patient care.
C.H.A.R.M. offers healthcare HR professionals fresh ideas on how to successfully navigate these challenges. It demonstrates the importance of prioritizing employee well-being and how to build a culture of care within an organization by supporting the caregiving, health, and educational needs of workers. Through a five-point approach that includes Caregiver support, Help at point of need, Advancement opportunities, Recruiting for skill, and Mental well-being, C.H.A.R.M. helps organizations understand what it means to see workers holistically. More than a people strategy, C.H.A.R.M. is also a business strategy that offers a roadmap to happier, healthier, and more productive employees, better patient outcomes, and stronger healthcare organizations.
Join Sara Wingfield, Managing Senior Director of Health Enterprise Client Relations for Bright Horizons, and HR leaders from companies such as Children’s Health, Saint Francis Health System and Houston Methodist System for an engaging and informative conversation around how C.H.A.R.M. can help healthcare HR professionals play a vital role in the success of their organizations by more effectively addressing workforce needs.
OBJECTIVES
- Discover how leading healthcare organizations are using C.H.A.R.M. to meet the unique and ever-changing needs of their employees.
- Learn how to use C.H.A.R.M. as a people and business strategy to drive better outcomes for patients, healthcare workers, and healthcare organizations.
- Understand how C.H.A.R.M. can be a win-win-win for patients, healthcare workers, and healthcare organizations.
Jennifer Kleinhenz
Senior Vice President, Strategic Initiatives, HealthCare Associates Credit Union
Jaimee Hartman
Business Development Account Executive, HealthCare Associates Credit Union
With the Great Resignation/Reshuffling/Aspiration, almost all aspects of healthcare workers have felt some degree of stress. Whether it’s emotional stress from caring for patients or loved ones at home, stress due to compassion fatigue, or right sizing income now that hazard pay is no longer in play, it’s important to engage your employees so they know the organization values them and their contributions. With retention is the new recruitment in mind, we’ll discuss ways your organization can use your benefits program to appeal to every generation of worker, so they are more engaged and are less likely to leave.
Join this session to review what each generation values, and what benefits truly matter to them. We’ll look to understand how financial wellness is valued and dispel common myths around it, understand financial concerns and threats your employees may face and share free resources for your employees that they have access to today and identify resources they can take advantage of and discuss ways you can help attract and maintain top talent.
OBJECTIVES
- Discuss what values each generation hold.
- Deep dive into how they view work.
- Learn what they look for in an employer and their compensation and what will motivate them to select your organization.
1:10 - 2:10 p.m.
Eliza Guilbault
Vice President, Fidelity Workplace Consulting
Kathryn (Kate) Van Hulzen
Senior Vice President and Human Capital Segment Leader, Fidelity Workplace Consulting
In the wake of the “great resignation” and lingering concerns about employee burnout and declining mental health, building organizational resilience has become a top HR priority.
Research shows that fostering belonging through a differentiated, values-based employee experience is key not only to attracting, retaining and engaging talent – it also builds resilience. But it’s hard to know where to start and even harder to find the time.
Fidelity’s Belonging Blueprint focuses on nine attributes that offer the greatest potential to create an inclusive culture and elevate the employee experience. In this session, participants will gain hands-on experience using the Belonging Blueprint to evaluate the experience their organization is delivering, learn how to gather insights to identify gaps and opportunities, and develop simple, immediate steps to build an “activation roadmap” and ignite change.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand nine organizational attributes that foster belonging and resilience.
- Identify potential gaps and focus areas for your organization.
- Explore opportunities to engage your leaders and build a simple “activation roadmap” to direct change.
David Mafe
Chief Diversity Officer and Vice President of Human Resources, UCHealth
Hanna Patterson
Senior Vice President, Healthcare and Applied Learning, Guild
The industry is facing critical staffing challenges – over half of frontline healthcare workers have experienced burnout and at least a third who assist with patient care and administrative work have considered leaving the industry. As healthcare organizations, we must support our teams, invest in continued learning, and provide equitable opportunities for untapped talent in our communities to enter the field and build a career.
This presentation will focus on UCHealth’s Ascend Career Program, including a look at impact and outcomes one year in. Launched in February 2022, the program offers employees access to education, upskilling and career mobility opportunities, including fully-funded clinical certification, foundational learning programs and college prep, as well as select degree programs in social work, behavioral health and other areas.
The presentation will illustrate how UCHealth’s strategic program – built to be accessible and targeted at critical staffing areas like behavioral health – supports employees’ growth into these roles and helps address the shortage of clinical healthcare workers. We’re accomplishing this by providing career opportunities for broad and diverse groups of people, which in turn helps achieve our health equity goals by developing care teams that reflect the communities we serve.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand an innovative way to recruit, retain, and develop healthcare workers that can support the future of the industry.
- Have a strong model for creating equitable education, skilling, and career opportunities for the healthcare workforce.
- Understand how equitable and accessible career opportunities are key to building a diverse workforce that is representative of the communities served.
Theresa Mazzaro RN, CHCR, RACR
Senior Talent Acquisition Specialist, Johns Hopkins HealthCare
Edward Pedini
Head of Customer Advocacy, Seekout
Healthcare recruiting has never been more competitive than today. We are competing for talent and the stakes are high. Patient outcomes, care delivery and retention of existing staff depend upon your talent team’s ability to find, engage and hire the very best for your organization.
