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As an MSP/VMS partner, we operate at a unique intersection — supporting healthcare organizations under workforce pressure while collaborating closely with agencies delivering care across nursing, rehab, and support services.
From this vantage point, one thing is clear:
The healthcare labor market hasn’t recovered. It has revealed.
Nationally, overall contingent labor usage has declined from pandemic highs. Yet that shift has not translated into universal relief. Instead, it has exposed where workforce models are resilient — and where they must evolve, particularly across specialty nursing, rehab disciplines, and front‑line support roles.
A More Selective, More Constrained Market
Today’s staffing challenges are no longer evenly distributed.
Certain roles remain persistently difficult to staff nationwide — ICU, Emergency, Labor & Delivery, Perioperative services, and Rehabilitation clinicians (PT, OT, SLP). This isn’t driven by sudden demand spikes, but by the time, experience, and specialization required to sustain these roles.
At the same time, Certified Nurse Aides (CNAs) remain one of the most vulnerable workforce segments nationally — essential to patient flow and outcomes, yet increasingly difficult to retain.
This is not a reflection of effort by agencies or providers.
It is the reality of a stratified labor market, where clinical complexity, scope of practice, and sustainability require a different level of recruitment to better support the partnership.
What We’re Asking of Our Partners — Collectively
For agencies supporting MSP programs:
- This market rewards role-specific focus, clarity, and consistency
- Speed AND Quality matters — but so does alignment around what truly drives fillability
- One-size approaches are giving way to purposeful collaboration
For healthcare organizations:
- Workforce sustainability cannot be solved through urgency alone
- Expectations, flexibility, and long-term planning must move together
- The solution is not more volume — it is better orchestration
This Is a Moment to Pivot — Together
As an MSP/VMS, our role is not just to manage process, but to surface signals, align stakeholders, suppliers and to help the ecosystem adapt. Together, we need to rethink our approach, realign on a strong strategy, and have shared accountability. This does not eliminate scarcity. It allows us to respond to it intelligently and with purposeful partners.