Client Spotlight - Guthrie

This week HospitalRecruiting.com is pleased to introduce our new semi-regular blog feature, Client Spotlight. In our Client Spotlight posts, we’ll conduct interviews with some of our clients and ask them what makes their healthcare organizations stand out as great places to work and how they find their greatest successes in physician and healthcare recruiting.

For our first Client Spotlight article, we focus on Guthrie, a health care delivery system in north central Pennsylvania and south central New York. Founded as a medical practice by Dr. Donald Guthrie in 1910, it now consists of 4 hospitals, The Guthrie Medical Group, and The Guthrie Foundation for Education and Research. Its core values are patient centeredness, teamwork, and excellence.

We spoke to Sean Belles, who manages social media initiatives to recruit and retain physicians for Guthrie. Sean shares his experience with the recruitment process and gives insight into the non-material benefits of working for Guthrie.

Question:  When Guthrie achieves physician recruiting success, what do you think are the main contributing factors?

Answer:  We find many physicians appreciate the advanced healthcare we can provide in a lowered stress, rural environment. Our organization is led by practicing physicians, and they can relate to the challenges faced by potential candidates in the continually changing healthcare environment.

Question:  Can you describe, from your own perspective, what factors contribute most to a smooth recruitment process?

Answer:  We find that an open and honest approach is mutually beneficial for all parties involved. We like to assure a cultural fit that will meet expectations, while not over promising. It works out best and keeps turnover to a minimum.

Question:  How does Guthrie handle communication with providers who have expressed interest in your positions? Do your recruiters take advantage of alternate communication methods such as video conferencing, text messaging, and social media such as LinkedIn? Which methods do you feel are most effective?

Answer:  Ever since I arrived at Guthrie, a little over 6 years ago, my initiatives have all been focused on the mobile movement. You have to make communication with potential candidates as easy and accessible as possible. We offer many options on our portal, www.ichoseguthrie.org, to call, send an email, link with us on all applicable social media, and text. With the text option, the recruiter is notified on his or her phone instantly that a potential candidate has submitted contact information and is available at that time. That level of attention is greatly appreciated by physicians, whether they want to submit a CV, or if they just want more information about our organization. We also offer a video library designed to share specialty specific details in follow-up emails about the area, our recruitment philosophy, etc.

Question:  Is there a certain type or profile of physician who is most likely to find long term satisfaction in both Guthrie's jobs and communities?

Answer:  We find that physicians who are more experienced and know what they're looking for find satisfaction within Guthrie. Our low-cost of living, low crime rates, great schools and beautiful natural surroundings offer a work-life balance most can only dream of.

Question:  Could you expand on the team concept, http://www.ichoseguthrie.org/?q=explore-guthrie/choose-guthrie/overview/we-are-guthrie, that Guthrie promotes on its website, how that affects your recruiting department, and how it affects the physician practices?

Answer:  Teamwork is an essential part of our pillars, Patient-centeredness, Teamwork and Excellence. We believe that that concept, which Dr. Donald Guthrie brought from the Mayo Clinic over 100 years ago, is the best approach for better patient outcomes. Having the benefit of a collegial, practicing physician-led, multi-specialty integrated healthcare system has proven to be a model that many other organizations are now trying to emulate.

Question:  What are some of the biggest selling points to physicians about your geographic area?

Answer:  We offer advanced healthcare in a rural setting. Our cost of living is low, our crime rates are low, and our schools and universities, including Cornell, are outstanding. We are centrally located in northern Pennsylvania and the southern tier of New York state, which allows for short distances to larger cities like New York, Boston, Philadelphia, etc. We are right in the middle of the Finger Lakes region, which offers award-winning wineries, spectacular winter skiing, NASCAR's fan favorite track in Watkins Glen, and large corporations such as Lockheed Martin and Corning Inc.

Question:  Could you share some information about the origins of Guthrie and how it has evolved over time?

Answer:  Guthrie Medical Group is a multispecialty group practice that was founded in 1910 by Dr. Donald Guthrie. Within a year of his arrival, Dr. Guthrie expanded services at Guthrie Robert Packer Hospital as he recruited physician specialists to join Guthrie, which he intended to model after the Mayo Clinic, where he had just completed his residency.

Academics are a distinguishing characteristic of the Guthrie organization, which dates back to 1901 when the School of Nursing was founded. The Donald Guthrie Research Foundation started in 1942, and with funds from the Emily Guthrie Estate, the Guthrie Research Institute was formed in 1980. Guthrie's commitment to learning and education includes the Internal Medicine Residency program in 1958, General Surgery Residency program in 1959, and the Family Practice Residency program in 1993.

Guthrie has grown in size and capability in the last century and now serves as a major regional referral center where more than 1,600 physicians send their patients. In 1977, Guthrie opened its first regional office in Troy, PA. Today Guthrie has 25 regional offices located throughout the region to provide primary care, outreach specialty care, and testing to its patients close to where they live.

In addition to its longstanding relationship with Robert Packer Hospital, Guthrie acquired Troy Community Hospital in 1985, Corning Hospital in 1999, and Towanda Memorial Hospital in 2015.

Today, one of the longest established group practices in the country, Guthrie has more than 280 primary and specialty care physicians and 173 advance practice practitioners that provide comprehensive care for 200,000 patients in 25 regional offices and three hospitals in the Twin Tiers region of northern Pennsylvania and southern New York. Guthrie’s commitment to its core values of patient centeredness, teamwork and excellence—the defining values upon which Guthrie Clinic was founded—remains robust and unchanging.

Question: What do you personally enjoy most about working for Guthrie?

Answer:  I enjoy being able to reach out and share Guthrie's unique message to physicians all across the world. I embrace the challenge of overcoming the national physician shortage and strive to differentiate Guthrie in order to bring in the very best physicians who will be the ones taking care of my family and friends.