This session is a primer on how you can implement modern sleuthing techniques into your recruitment process, best practices in engaging passive talent and leveraging technology to get the right message in front of the right person at the right time.
OBJECTIVES
- Sleuthing: Learn how to use modern recruiting tools to identify highly qualified healthcare professionals from hidden talent pools.
- Engagement: Learn best practices on how to sell your organization’s unique value proposition to passive candidates using compelling messaging campaigns.
- Conversion: How do you take engaged prospects beyond that first step and turn them into candidates.
Fred Hencke
Senior Vice President, Segal Consulting
Timothy Juergensen
Chief Employee Experience Officer, Covenant Health
Covenant Health, an innovative regional healthcare delivery network, reduced turnover by 10% and drove positive outcomes for patient care and related financial gains for the organization. The past few years have presented unprecedented challenges to Covenant Health’s ability to continue improving patient outcomes while keeping employees safe, productive and engaged.
A critical element in navigating successfully through the many challenges and opportunities facing Covenant Health starts with their leaders. They have taken steps to clarify and cultivate the core leadership competencies across the organization and identify what their employees need to make working at Covenant a great experience. In 2021, this approach reduced turnover by 10%, with a strong correlation to patient care outcomes and significant financial gains.
This employee experience journey includes training and supporting managers to conduct regular stay interviews, alignment and investment in total rewards to be competitive with industry benchmarks and developing continuous performance feedback tools and processes. They are in the early stages of deploying innovative wellbeing solutions to address the physical, mental, emotional/social, and financial stresses employees face in the workplace and at home. Given the prolonged labor shortages in their industry, a healthy, productive and retained workforce is their number one recruiting channel.
OBJECTIVES
- Hear practical advice and immediately useable tools and techniques to help healthcare systems deliver results.
- Create an environment where individuals and teams are set up for success, have a strong sense of intrinsic purpose and sense of belonging.
- Design metrics and targets that matter and using those metrics (quantitative) and qualitative information to demonstrate, recognize and celebrate progress, and to know when course correction is needed.
Marisa Boevers
Vice President, Product Development and Management, Contigo Health
Benefit plans, now more than ever, have been asked to do more with less. Contigo Health uses our strong vantage point to see the challenges and opportunities unique to health system health plan benefits decision makers. Join this session to help you see the playing field more clearly: how to reduce the cost of care, lead members towards affordable appropriate care and how these optimizations can help increase retention. We will uncover the three opportunities to improve your benefit plan that you may not have considered:
- How to implement a behavioral health strategy to fit your evolving workforce—increase productivity and reduce the strain on healthcare costs.
- How you can better leverage your networks to drive down costs.
- How peer benchmarks can improve your benefit design decisions.
Discover what strategic questions you should be asking of yourself, your health plan and your vendor partners. It’s time to think differently for benefits year 2024.
OBJECTIVES
- Learn how to implement a behavioral health strategy to fit your evolving workforce.
- Understand how to use networks to drive your benefits strategy.
- Discover how peer benchmarks can better improve your benefit design decisions.
2:20 - 3:20 p.m.
Barbara Hoey
Partner, Kelley Drye and Warren LLP
Mark Konkel
Partner, Kelley Drye and Warren LLP
Artificial intelligence is transforming the way HR departments function. Realizing the considerable efficiency gains, employers are increasingly adopting AI technology to help gather and analyze immense amount of vital human data to screen resumes, analyze interviews, and issue disciplinary decisions. Along with efficiencies however, employers may also (unknowingly) be introducing bias into the automated decision making process that can implicate employment laws. In response, we are seeing increased legislation focused on regulating technologies to preserve employment protections. Additionally, courts are also weighting in on whether existing employment laws may apply to the use of such technologies. This session will cover AI, its risk of bias, legislative responses to the technology and the impact of already-existing employment laws on AI use by employers.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand the risks of AI.
- Learn new laws governing AI technology in the workplace.
- Hear court decisions on how AI weights on employment laws.
Rollis Fontenot III
Founder and CIO, HR Maximizer
Vince Goodwine, SPHR
Chief Human Resources Officer, Legacy Community Health
Vanessa Hooker
Vice President, HR Maximizer
Most HR folks know that video is powerful and can help convert applications, however, going from making 1 or 2 videos to creating over 100 in a year seems overwhelming. Join this session to see how your organization can go from 1 to 100+ in 12 months, just like Legacy Community Health and many other healthcare organizations.
OBJECTIVES
- Learn how to create short but impactful recruitment videos.
- Understand how to get buy-in from marketing and C-suite, predicting and showing ROI.
- Learn how to maximize video content in healthcare recruitment using email, text, marketing, and social media.
Matt Morris, DNP, RN, NEA-BC
Vice President Patient Care/CNO, Wellstar North Fulton Hospital
Keith W. Minnis, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
Vice President & Chief People Officer, Norman Regional Health System
With the reality of the healthcare staffing supply, limited talent pool, and the ever-increasing resource intensive efforts to recruit healthcare staff, it is imperative and invaluable to foster a culture that retains all staff. The saying that “culture eats strategy and technology for lunch and breakfast” has never been more relevant than the current post-pandemic environment. However, there are opportunities to leverage a strong leadership presence to create a culture of retention and to develop proven strategies necessary to develop and improve staff retention. Join this session for an informative, entertaining and educational discussion of various models of leadership that support a culture of retention and a case study of an organization with nursing turnover at half the rate of the national average.
