As the number of employees on company payrolls continues to decline, the healthcare field is seeing a different trend. Although 216,000 jobs disappeared from the overall economy in August, the industry added 28,000 positions. There are 544,000 more healthcare jobs now than there were at the December 2007 start of the recession.
While healthcare job prospects will attract many people planning their careers, the industry’s business opportunities inspire entrepreneurs. Their firms help supply healthcare’s growing demand for workers.
Growing Staffing Market
“The healthcare market is one of the few verticals that continue to grow in this economic environment,” says Harold F. Mills, CEO of Orlando, Florida-based staffing company, ZeroChaos (No. 6 on the B.E. Industrial/Service list with $664 million in revenues). “This growth is driven not only by federal stimulus money and efforts to digitize healthcare delivery but also inherently by the significant shift in demographics. As such, ZeroChaos is actively taking a leadership role in delivering innovative solutions to this marketplace, that in many cases is transforming how our clients do business.”
Staffing companies that are much smaller are also involved in the industry. With revenues of $1.5 million, the Home Instead Senior Care franchise in Oak Park, Illinois, provides non-medical services to elderly women and men living in their homes, assisted living facilities, or nursing homes. Husband-and-wife owners Tia and Richard Harrison purchased the franchise in 2002 and now have. Eighty employees completing personal care attendant tasks such as meal preparation, medication reminders, errands, incidental transportation, and light housekeeping.
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) ranks personal and home care aides as the country’s No. 2 fastest-growing job category. Home health aides rank No. 3. By 2016, demand for these caregivers is expected to jump more than 50%.
Large staffing companies that field healthcare professionals face unique challenges. “On the clinical side of the business, there are special requirements for staffing these resources, not only in how you source the talent, but also in managing the talent,” says ZeroChaos CEO Mills. “These requirements include special insurances and very specific [practices], including credentialing and document management.”