Work for the modern person is not like an episode of “Severance,” the dystopian show where employees surgically separate their work lives and personal lives to achieve a perceived work-life balance.
The reality for most of us correlates better to a plate-spinning circus act. The key lies in managing multiple aspects of life simultaneously, focusing on what needs attention most urgently. No two plates are ever spinning at the same speed at the same time, but we work to keep them in motion. Sometimes, work plates need spinning; other times, personal plates must be spun.
With mindful integration of technology, leading workplaces account for this balancing act, leveraging the appropriate tools to enable employees to manage their personal and professional needs in a variety of ways.
A Non-Lumon Approach to Employee Engagement
Managers have a unique opportunity to shape the lives of their teams. Creating meaningful work experiences takes effort and focus, more so than the waffle parties and dance breaks that characterize Lumon, the imaginary corporate world of “Severance.” In fact, a Deloitte analysis suggests organizations should embrace a new standard—one that emphasizes flexibility, connection and fosters accountability. Focusing on creating space where individuals can learn, take responsibility and feel valued will help people develop self-esteem and reinforce a feeling of accomplishment.
The nurse staffing shortage—and those nurse leaders championing change—offer powerful examples on ways to meet team members’ unique needs. At a time when lack of autonomy and flexibility in work schedules have been found to be significant predictors of emotional exhaustion, contributing to burnout, tech models like these demonstrate strong potential to increase personal satisfaction, strengthening engagement.
Technology also gives nurse leaders the ability to track the resulting reduction in burnout and turnover rates after implementing more flexible tools for staffing and engagement. It’s also an essential element for cultivating connections among teams and empowering talent to create better relationships through work.
Progressive hospitals and health systems are leaning into tech-based models for staffing and engagement to build stronger relationships with nurses—including contract nurses, a rapidly growing segment of the nurse workforce.
Here are three ways these organizations successfully leverage technology to create a work culture that appeals across generations.
- Build connection. The best leaders leverage technology to help both full-time employees and contract staff plug into their culture. In healthcare, examples include community-based forums that give nurses a chance to connect with each other as well as one-to-one messaging vehicles between nurse leaders and full-time and contract staff.
For Beatriz, an Oregon mother of five who uses a staffing app to schedule shifts while going to school and managing her family’s needs, the level of communication she receives from her staffing manager through a technology platform makes the work experience that much more inviting. “He’ll text me consistently with openings for shifts, but also just to check up on me and see how I’m doing,” she said, especially during periods when she’s working quite a few shifts. “That communication is so important to me. You experience a sense of support and, really, the culture of the organization.”
Some organizations also use their staffing platform to provide and receive feedback with nurses mere minutes after a shift has been completed. This creates transparency and opportunities for learning for both parties. This is a cost-effective way to make small changes faster than a traditional bureaucracy. It also gives nurse managers a basis for reviewing performance among independent nurses. With this information in hand, these managers can more effectively determine who to contact for specific types of openings, providing a tool for improved performance and professional satisfaction.
- Increase flexibility. A recent survey indicates that what nurses really want from their relationship with their employer is more elasticity, from the ability to select their own shifts or even share shifts with another nurse according to their needs. This finding corresponds with Deloitte’s analysis, which suggests optimizing work performance comes down, in part, to acknowledging team members’ diverse needs and unique life circumstances. Today, such circumstances might involve being a caregiver for a family member or balancing school or parenting with work.
Fernando, a Utah nurse, originally decided to complement his full-time job with contract shifts to take his family on a bucket-list vacation to the Redwood Forest, using a technology platform to select available shifts. From there, he’s leaned into the tech platform for extra shifts that helped pay for the downpayment on his first house, funded initial repairs for the home, and now help him pursue his dreams of professional advancement.
“I’m going back to school to become a nurse practitioner, and this platform has actually helped me pay for my tuition,” he said. “It has helped me come up with those extra funds as needed without the stress of getting burnout from combining contract work with my regular job.”
One key to success for Providence Healthcare, a prominent West Coast health system: integrating full-time and on-demand nurses on the same tech platform. This not only allows full-time staff to select shifts that suddenly become available, but also offers a pathway for nursing leaders and human resources managers to capture data regarding fill rates, the price point at which contingency staffing makes good business sense by unit or specialty, and more.
“By bringing our contingent nursing workforce together under a tech platform, we can manage rates together with our nurse leaders. We can understand utilization,” said Mark Smith, vice president of workforce insights, optimization and staffing for Providence. “The platform also helps our leaders understand how to wisely manage our staffing investments. For instance, knowing who is willing to work overtime helps us gauge when it’s beneficial to offer overtime to fill a last-minute need or whether contingency staffing is the right choice.”
- Offer support for the employee’s holistic needs. A Truist study found that when employers invest in resources to support employee well-being, communicate the availability of these resources broadly and frequently, and involve leaders in demonstrating how these tools can be used, employees are more likely to stay with their employer. They also demonstrate higher levels of engagement in their everyday work and a deeper sense of connection to the company’s purpose and mission.
At one Oregon health and rehabilitation center, a nurse manager who was preparing for maternity leave felt stressed about how the organization would cover staffing needs in her absence, given the number of older nurses who had retired during the pandemic. Her manager pointed her to an area in the center’s tech staffing platform where she could connect with live support to discuss her concerns. Together, they established a plan for ensuring optimal coverage while she was out, allowing the nurse manager to focus on her baby and her recovery during her maternity leave.
Separately, Beatriz worked with her nurse manager to come up with a plan for block scheduling that allows her to schedule double shifts multiple days in a row to navigate her family’s needs, including regular doctors appointments for two of her children with special needs. “I haven’t worked five days a week in forever, and because of that, I’m able to spend more quality time with my kids and my partner,” she said. The ability to lean into technology to deploy this approach has heightened her professional satisfaction.
The Power of Tech-Enabled Connection
Reinforcing a commitment to employees’ holistic needs is an essential ingredient for retention and recruitment. It enables individuals to focus on spinning the right plates at the right time when it is supported through tech. By looking at the ways high-pressure industries have leveraged technology in this way, leaders can strengthen staffing and engagement and create a positive work culture that is mutually beneficial.
About Curtis Anderson
Curtis Anderson is the CEO and founder of Nursa, which exists to put a nurse at the bedside of every patient in need. Nursa’s early days were bootstrapped with personal cash. The company grew from 20,000 to 2.5MM patient hours annually in less than 36 months. Today Nursa is headquartered outside of Salt Lake City, and the entire team is passionate about making the process of care delivery more efficient for everyone. Nursa has now raised over $100 million and is trusted by a growing community of more than 1,500 facilities and 100,000 nurses nationwide.