Additionally, the presenters will address the current trends and best practices with respect to internal staffing agencies, GIG workforce, traveler compensation, workforce solutions and strategic innovative practices. Takeaways will include intentional leadership evaluation, efforts to transform leaders into recruitment and retention directors and proven uncommon strategies to ensure healthcare staff retention.
OBJECTIVES
- Deliver intentional leadership evaluation.
- Transform leaders into recruitment and retention directors.
- Learn proven and uncommon strategies to ensure healthcare staff retention.
**UPDATE: This session will be presented as a webinar later this year, instead of a conference session.**
Joe Grasso, Ph.D.
Senior Director of Workforce Transformation, Lyra Health
According to a survey conducted by Mental Health America (MHA) during the height of Covid-19, more than two-thirds of health workers responded feeling: burned out, exhausted, frustrated, and overwhelmed. Yet only 15% of that same population sought out therapy as a means to receive emotional support. Contrast that with the fact that more than half were receiving emotional support from family (57%) and friends (53%), and it’s clear that not even those working in health care are protected from our country’s broken mental health care system. What can HR leaders do to address the growing need for mental health services for our frontline workers? Should employers shoulder the burden of mental health care? Dr. Joe Grasso, Ph.D., senior director of workforce transformation at Lyra Health, tackles these questions and shares a detailed case study of a healthcare company that prioritized mental health as a key part of their company culture and the unexpected outcomes it had on individual mental wellness and organizational well-being.
OBJECTIVES
- Address the growing need for mental health services for our frontline workers.
- Impact organizational culture and well-being through mental healthcare benefits.
- Prioritize a culture of well-ness and unexpected business outcomes.
Amy Mackenroth, M.A.
Senior Managing Director, Workforce Development, Dallas College
Krista Watkins, MBA
Project Manager, Global Programs & Relations
Dallas College
Learn how work-based learning programs will help you leapfrog the competition and deliver great patient outcomes. Competency-based training programs that result in an industry-recognized credential offer a win-win-win situation for staff, the organization and your patients. Discover how Dallas College has spent the last few years doing research and development to create a highly curated menu of training programs in occupations to help recruit and retain folks for occupations such as sterile processing, medical assistant, MRI technologist, facilities management, supply chain and culinary services.
OBJECTIVES
- Strategic offerings of work-based learning programs can help you prepare for the future workforce.
- Work-based learning programs that are competency-based and end in a stackable, portable, industry-recognized credential can be a huge win for your organization, staff and patients.
- Harness our collective ingenuity as people who think about the future of work and make a real difference for our talent supply chain.
MONDAY, April 24
2:00 - 3:00 p.m.
James Roth
Managing Principal, SullivanCotter
Tim Pang
Principal, SullivanCotter
As healthcare organizations continue to look for ways to streamline operations and enhance organizational efficiency, many are exploring consolidation of the Shared Services function. Recent growth and expansion due to health system mergers and acquisitions have prompted organizations to evaluate opportunities to consolidate functions and centralize reporting relationships across the system – especially in administrative areas such as human resources (HR), finance, information technology, and marketing and communications. Centralization of people and reporting structures can help to achieve key system-wide goals such as enhancing operational efficiency, reducing costs, improving talent management processes and creating additional career growth opportunities.
This session will leverage data from SullivanCotter’s Workforce Metrics Benchmark Survey to explore leading practices in centralization across administrative areas and understand how they support these goals. A range of statistics to identify leading practices and top quartile performance will be presented. Join this session to take a deeper dive into the structure of the HR job family.
OBJECTIVES
- Gain insight into the degree to which various administrative functions in health systems are centralized.
- Learn about leading practices in centralization and how they support greater operational efficiency and reduced costs.
- Understand centralization in HR in greater depth such as the structure and organization of roles and how they report up through the job family.
Colin Lyle
System Director, of Talent Acquisition AdventHealth
Join this session to learn how to increase your hiring volume by centralizing recruitment models and rethinking the screening process. Hear how AdventHealth cut the time from application to offer by 100-150% and increased conversions by 30%. Walk away knowing how to do more with less and take advantage of existing talent pipelines to shorten the recruitment process.
OBJECTIVES
- Improve your long and non-candidate friendly screening process.
- Capitalize on talent you already have in your system.
- Hire more candidates more efficiently.
Dr. Rebecca Eldredge
Feel Deeply, Live Completely
Many HR leaders supporting doctors, nurses, and other valuable healthcare staff are struggling with healthcare budgetary constraints, employee turnover, “quiet quitting”, and widespread employee burnout. While employee wellbeing is an HR priority, too many in the field are sacrificing their own wellbeing and, ultimately, their desired impact. Drained from the events and tensions of the current times, these dedicated leaders too often push past the warning signs of compassion fatigue in an effort to support those whose needs seem more urgent than their own. Dr. Rebecca Eldredge shows these leaders the necessity of caring for themselves and how destigmatizing self-compassion is integral to sustainable and effective change within their organizations and with their employees.
