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The health care worker shortage has plagued us for decades. Why haven’t we fixed it yet?

Opinion: CEO of MedCerts on finding solutions to the shortage of health care workers
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Our entire country was turned upside down by COVID-19. Yet, the health care system and the frontline heroes who cared for us all throughout the course of the pandemic felt the impact reverberate like no other. More than 115,000 health care workers worldwide died from COVID-19, according to the World Health Organization.

Jason Aubrey, CEO, MedCerts (Photo: MedCerts)

Now, as hospitals and medical centers mandate employee vaccinations, employers fear that what’s left of the industry, will be driven out. Still, each day in the United States, the demand for health care workers at every level—from medical assistants to pharmacy technicians to nurses to phlebotomists—continues to grow.

While a shortage of health care workers has existed for decades, the events of the past 18 months have provided us with yet another opportunity to address this persistent challenge.

But simply wishing this problem away, or pretending it doesn’t exist, won’t fix what we know is broken. To better ensure our health care system can outlast the challenges brought on by the virus—and to pandemic-proof our health care system for the future—we must fundamentally change the way we train health care workers and set them up for success.

The first step is making training more accessible. Health care education has largely been an in-person endeavor. But with the advances in technology, and the simulation and VR capabilities of online learning, it is a comparable learning option.

There simply needs to be a greater push to provide more training opportunities online. This would increase access for those unable to travel to a classroom or hospital—especially since the pandemic forced universities and colleges across the country to cancel in-person learning options. It could also help potential workers who live in areas where in-person training opportunities are hard to come by.

In fact, one of the best benefits of providing online training is the flexibility that comes with it.  When adults can take classes based on their own schedule, they have the freedom to continue working in their current jobs and journey toward completing a training program simultaneously. Some online training programs for jobs in the health care field, such as MedCerts, even provide individuals with the opportunity to complete necessary certifications in as little as ten weeks before starting off on a new career path.

But to address the dire shortage of health care workers we face today, we need to make sure that option becomes the norm—not just the exception.

Employers can also be part of the solution by offering some level of hands-on training for students attending online schools and programs that already make education more accessible and affordable. Simultaneously, they can work with schools to recruit, train, and place candidates that meet their criteria. This is a viable option to fill vacancies at scale and improve employee retention by sponsoring this training.

That’s why the second step is making training more affordable. While state-level grants and federal programs are a good start and help increase the number of workers training for various health care roles, we need to ensure that more corporations support and play an active role in investing in reskilling programs. There are so many resources available to help potential health care workers retrain for new careers at a low cost, but more corporate buy-in would go a long way to increase access and awareness of these programs.

More businesses should also play an active role in reskilling their existing employee base and retaining their current workforce. Companies have much to gain by providing financial incentives for health care workers, as this upfront investment in the workforce is far more affordable than the costs associated with a high turnover rate or the consequences of leaving the health care industry understaffed during this public health crisis or those to come.

Finally, once new workers are trained for open positions, we need to ensure they have good reasons to stay. Right now, the average salary for a medical assistant is just over $15 an hour. Simply put—making minimum wage is not commensurate with the hard work and dedication these health care workers devote to their jobs on a daily basis. By increasing the pay and benefits for our health care workers, we can better ensure they stay in their jobs longer and possibly limit the worker shortage along the way.

There is no telling what the future holds, but there’s also no denying that our health care system is struggling to keep pace with the barrage of demands being placed on it. By making training for these jobs more accessible and affordable, and by incentivizing workers with better salaries and support, we can fortify our health care worker pipeline. This strategy may be our best chance at pandemic-proofing our health care system and the only way to protect our nation against any future crises that may arise.

Jason Aubrey is the CEO of MedCerts, a leader in online career certification training.

Dana Beth Ardi

Executive Committee

Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.

Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.

Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.

Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.

Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.

Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.