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Ensuring safety in your lab starts with the people you employ. Hiring effectively, and fairly, will go a long way in patient care.
Non-discriminatory recruiting doesn't apply only to "EEOC" or "Affirmative Action," or only to race and gender, as many seem to believe. (A set of policies governs hiring practices that pertain solely to race, gender and ethnic groups: the Uniform Employee Selection Guidelines, defined and maintained by the Department of Labor.) Fair hiring practices are about finding (or attracting) and hiring the best candidates for the job, from any and every walk of life.
Understanding Competencies
A company must work to embrace a diversity initiative that helps teams and employees thrive on new perspectives and creative approaches to problem solving. The vision must exist to help employees understand diversity as a welcome change that positively affects productivity by building teams with a wide breadth of experiences and perspectives, and making every employee feel as though his or her contribution is important.
Employing proper and fair techniques means that a human resources (HR) department and hiring managers need to have a comprehensive understanding of his or her position and of the characteristics of a candidate who will be successful in a position. With an in-depth understanding of the competencies to look for in a candidate, a company positions itself to be able to evaluate a candidate based on how well his or her competencies match up against the job, rather than how well he or she stacks up against another employee. How often have you interviewed several candidates for a position, and afterward, began to compare the candidates to each other, rather than comparing each candidate to the competencies necessary for the job? Did you know what competencies were needed for the position?
The problem with comparing candidates to one another is akin to comparing essays without knowing the topic. One essay may be written in pretty ink, with beautiful penmanship, and may even sound complex and detailed, but that is all irrelevant if the writer did not know the topic, or if the grader does not know the topic. And trust me, with the woes of health care right now, we don't need to find ourselves facing a multi-million dollar lawsuit because we chose a "pretty" essay.
Hiring Managers
How do we address this issue? Hiring managers must be well-trained and empowered. As someone in a position to hire, you most likely know what you need to see in a candidate to make a hiring decision. Has the company ever asked you for your input to help develop a formal selection system? It should. Laboratorians are responsible for the treatment plans of patients by default of the outcomes of the tests you complete; patient histories and tests are completed by members of the clinical laboratory practice.
To ensure the most accurate outcomes in your office, and to help ensure the safety and health of the patients you serve, the staffing of your department should not be left to anyone's biases, or the idea of just "getting a warm body in there." You want skilled employees whose competencies have been linked to success on the job (perhaps measured by the organization as accurate and timely results). Managers should be trained to understand the entire selection process, to understand the competencies identified as necessary for the job, and how to assess a candidate for those competencies-whether it is with criterion-validated tests and assessments, or through more effective behavioral and structured interviewing techniques.
Professional Recruiters
If the appropriately trained hiring manager is not available to interview a candidate, then the substitute should be a well-trained replacement, lest he or she interview solely for personality, and opt to hire someone if they like the way he or she looks, or learn that he or she shares a similar interest.
Poor hiring practices can lead to discriminatory practices. This could result in lost jobs, investigations (Isn't JCAHO enough?) and costly lawsuits.
The best way to avoid these unethical and costly mistakes is to have a structured staffing process. This is usually the product of the human resources department or manager. The process, whether it is centralized, decentralized or a hybrid of the two, could involve a professional recruiter at every phase. This is something to consider.
The recruiter could be well-trained (with a competency and education level equivalent to that of other human resources staff) and have working knowledge of the Uniform Guidelines and the company's diversity initiative, knowledge of appropriate assessments and an understanding of job-based competencies.
With a practice like this in place, you're not only guarding yourself against discrimination claims or allegations, but you're also creating a clinical laboratory that will gain a reputation for high-quality results-and employees.
Matthew T. Patton is editor of ADVANCE for Medical Laboratory Professionals.
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