OBJECTIVES
- Identify key areas of personal and organizational overwhelm and how they contribute to burnout.
- Embed compassion for themselves and others into their employee communication and HR work.
- Use emotions as a compass toward better physical and mental health, connection and change making (for themselves and employees).
Robert (Bo) Brabo, SPHR (Moderator)
The Bo & Luke Show
Luke Carignan, PHR, SHRM-CP (Moderator)
The Bo & Luke Show
Octavia Williams-Blake
Senior Vice President and CHRO, McLeod Health
Rena Freeman
Senior Vice President, Associate Chief People Officer, AdventHealth
Paul E. Neagle, MBA, MHA, PA-C, FACHE
Chief Operation Officer, OrthoCarolina
Pubali Chakravorty, SHRM-SCP
Chief Administrative Officer, Promises Behavioral Health
Executive leaders are invited to join this exclusive panel, moderated by ASHHRA podcast hosts, Robert (Bo) Brabo and Luke Carignan.
Hear from fellow healthcare leaders as they discuss the changing employee/employer relationship. The new workforce comes with challenges as we manage talent shortages and expectations from employees. It is time to re-energize organization culture, but first we will look at why culture is often misunderstood. The panelists lead by doing and meet their employees (and recruits) where they are at.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand talent expectations (scheduling, benefits, rewards and recognition) as your recruit and retain.
- Hear how the panel is building champions in their organizations.
- Walk away ready to revolutionize internal training programs by doing.
3:10 - 4:10 p.m.
Dr. Louis Dickey, M.D., MBA
Medical Director, Hinge Health
As healthcare costs continue to increase and improved care accessibility becomes a common expectation, both healthcare providers and HR leaders are evaluating digital health solutions. From primary care to specialized care addressing conditions like diabetes and musculoskeletal pain, new technology and digital therapeutics present an opportunity to positively impact clinical outcomes and reduce costs for both clinicians providing care and employers funding care. HR leaders within healthcare organizations sit at the convergence of these employer and provider-fueled digital health trends. Learn how HR and clinical leaders are partnering to bring these innovations and their benefits to employees and patients alike.
OBJECTIVES
- Learn how employers outside of healthcare are evaluating and integrating digital solutions into their employee benefit plans
- Discuss why clinicians are looking beyond telehealth for the next wave of digital health innovation.
- Discover the “common objectives” of patient engagement, clinical outcomes and cost savings are driving groundbreaking collaborations among health system HR and clinical leadership teams.
4:20 - 5:20 p.m.
Timothy Teague
President, BlueSky Synergy, LLC
As the rate of nurses forgoing full time roles for travel positions soars, recruiting and retaining talent has become increasingly challenging. Keeping up with the surging demand for travel nurses has left healthcare providers with little to no choice but to turn to staffing agencies.
This approach is effective, although it comes at a price – impossible costs and unsustainable staffing models. While legislation is actively being proposed for the transparency of staffing agency practices, healthcare providers cannot wait. Urgency to fill vacant positions with travel nurse talent and mounting pressure to reduce costs require action now.
This session will showcase the surprising elements that make up typical staffing agency fees, unveil the true impact to your bottom line and outline how you can evolve your approach to succeed in acquiring travel nurse talent both now and into the future.
OBJECTIVES
- Illuminate how staffing agency hidden fees and incentivization models are driving skyrocketing costs and impacting the bottom line for healthcare providers.
- Share how healthcare providers can better contend in the increasingly competitive environment of travel nurse talent acquisition.
- Discuss healthcare contract labor statistics, anticipated increases in future demand and how to best position for success.
Tracy Hall, MS
Associate Director, Physician and Employee Solutions, PRC
Dr. Deborah Zastocki, DNP, ED.M., MA, RN, NEA-BC ®, FACHE®
Executive Coach and Senior Advisor, Healthcare Experience Foundation
Cynde King, Ph.D.
Senior Vice President, Physician and Employee Solutions, PRC
A lot has changed in healthcare since 2020. Nurses are experiencing higher levels of burnout, with many leaving the profession amid increasing demands. This forces hospitals to accommodate for the growing prevalence of traveling nurses and often requires employed nurses to lead orientation on top of an increasingly difficult workload. These topics set the tone for PRC’s National Nursing Resiliency Study, along with explorations of how organizations engage (or reengage) their workforce, and how nurses themselves cope with increased burnout.
The study was published in 2019, but it was repeated in 2022 with data trended and compared pre- and post-pandemic. As a result, PRC was able to take a deep dive and understand some of the current leading issues of nurse retention.
Preliminary data shows that over 60% of RN’s who are not fully engaged intend to remain in their occupation for at least the next two years. Employees who are not fully engaged are less productive, less resilient, and are more at risk of quiet quitting. To illustrate session topics, facilitators will lead participants through an exercise that can easily be replicated in the work setting, creating a framework to help guide them when connecting with all employees.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand the results of a National Nursing Resiliency Study that focused on engagement, retention and burnout.
- Identify key drivers of engagement and recognize the impact they have on employees.
