Preparing the Next Generation of the Healthcare Workforce

The states in the Next Generation of the Healthcare Workforce project took a variety of policy approaches to address this challenge. Bringing project states together on this topic fostered discussion of best practices to address these challenges. The paper, "Preparing the Next Generation of the Healthcare Workforce: State Strategies for Recruitment and Retention," summarizes these approaches and identifies best practices from the states’ efforts over the first year of the collaborative. Several themes emerged from this work, including the importance of:

• Peer-to-peer discussion. The project states learned from one another and occasionally adopted innovations from other states. These states highlighted the importance of working collaboratively to build up the healthcare workforce across the country rather than courting workers across state borders.
• Stakeholder engagement. Many states have engaged their local communities, industry and healthcare groups, and other stakeholders to better understand community healthcare needs and healthcare workforce needs to inform their initiatives. States have fostered these partnerships by identifying a specific role for these stakeholders to play and giving them a seat at the table for true engagement.
• Healthcare workforce data. This data can be a challenge to gather and analyze, especially across agencies and from private healthcare systems, but it is essential to understand how to formulate initiatives to support these workers.
• Employer partnerships. States are partnering with employers on healthcare career pathways to develop sustainable pipelines of talent.
• Evaluation. With so many new and expanded programs to support the healthcare workforce, it will be important for states to evaluate these efforts to understand which initiatives are the most effective and provide a sufficient return on investment.
• Initiative sustainability. States are also focused on maintaining momentum to sustain these efforts.

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• Resource Publication Date: 2023
• