For nearly four years, Erin Flaherty worked as a nurse in a Warwick urgent-care clinic. The job was rewarding but offered no chance of career growth. She went back to school, and armed with a newly earned Bachelor of Science in nursing degree, Flaherty was confident as she started looking for a job in a hospital.
But after applying for six openings and getting little feedback, frustration began to set in.
Flaherty had the feeling that success would only come with an in-person interview.
“I never got anything but a generic email back thanking me for my application,” she said.
The opportunity Flaherty was looking for came in March, when Kent County Memorial Hospital held the first of its walk-in interview days aimed at drawing in nursing candidates.
Flaherty, 35, a Cranston native, was there before the doors opened, and finally got her job.
“I was hired on the spot,” she said.
She is now one of 18 nurses who will gain acute-care experience from a nurse- residency program at Kent, part of Care New England Health System.
Flaherty is among a wave of new hires as hospitals across the state react to what health care specialists say is a shortage of nurses with experience.
The state’s two largest health care groups have revamped recruiting efforts in order to hire those qualified to work in specialized settings.
‘It’s old-school recruiting, we have to have conversations with candidates.’
JOHN O’LEARY, Lifespan Corp. vice president of talent acquisition sourcing
“It’s very difficult to try and recruit for… areas you need experience for. You wouldn’t want a new grad in the operating room,” said Christina Johnk, head of talent acquisition for Care New England and senior human resources director for Women & Infants Hospital.
Faced with a high number of job openings, the majority of them for nurses, at the beginning of the year, Kent Hospital doubled down on recruiting with its walk-in interview day once a week.
The effort soon resulted in at least 20 offers, including Flaherty’s.
“Over the course of a month, that’s pretty impressive,” said Dean Carlson, Kent’s senior human resources director.
Last year Lifespan Corp., Rhode Island’s largest private employer, hired nearly 3,000 new employees, but continues to update recruiting methods to attract experienced candidates.
Nursing tops the list of in-demand positions, says John O’Leary, Lifespan’s vice president of talent acquisition sourcing.
Lifespan’s hiring process has changed from pulling in candidates through advertised openings to more aggressively seeking out qualified people. Part of that effort includes building relationships with colleges and universities and experimenting with options such as a walk-in interview day.
“It’s old-school recruiting, we have to have conversations with candidates and recruiters,” O’Leary said.
Care New England is combatting the nursing scarcity by creating programs to help existing employees gain specialized skills, said Carlson, who also heads organizational development for Care New England.
Nurses at Care New England can also qualify for funding toward a bachelor’s degree, thanks to a union partnership, Johnk added.
It’s too early to say whether the broad need for nurses will outpace the supply in Rhode Island, said Donna Policastro, executive director of the American Nurses Association of Rhode Island.
“Until we can get this data to see whether we’re going to have this bubble and see if it’s going to burst, I don’t think we can answer that question,” she said. Policastro added that of the 18,000 licensed, registered nurses in Rhode Island, it’s not clear how many of them are working.
Going forward, the need is likely to be concentrated in areas such as emergency departments and operating rooms. Many nurses in those specialties are baby boomers nearing retirement age, and young nursing school graduates simply won’t have the skills to replace them, Policastro said.
Money is another issue.
“Nurses make more money in Boston, and a lot of our nurses who graduate from Rhode Island go to work in Boston because it’s an easy commute,” Policastro said. “We have to make it an attractive environment for them to stay.”
The pay gap exists, O’Leary acknowledged. Lifespan tries to bridge it by touting other benefits.
“Maybe we won’t compete exactly on pay, but there [are] other things we can do,” O’Leary said, citing a commitment to work-life balance.
In response to recent reports of nursing shortages from hospitals, the Hospital Association of Rhode Island is gathering details.
The trade organization is collecting information from hospitals on how many and what type of nursing positions are open, along with how long the jobs typically take to fill, said Lisa Tomasso, vice president of strategy and public relations.
Data will be forwarded to state health officials, she said.
“This nursing shortage is not unique to Rhode Island, it’s also in Massachusetts and Connecticut,” Tomasso said.
Elizabeth Graham is a PBN staff writer. Contact her at Graham@PBN.com.