- Establish strategies to reconnect, combat burnout, and mitigate quiet quitting.
Aaron Blumberg
Healthcare Immigration Attorney, Fragomen
This session will focus on the very unique and challenging aspects of sponsoring a foreign national physician for U.S. work authorization. The immigration process in the U.S. is extremely time consuming and difficult to maneuver, and even more so for physicians. However, with the growing shortage of physicians, especially in primary care, there is a growing need to consider visa sponsorship opportunities for foreign national physicians. We will delve deep into the J-1, H-1B and O-1 visas, including timelines, fees and requirements. We will also discuss the impact of using the H-1B vs. the J-1 for residency/fellowship. Both visas are problematic – the J-1 comes with a requirement that the physician return to their home country for two years (or obtain a waiver) and the H-1B is only valid for six years which is often the length of a residency and fellowship, leaving little time remaining to work beyond their training. In comparing these two options, we will review available J-1 waiver options, with a particular focus on the Conrad 30. Finally, we will touch upon the license and credentialing requirements to be sponsored for an H-1B.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand the basic options for waiving the J-1 two-year foreign residence requirement, with a focus on the Conrad 30.
- Understand the various visas available to sponsor a physician, including requirements and timelines.
- Learn unique ways to temporarily avoid the J-1 2 year foreign residence requirement.
Bianca A. Briola, MPH
Practice Leader, Healthcare Human Capital and Workforce Management, Alvarez and Marsal
Sarah R. Skubas, J.D.
Principal and Healthcare Industry Group Co-head, Jackson Lewis P.C.
Over the course of the pandemic, healthcare employers have increasingly faced a paradoxical workforce challenge: depleted budgets prompting layoffs and hiring freezes contrasted with the need to retain and recruit talent. While health systems may be pressured to reduce workforce expense, there are alternatives to avoid layoffs. This session will analyze lessons learned from recent Reduction in Force case studies and discuss the common mistakes healthcare employers encounter when conducting a reduction in force.
This panel of experts and operators will discuss best practices for protecting your organization and minimizing risk when undergoing a reduction in force. Additionally, we will discuss considerations for employers post-reduction including remaining employee retention, messaging to your talent pipeline and building the same, maintaining employee engagement, and unique labor considerations facing both unionized and non-unionized employers in a post-reduction culture.
OBJECTIVES
- Discover alternatives to a reduction in force within the current healthcare workforce landscape.
- Learn best practices to mitigate risks when undergoing a reduction in force.
- Understand post-reduction considerations including workforce retention, talent pipeline, employee engagement and labor considerations facing both unionized and non-unionized employers.
Courtney Ramsey, PHR, CPTD
Talent Development Facilitator, Magnet Culture
Employee turnover continues to plague healthcare with financial burdens and affect our quality of care. While today’s new workforce is quick to leave, effective leaders have found strategies to slow the revolving door of turnover, but what worked six months ago, may not work today. In this session, workforce thought leader and retention expert, Cara Silletto, MBA, CSP, will guide the discussion of what’s working and not today, what are immediate actions you can take to stabilize staffing, and what the next 6 to 12 months look like in regard to workforce challenges. Cara will share her insights and strategies based on her continued research from industry leaders and clients across the U.S.
OBJECTIVES
- Identify gaps between where our work culture is today versus where it needs to be to effectively attract and retain talent.
- Prioritize potential retention initiatives to gain the greatest ROI with the smallest time commitment.
- Discuss a plan of action for retention initiatives that will make a difference.
TUESDAY, April 25
9:20 - 10:20 a.m.
Leslie Archer
Wellness and Benefits Communications Manager, Syneos Health
Dr. Louis Dickey, M.D., MBA
Medical Director, Hinge Health
Employers increasingly want to provide inclusive, equitable and personalized healthcare experiences to their employees, while controlling costs and improving productivity. But how can employers offer a deeply personalized experience for musculoskeletal (MSK) care that provides flexibility, choice, and one-on-one guidance?
In this session, we’ll review the latest research on how and why member MSK outcomes improve when treated holistically with a lifestyle medicine approach. In addition, attendees will hear directly from Syneos Health about why they partnered with Hinge Health to deliver exceptional MSK care across their workforce and achieved significant productivity gains and a positive ROI.
OBJECTIVES
- Learn how digital care solutions can help to narrow health equity gaps.
- Understand why addressing the chronic pain epidemic requires holistic and personalized care.
- Hear how Syneos Health was able to drive better member outcomes, increase workplace productivity and reduce their MSK claims spend resulting in a positive ROI.
Nicole Schell MBA, FACHE, CHHR, SHRM-CP, PHR
Senior Director Human Resources, UCHealth
Melissa McDonald
Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion UCHealth
DEI Roadmap and Practical Application Colorado-based health system, UCHealth, is in its fourth year of our formal journey in diversity, equity and inclusion efforts. UCHealth is a large network of nationally-recognized hospitals, clinic locations and healthcare providers with over 29,000 employees in Colorado, southern Wyoming and western Nebraska. This session will be shared through the lens of a leader in the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and an HR leader who is embedded in operations. We will share the roadmap, lessons learned along the way, challenges and share practical application of how all levels of employees, leaders and providers are being engaged in the work. The session will highlight efforts that are both employee-facing and patient-facing. Learn through practical approach what it means to be an “upstander,” how our training is supported by policy and what actions you can take.
