Leveraging Software to Drive Savings in Labor Management

Lawonn says that when he talks to colleagues across the country, they say those staffing and labor issues are under control with their productivity system and nursing ratios, and there isn’t much more they can do. “But I tell them that is false—all they are managing is the FTE count, not the utilization of labor. If they need eight nurses for a unit and they have eight, that’s really all they know. They don’t necessarily know what they’re paying those nurses and that they’re paying benefits for nurses that aren’t there. There is a great additional opportunity to manage labor by effectively managing the utilization of the labor you have.”

EASING THE BURDEN

Heavy patient loads, smaller staffs and higher stress levels may be causing healthcare workers to check themselves out of their facilities, according to survey by recruiting firm CareerBuilder, conducted online by Harris Interactive earlier this year.

In fact, 60 percent of healthcare workers say they are burned out on their jobs. Twenty-one percent always or often feel burned out. Of workers who feel always or often burned out, 67 percent plan to look for a new job this year, the survey says.

“We absolutely have that issue here,” admits Lawonn. “But with the use of this software, you give nurses some sense of ownership of their schedule, which is a huge satisfier. It also reduces the amount of times that were asking people to come in for a second shift or go home because we don’t have enough volume for the staffing. Healthcare and nursing is hard enough. If you can take away the stress of having to work a double shift or getting everything arranged to go to work and then being reduced because we didn’t have the volumes, it really helps to decrease that stress and burnout. Our numbers would show that we have had significant improvements in turnover over the years.”

At the end of the day, the main goal in healthcare is improved patient outcomes, and the more familiarity there is in a health system and the more people who understand the process are on staff, the better the results will be and the better the care will be, says Lawonn. “Reduce the amount of outside labor that goes into the units, so you gain more consistency and spend less time on bringing people up to speed. Principally, if you have a less stressed and burned out staff, you’re just going to have a better workforce taking care of patients, and that will lead to better outcomes.”