Ten recruiting strategies to attract nurses

As the healthcare industry continues to grapple with a nursing shortage, healthcare organizations that personalize their marketing strategies can stand out in attracting and retaining new hires.

It is becoming more and more difficult to attract and hire nurses. There are roughly three million nurses in the U.S. according to the most recent data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), yet the increasing demand for nurses is making the current shortage even more challenging. Now, the average number of annual openings in nursing is reaching 194,500 annually through 2030.

There are several factors contributing to the gap between supply and demand for nurses, including:

• Nurses are aging out of the workforce, where one million nurses will have entered retirement by 2030.
• The number of Americans ages 65 or older will reach 82 million by 2050—a 47% upsurge compared to 2022—increasing the need for more nurses.
• The portion of seniors with chronic illnesses will grow from 71.522 million in 2020 to 142.66 million in 2050, increasing requirements for committed nursing staff.
• While 8 in 10 Americans believe nurses provide good or excellent care, nurses feel undervalued in the industry: they lack autonomy and trust to make independent, critical decisions.
• Nursing schools are increasingly turning away applicants due to their own staffing shortages, where 78,200 qualified scholar applications were turned down in 2022.

Despite these factors, there are strategies you can adopt to attract more qualified candidates. It begins with addressing those matters that are most important to nurses. By emphasizing these differentiators at your organization, you can stand out from other employers; you can connect with high-quality candidates and fulfill available positions in a sustainable way.

10 strategies that will make your nurse recruitment efforts more effective

1. Create an environment that supports work-life balance

First, create a workplace that nurses seek out. For example, many nurses burn out due to long working hours. Offering a flexible schedule will attract more nurses to work in hospitals since they will be able to balance personal time and work time. If you have multiple locations, you can also offer nurses more choices when choosing shifts to work at various locations.

2. Demonstrate active professional and personal support for existing nursing staff

Potential hires must see that your organization is supportive and that it values its employees. For example, you might offer continuing education programs and career growth opportunities to your nursing staff. Offering new-graduate residency programs and transition-to-practice programs enable you to attract and hire new graduates into various specialties as well. You can also provide personal support through perks like discounted gym memberships and wellness programs.

3. Create a positive workplace culture

A healthy workplace culture has several elements:

• Emphasis on teamwork: By promoting teamwork, nurses will feel more connected to their peers rather than isolated and overwhelmed by their workload.
• Positive communication: Encourage nurses to communicate openly with their colleagues and superiors.
• Recognition of achievements: Nurses work hard, and they deserve recognition for their efforts. Celebrating milestones like national nurse week or acknowledging exceptional patient care can make a big difference.

4. Prevent bullying and create a safer working environment

Nurses are experiencing dramatic increases in bullying and violence from patients or visitors, where nurses who have become victims report far lower levels of job satisfaction compared to others. You can help nurses by delineating zero-tolerance policies for any kind of abuse and create policies that support nurses when bullying occurs.

5. Adjust compensation based on industry trends

Salary is a major factor for all employees, including nurses. Ultimately, the salaries you offer may be sabotaging otherwise effective recruiting strategies. You may need to adjust what you offer based on supply and demand. For example, competitive hospitals are offering tuition support and even large signing bonuses to nurses willing to join their organizations.

6. Adapt care models to relieve nurses from burdensome tasks

Save nurses from excessive workloads by using technology to ease the paperwork burden and other administrative tasks. You can also adjust how nurses manage workflows during day-to-day interactions. For example, hospitals are increasingly taking a team-based approach featuring “floating nurses” as opposed to strictly “nurse-to-patient staffing models,” as Nurse Journal describes.

7. Make your brand personable and relatable

Instead of sending out generic messages to a pool of candidates, be more personal in your communications strategy. Humanize your organization by emphasizing personalized performance management, intentional culture building, and authentically communicating why experienced nurses would want to be a part of it. 69% of employees want an employer whose brand they’re proud to support.

8. Advertise on leading job boards and nursing publications

Engaging in email marketing, sponsoring continuing education programs and conferences, placing website advertisements, and advertising in medical journals both in print and online need to continue to be the most essential channels to recruit nurses.

9. Utilize social media

Be active on social media outlets Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter to reach both passive and active candidates. Add a career tab on your company page that links to your career site for easy access. Use videos and photos to display testimonials that highlight the positive aspects of your work environment.

10. Create nurse ambassadors

Encourage your best nurses to become ambassadors. Enable nurses who embody the culture of your organization to voice their positive views on your various marketing outlets. Utilize their testimonials in your recruitment materials to build an emotional connection with their peers.

Now is the time to be creative in your nurse recruitment efforts. At the same time, you must become more responsive to the needs of your existing and future nursing workforce. Focusing on the needs of candidates combined with creative marketing and brand efforts will have a significant impact on the quantity and quality of applicants you attract.