OBJECTIVES
- Participants will learn about UCHealth’s journey in DEI.
- Participants will practically apply principles of “being an upstander.”
- Participants will develop ideas on how to implement DEI efforts across their organizations.
Brandon Melton, M.A.
Consultant, IRI Consultants to Management
Nurses are experiencing unprecedented challenges. After enduring three years of the deadliest public health crisis in a century, nurses are experiencing worsening labor shortages, crippling workloads, high turnover and increasing violence, illness, and injury. It is no surprise that nurses are physically and emotionally exhausted, burned out and for some, experiencing Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
Nurses are deeply concerned that their staffing levels are not sufficient to provide safe patient care; let alone deliver the high-quality care their patients require and deserve. Additionally, agency nurses are making three to four times what they are being paid, while nurse’s families are facing economic pressures with inflation at a 40-year high. Is it any wonder that unions are achieving unprecedented wins and leading the largest and longest nurses strikes in history?
This session will focus on the most significant issues facing the nursing profession and will outline specific ways in which HR leaders can respond. The co-presenters offer two very different perspectives – one as a nurse, nurse manager and former union leader while the other brings 40 years of experience as a human resources leader in hospitals and health systems.
OBJECTIVES
- Identify the five most significant issues facing nurses in today’s healthcare environment.
- List at least four specific tactics for successfully addressing each of these significant issues.
- Outline seven successful strategies to help ensure that your leaders can continue to maintain a direct working relationship with your nurses.
Janna Wooten, RN, MSN, MBA
Director, NCLEX Program, AMN Healthcare
Charlene Wilson, Ed.D., MPA, CCP
Chief Human Resources Officer, East Carolina University
Daphne Brewington, Ph.D., RN
Senior Vice President Nurse Executive, East Carolina University Health Medical Center
Barbara Vancil RN, DNP, CCRN-K, CNE
Director of Nursing Excellence, Mercy Hospital South
Stacy Blankenship RN, MSN, CENP, NEA-BC
Chief Nursing Officer, Mercy Hospital South
As healthcare systems face unprecedented nursing workforce shortfalls and retention challenges, it is imperative to not only consider an international nurse staffing program but develop an evidence-based strategy to fully enculturate diverse nurses to ensure success. Leveraging international nurses to bring both clinical experience and cultural diversity to the workforce can meet organizational priorities on multiple fronts. How leaders approach their international nurse program, who they partner with to achieve success, and how they center cultural inclusivity in the program are keys to sustaining an international workforce.
This panel presentation of two nurse leaders and one human resources leader representing a variety of organizational and practice settings will demonstrate how intentional partnerships internally and externally can inform an international nursing strategy. Each leader will tell the story of their organization’s journey from consideration to implementation of collectively recruiting and retaining over 270 international nurses in a two-year time frame. Best practices in recruitment, onboarding, engagement, evaluation and retention will be presented in this interactive session that allows for audience polling and participation. The programs’ effects on international nurse performance, satisfaction and retention will be highlighted. Drawing from lessons learned in leadership and permanent staff investment, innovative approaches to international nurse onboarding, and an enterprise approach to fostering true cultural belonging within the organization and community, leaders will provide tactical guidance to ensure international nurse program success.
OBJECTIVES
- Recall two strategies that address the enculturation and onboarding needs specific to international nurses.
- Assess domestic staff orientation to international nurses and identify one strategy to enhance inclusion and belonging of international nurses.
- Prepare a stakeholder presentation that demonstrates how international nurse recruitment can amplify organizational diversity and inclusion efforts.
10:30 - 11:30 a.m.
Jacqueline Herd, MSN, DNP, RN, NEA-BC, FACHE
Principal, Workforce Strategy, Vizient, Inc.
Melanie Bell, MSN, RN, CENP
Senior Vice President, Fulfillment and Strategy, Vaya Workforce
COVID-19 tipped the seesaw for an already exasperated healthcare workforce, which led to a 500% increase in contract labor demand in fall 2021 compared to 2019. While demand has since decreased, it is still nearly triple pre-pandemic levels. On the cost front, unprecedented demand for contract labor is straining already thin financial margins. Contract Labor is going to continue to be needed as one aspect of a flexible workforce strategy. Shifting our mindset to approach contract labor as a strategic advantage can bolster employee retention and promote a culture of flexibility, which can help us rethink traditional approaches to improving the bottom line. As a result, leaders must think differently to create a long-term contract labor strategy that balances reliance with efficiency — and ultimately avoids seesaw reactions. Hear from two industry experts on how your organization can drive long-term success and appropriate utilization.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand the impact of COVID-19 on contract labor utilization, demand and rate trends.
- Discuss emerging trends in workforce strategies to improve core staff vacancy rates.
- Evaluate ways to maximize the value contract labor is bringing to your organization while effectively managing utilization.
Chris Cimino BA, MSIR
CEO Chessboard Consulting, Inc.
Hospitals and health systems are facing serious workforce challenges, including high turnover rates, high vacancy rates, staffing challenges and surging labor costs. In 2023, healthcare employers face another serious workforce challenge – increased union organizing targeting nurses and other hospital staff.
