When my colleagues and I formed HWL, there were a lot of spirited discussions around what constitutes a great VMS/MSP program. And yes, there were lots of different perspectives and opinions regarding the existing models in the marketplace, and about the functionality gaps that existed in available VMS systems. However, there was one area where there was universal agreement. Treat agencies with respect, listen, and be hyper-focused on what is important to them. This may sound simple and obvious but having been in this business for over 20 years I constantly hear from agencies that are frustrated with this or that MSP provider or VMS system because they feel like concerns aren’t heard and they are treated as second class citizens. Having spent the first part of my career on the agency side, I personally experienced this and remember that feeling. Not great.
Become a Preferred Agency Today!
So, we set out with a goal to get it right. When we dug deeper into it, we identified five areas that if well executed, would earn us the respect and admiration of agencies of all stripes and in turn a highly engaged and productive agency community to share with our clients. I'll share those with you now.
1. Helping Agencies Open New Doors
We have developed a preferred agency program that encourages clients to use agencies that are high performers. Because our VMS technology platform provides scorecards on vendor performance we can aggregate that data and be proactive in bringing high-performing agencies to the forefront in all of our accounts. It’s not just enough to make a suggestion, we advocate for our preferred agencies in a vendor-neutral way letting the stats speak for themselves. Join the HWL team and let your performance shine.
2. Guaranteed Protection of Staff Information
Unfortunately, candidate poaching is a real thing. And it’s the dirty underbelly of many of the largest MSP providers in the industry. As a result, many agencies are hesitant to share information on their best staff or may choose not to participate at all. This hurts clients and dilutes the value of the MSP/VMS. We respect the hard work and effort that our agencies put into recruiting quality talent and therefore we commit contractually to protecting agency information and do not share proprietary data with other staffing agencies.
Because we are vendor-neutral, not an agency, and don’t provide staff, our programs offer a safe place for agencies to share candidate information with no fear of poaching. Furthermore, we pride ourselves on delivering the highest quality candidates in the market so making sure agencies submit the best of their best is important to us and our clients.
3. Give agencies access to the client
When it comes to agency engagement, HWL understands that consistent communication and acknowledgment of hard-working efforts go a long way. Working hard on a job order and then watching a candidate submittal go into a black hole of darkness and silence is extremely frustrating. That is why we support open communication between the agency and our client and recognize the importance of feedback.
We believe that keeping channels of communication open is good for clients and agencies. Therefore, we provide our agencies with a variety of direct communication options depending on the client’s preferred communication protocols and the purpose of the communications.
Regardless of the level of communication, a client wants to have with an agency, at HWL we understand the importance of open communication and feedback. By making this a cornerstone of our programs we see great matches between clients and agency staff. The better the communication the better the fit and ultimately the better the patient care.
4. Provide valuable data
We believe that market bench-marking can help agencies improve their performance which benefits clients and the agencies themselves. That’s why we provide benchmarking tools to agencies so that they can measure their relative performance against the competition including market share, fill rate, time-to-fill, conversion rates, compliance performance, and more.
5. Provide market competitive bill rates
We have access to a variety of market-based demand and hiring statistics, which we incorporate into our sourcing process to provide transparency and benchmarking of market rates. As a result, both clients and agencies benefit as agencies are able to negotiate market competitive bill rates with clients that enable them to source high-quality candidates, and clients benefit by having a large pool of vendors engaged to find candidates to fill their job orders without having to overpay.
