While hiring and retention remain major concerns for many healthcare leaders, the balance of in-person, hybrid and remote roles has emerged as a bit of calm in an otherwise stormy HR situation.
Six in 10 (60%) medical group leaders say they will hold the overall share of remote and hybrid jobs steady throughout 2024, according to a July 23, 2024, MGMA Stat poll. Only about one in five (22%) expect to increase their organizations’ share of remote or hybrid jobs, while slightly fewer (18%) report plans to decrease their hybrid and remote roles. The poll had 334 applicable responses.
This reinforces the results of MGMA polling from June 2023 that began to signal that the industry was settling into a comfortable mix of in-person and work-from-elsewhere jobs, in which more than half (52%) of medical groups had about 1% to 25% of their workforce remote at least 50% of the time, while more than one in three (36%) reported no majority-remote workers.
Hybrid/remote for casting a wider net and growing
Among medical groups and health systems still shifting jobs to hybrid and remote settings, it’s often a byproduct of growth. “We’re increasing roles as we centralize our operations and cross-functional teams,” one respondent told MGMA, noting that workers naturally will serve multiple locations, none of which they need to regularly visit.
Embracing remote and hybrid roles is also a means to cast a wider net for talent, addressing the competitive labor market and national shortages for certain roles that are extremely difficult to fill locally.
The lack of a major shift also reinforces the notion that most medical groups largely stuck with the shift to hybrid and remote roles that began during the COVID-19 pandemic. MGMA polling from early 2022 found that about six in 10 (59%) of medical practices transitioned workers to permanent remote or hybrid settings in 2021. This shift especially affected positions such as:
- Revenue cycle management, including coding, billing, insurance verification and authorizations
- Surgery/patient schedulers and call center representatives
- Recruiters
- Accounting/payroll and quality reporting/data entry specialists.
Why are hybrid and remote jobs being cut?
What isn’t so easy is making the case in organizations where clinical leaders have been hesitant to change. “The doctors greatly dislike people working from home,” one practice leader told MGMA, “but administratively we think it’s working fine. There’s just a stigma.”
In some cases, medical groups and health systems are forced to re-evaluate whether a role should remain hybrid or remote because an experienced worker with an off-site role has resigned or retired. When a new hire for that role requires onboarding and training to succeed in that role, many practice leaders will opt to have that role work primarily in the practice to start, if not permanently.
Some respondents to the latest poll who expect to decrease the overall share of remote and hybrid jobs also noted the shift was due to:
- Their organizations struggling to monitor productivity for off-site roles
- Needing more workers on site to help cover other departments if other workers call out unexpectedly
- Having an easier path to building team culture/mentality with in-person staff
- Receiving a directive from leadership to put things “back to normal,” regardless of performance.
What do other data say about the state of hybrid/remote work in healthcare?
A 2024 Robert Half survey suggests about 6% of all healthcare jobs are hybrid and another 5% are fully remote; however, this includes several clinical roles that require in-person work. Nonclinical roles in medical practices that are easiest to transition to remote or hybrid settings are often “administrative” or “customer support.” The Robert Half survey finds about 12% of these are hybrid and 8% fully remote.
A narrower examination — from a 2022 McKinsey American Opportunity Survey — suggested that:
- Healthcare support roles had about 31% full-time remote availability and another 14% had part-time remote availability, or hybrid.
- Healthcare practitioners and technical roles had only 27% full-time remote availability and another 16% part-time/hybrid.
Learn more at MGMA Focus | Staffing Conference
Uncover staffing and retention solutions and best practices in healthcare management at MGMA’s newest conference, MGMA Focus | Staffing Conference, slated for Aug. 15-16 in Burlington, Mass. Attendees will hear from Shannon Cameron, MBA, MHIM, CPC, executive director, Harvard Medical Faculty Physicians, on how they achieve ROI from optimizing performance in remote workspaces.
Do you have a remote/hybrid work success story to share? Email us at connection@mgma.com.
Join MGMA Stat
Our ability at MGMA to provide great resources, education and advocacy depends on a strong feedback loop with healthcare leaders. To be part of this effort, sign up for MGMA Stat and make your voice heard in our weekly polls. Sign up by texting “STAT” to 33550 or visit mgma.com/stat. Polls will be sent to your phone via text message.
Resources for practice leaders
- “Strategies to enhance the remote employee experience” (Article)
- “Modernizing hiring and retention strategies with remote employees” (Podcast)
- “Assessing place and time: Hybrid and remote work models provide growth potential for practices and flexibility for staff” (Article)
- “Recreating the Wheel: Modernized Hiring and Retention Strategies with Remote Employees” (on demand)
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