Union organizing targeting healthcare employees increased significantly in 2022 (over 2021) and, with continued support from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and Department of Labor (DOL), union organizing targeting healthcare workers will likely surge even higher in 2023.
Learn the latest developments regarding union organizing targeting healthcare employees and the latest tactics unions have developed to take advantage of the challenges facing hospitals in the post-COVID environment.
OBJECTIVES
- Develop a deeper understanding of how post-COVID workforce challenges increase vulnerability to union organizing.
- Hear about the latest tactics employed by labor unions to target healthcare employees, including how unions are seeking to take advantage of staffing and workload challenges that were made more challenging by the pandemic.
- Learn the latest strategies to increase employee engagement and how leaders can leverage these strategies to lower vulnerability to union organizing.
Dr. DeLancey Johnson, SPHR, SHRM -SCP, sHRBP, SWP, LDSS
Senior Vice President, Associate Chief Talent Officer, Parkland Health
As we transition from COVID, organizations cannot solve the employee value differential without solving how to attract and retain their current workforce. This session will focus on how employees see the world (Employee Value Proposition) vs. the company (Employee Value Experience).
OBJECTIVES
- Lead performance on what is essential.
- Learn how to turn retention flags into micro strategies.
- Gain tips on addressing active and passive job seekers.
Molly Ellenberg Friedland
Vice President, Corporate Partnerships, InStride
The pandemic has accelerated healthcare staffing challenges, with growing pressure on providers to retain, upskill and reskill talent. While nursing shortages capture headlines, crucial roles across organizations remain unfilled, including entry-level roles that can lead to long and fulfilling careers in healthcare.
Visionary healthcare providers have leveraged strategic workforce education to attract and engage healthcare workers and provide multiple ongoing opportunities for employees to advance their careers and become leaders. This session offers insights and best practices from their experiences and successes.
OBJECTIVES
- Typical recruitment and retention strategies are no longer enough, walk away ready to invest in your people in order to hire and keep the best talent.
- Employer-sponsored education can improve recruitment, lower employee attrition rates, expand your internal talent pipeline and drive better results for patients.
- Between the Great Resignation, an aging nursing population and rapidly changing technology, act fast to ensure your organization is adequately staffed to serve your community.
2:10 - 3:10 p.m.
Aaron Olman
Co-Founder, People On Point
Erika Duncan
Co-Founder, People On Point
More and more states and cities are starting to require pay ranges to be listed on job postings. Job boards are now requiring pay ranges to be published and if they are not then an estimated pay range will be provided for you. But compensation transparency is so much more than just publishing pay ranges where current and prospective employees can view them. In order for an organization to truly have pay transparency, its important for current and prospective employees to know and understand the organization compensation philosophy. Most importantly, how it impacts each of them individually. Is it based solely on market? Or does it consider experience, skill level, performance or even tenure? If an employee has transparency into these aspects, they trust their compensation was determined in the same, equitable manner as their colleague’s. Join this session to learn why this should be important to your organization, what some of the unintended consequences may be and what are some practical steps that can be taken to provide your employees with greater pay transparency.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand the full extent of pay transparency.
- Ensure your organization is ready.
- What are some pit falls you may be able to avoid.
Sheila Coggins, MA, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
Strategic HR Business Partner, Houston Methodist
Mary Harris, MSN, RN
Director Education, Houston Methodist
Hadji Sarr
System Director, Public Safety/Security, Houston Methodist
Learn how a hospital system’s commitment to a safe, healthy and positive work environment led to collaboration between human resources, nursing, and security to create a System Workplace Violence (WPV) Prevention Program. Innovative ideas and solutions were initiated to educate employees and leaders about the five types of WPV; how to report WPV; obtain de-escalation skills; use a validated nursing assessment tool to identify patients at risk for violent or aggressive behavior; and use augmented and virtual reality to prepare employees and leaders for active aggressor events. This collaborative relationship provides support for leaders and employees who experience WPV, connecting them with resources to manage post-traumatic stress and burnout. When an assessment identifies a patient as violent/aggressive, HR, nursing leaders, and security are informed and available to support staff and create a behavior action plan with the patient. The assessment reinforces the nurse’s ability to recognize, prevent and respond to WPV incidents. Scenario-based videos train staff to de-escalate aggressive patients. Augmented and virtual reality scenarios focus on competency development and muscle memory simulation in a safe environment to practice appropriate responses. Through collaboration, HR, nursing and security created activities and heightened awareness about WPV prevention.
OBJECTIVES
- Gain knowledge with the intent to implement one or all of the WPV Prevention Program strategies into your practice.
- Identify gaps in your knowledge about WPV prevention.
- Apply knowledge gained to your practice environment.
Patricia Mook, MSN, RN, NEA-BC, FAONL
Vice President, Nursing Operations and Practice, Atrium Health
Nurse managers have experienced significant changes to their roles primarily through expanding responsibilities and salaries far lower than their staff. Ongoing threats to support and resource constraints increase stress and turnover among nurse managers and provide significant challenges to recruiting nurse managers. The American Organization for Nursing Leadership (AONL) Workforce Committee culled together national best practices and innovations to support and retain nurse managers. With an emphasis on nurse managers, the AONL Committee identified numerous strategies that have been found to effectively support nursing leadership, they are emerging and not commonly found in the peer-reviewed literature nor previously disseminated. These best practices and innovations support and empower nurse leaders in attaining, retaining, and sustaining environments where nurses want to work, feel like they belong and ensure patient satisfaction and safety.
