Emerging needs in healthcare and the changing role of IT staffing companies

In the era of cut-throat competition and technological disruption, businesses reluctant to adopt change will soon struggle for their survival. That’s why the healthcare industry is also striving hard to beat the growing market competition, and brands which successfully navigate the changing landscape of market conditions are leaders in their respective fields. Always, these are the people who make things perfect – technology just facilitates and catalyses their work. As IT plays a pivotal role in the healthcare sector, from diagnostics to surgery, well-trained IT staff and technicians are the indispensable need of every modern hospital and medical institution. Hence, the industry expects a good inflow of talent from the IT staffing industry.

Facilitating the digital transformation

Inspired by the digital success of Amazons, Ubers, and Airbnb, the healthcare sector is also looking at IT as a ladder of assured success. To reap the benefits of digital transformation, modern hospitals are incorporating IoT-driven services in almost every department – from electronic health forms to medical billing and coding, medical transcription, back-office medical support, and healthcare application development. Some hospitals recruit IT professionals for these services, and many outsource them to cut the cost. But in both the cases, the need for IT professionals is rather imperative.

Apart from paramedical services, these IT professionals facilitate internal communication and also assist doctors, surgeons, and clinicians with their expertise.

Fixing the problem

The global healthcare industry is running out of qualified and competitive staff, especially the IT workforce. In totality, there was a shortage of 7.2 million healthcare professionals in 2013, and it is expected that by 2035, this figure will reach 12.9 million. Now, providing the right talent to the sector is the foremost responsibility of the IT staffing companies in India and abroad. Moreover, staffing in the healthcare sector today is not restricted to recruitment and selection of doctors, nurses, and administrative staff – the rapid rise in digital technology and its innumerable implications in the medical field has drastically changed the hiring needs in the sector.

Grooming the change

Today, every successful organisation in the healthcare sector thrives on an ‘attitude of gratitude’, which means serving the actual needs of customers and motivating them for wishful participation and engagement in the organisation’s marketing activities that ensure better and improved solutions. Only those organisations which are smart in connecting themselves with their target audience through the Internet, social media, and mobile messaging apps are successful in beating the competition. Therefore, in addition to domain knowledge, employees must also have great IT skills to match their KRAs.

Technology is not independent and it will never be – it performs as per human direction. With the advent of smart medical devices, self-service registration kiosks, combined EHR/practice management systems, and voice/face recognition equipment, many manual tasks have been overtaken by technology and their smart implementation requires qualified and dedicated IT talent. Programmes like predictive modelling are very useful here to determine staff scheduling needs and identify patient-flow logistic bottlenecks so that hospitals can reassign employees accordingly.

Scripting the success

Technology has not only improved the efficiency of healthcare staff but it has also bridged the gap between hospitals and patients. With the digital niche, even smaller healthcare companies can reach out to their target audience at a fraction of the cost. The recent shift to digital is also good news for future healthcare entrepreneurs. Be it a hospital or new pharmaceutical company or a crazy new med device, today, with the induction of IT in medical technology, reaching out to end users or talent becomes much easier for hospitals. Hence, it must be the focus of the entire staffing industry to equip the healthcare sector with the best IT talent at the optimum cost.

Abhishek Agarwal is SVP (Global Delivery) for The Judge Group.

(Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of YourStory.)