Using Interim Leaders to Elevate Your Healthcare Organization
In the fast-paced and rapidly evolving healthcare landscape, interim leaders can be important assets for not only filling leadership gaps but also bringing in fresh perspectives and unique skill sets to tackle specific initiatives or challenges. The demand for interim professionals has surged 23% year over year and 170% since 2022.
Determining Your Organization's Needs
While there are many potential benefits to hiring an interim leader, it's important to evaluate if this approach is the right one for your organization. Here are some of the signs interim support may make sense:
You need specialized expertise to tackle a short-term initiative. Interim leaders generally stay with an organization for six to nine months, during which they can bring specialized healthcare knowledge to bear to help address your initiative.
You've had a leadership vacancy for an extended period of time and need coverage until you can hire the right permanent candidate. In general, the more education and experience the position requires, the longer it takes to fill. This timeline pressure can make employers feel like they need to rush to permanently fill a leadership vacancy, but with an interim leader, your company can continue making progress while you take the necessary time to find the ideal candidate.
You have staffing shortages that are putting a department's daily operations in jeopardy. Through interim leadership, you can lessen the burdens on the rest of your people. Interim leaders can be great resources to pick up workloads and point out opportunities to make work more efficient, which can also help with employee engagement and retention during a leadership transition.
Interim leaders can help you overcome setbacks that may otherwise severely hinder your organization. Let's take a closer look at the skills interim leaders offer and how you can determine if a candidate has the right skill set for your needs.
Skills To Look For In Interim Leaders
1. Ability To Bring Fresh Ideas
As a new leader to your organization, a qualified interim professional can assess your operations, people and performance from an unbiased perspective. When considering an interim leader, ensure they have years of hands-on expertise across various settings and within your organization's healthcare field specifically, as this can equip them with proven methods and tactics that can be directly applied to advance your efforts to improve your organization.
2. Continuity And Flexibility
It’s no secret that leadership transitions take a toll on any organization. When a staple of your leadership team departs, whether permanently or temporarily, it can stall projects, cause disruption to other leaders’ responsibilities and create uncertainty among team members.
Your interim leader should be capable of stepping into the vacancy quickly to ensure your organization stays on track until a permanent leader is found. If you are hiring them to cover a specific initiative, they should require little lead time before taking on the assignment, and be nimble to work on your timeline.
3. Cost-Effective Leadership Solutions
Interim leadership can also offer cost-effectiveness. Inquire about your potential interim leader's past success in addressing critical issues and implementing cost-saving measures with healthcare organizations they have worked with. And because of their interim status, they typically don't not need all the costs of a full-time employee, such as benefits and other financial investments.
Conclusion
When your hospital or medical center needs a qualified leader to step in, consider whether an interim leader may be right for you. Their expertise, fresh perspectives and flexibility can make interim leaders an ideal solution for healthcare organizations in need of stable, short-term assistance in the event of a leadership gap or to oversee a unique project.