Key strategies for nurse managers include: 1) Organizational investment in competency development; 2) Role creep needs to decrease and consistent with industry to improve nurse manager and staff work; and 3) Work schedules need to be flexible and employ effective strategies such as remote working once a week. Human resources must be a key partner in implementing and sustaining these best practices and innovations.
OBJECTIVES
- Describe work schedule strategies that improve nurse managers’ job satisfaction.
- List top recruitment, acquisition, and retention innovations for nurse managers.
- Describe effective support and partnership strategies that enable the nurse manager and nursing staff workforce.
Marilyn Corbin, M.Ed.
AVP, Strategic Solutions Partnerships and Outreach
Voya
Human resource teams know they realize greater value when workplace benefits and financial decision making are in sync and when the employee experience continually improves. We know certain health savings accounts can be fuel for retirement savings. We also know that financially well employees are more likely to be physically well and more productive at work.
With so many organizations adopting progressive use of technology, especially post pandemic, now is the time to evaluate the role of technology your workplace benefits.
OBJECTIVES
- Hear about employee benefit attitudes research and what employees want from employer programs.
- Discuss what approaches are working to engage employees in the use of benefits technology.
- Discover how a connected benefits experience will help you drive organizational goals.
3:20 - 4:20 p.m.
Jonathan W. Yarbrough
Managing Partner, Constangy, Brooks, Smith and Prophete
“My First Amendment right is being violated,” is often heard from employees in the workplace. However, most times the employee asserting this claim has a flawed understanding of their ‘rights.’ This presentation explores employee ‘rights’ in the workplace from speech, to politics, to off duty conduct.
OBJECTIVES
- Gain a better understanding of the U.S. Constitution and its application to the workplace.
- Learn what ‘rights’ employees have in private workplaces.
- Grow your confidence in how to effectively deal with employees mistakenly asserting their ‘rights.’
Gail Games
Vice President, Chief Learning and Development Officer, Holzer Health System
Holzer Health System, located in Southeast Ohio, was in need of a culture shift, due to system performance metrics not moving. As many organizations would agree, it was unclear where to begin. Participants of this session will learn how to conduct their own foundational workshop and subsequent culture commitment creation that establishes behavioral expectations for all system employees. Key concepts from leadership training will be shared, along with system metric improvements.
OBJECTIVES
- Learn the key points of facilitating a culture workshop.
- Understand how to create your own organizational culture commitment.
- Utilize tools shared in the session for their own training.
Mark Konkel
Partner, Kelley Drye and Warren LLP
Barbara Hoey
Partner, Kelley Drye and Warren LLP
The working world has changed, and laws are changing along with it. Are we entering a recession? Are we now trying to manage workers we don’t even see? How much can we monitor and not invade privacy? What are the new laws and regulations? What can employers expect in 2023? This session will focus on key compliance updates and HR trends that drive policy development and changes as employers move forward into 2023.
OBJECTIVES
- Learn top trends in state and local laws that emerged from 2022 and how they impact employer policies and HR practices.
- Review federal and state-specific updates.
- Gain perspective on top employment law trends for 2023.
Erin Vassallo (Moderator)
Vice President, All’s Well Healthcare Services
Josh Elliott
Director of People and Culture, Surdna Foundation
Danielle Bethea- Brown
Assistant Director of Employment, Lexington Medical Center
Shannon Tallent
Human Resources Director, UCI Medical Affiliates
As federal funding slows down in a post pandemic world, healthcare facilities across the country are forced to reduce the number of contracted healthcare professionals on their team. However, the demand for viable healthcare professionals remains high. In this session we will discuss how to reshape your talent and maintain your workforce in 2023 and beyond.
OBJECTIVES
- Understand that building your workforce means building your community.
- Learn onboarding and acquisition processes that lead to a cohesive workforce.
- Identify retention strategies that strengthen your workforce community.
Victory Lap: Closing Celebration Social Event
NASCAR Hall of Fame
Tuesday, April 25 | 6:00 – 9:00 p.m.
TICKET REQUIRED: This event is not included with conference registration and requires a separate ticket. Attendees can purchase tickets for themselves and a guest.
The NASCAR Hall of Fame is more than just a museum – it’s a shrine to the history, heritage, and future of the sport. It is an interactive entertainment attraction. A place where fans can learn about NASCAR’s history in a state-of-the-art theater that offers a short 12-minute film. Uncover new stories and get in on the action at every turn with more than 50 interactive experiences. Get behind the wheel of an iRacing simulator on your favorite track or see if you have what it takes to make the team in a Pit Crew challenge.
The 2023 Victory Lap evening will offer musical entertainment, food and beverage and time to mingle with fellow attendees and our wonderful sponsors. See you on the track!
GETTING THERE
The NASCAR Hall of Fame is adjacent to the Charlotte Convention Center (CCC), and both host hotels are directly across from the convention center (see map).
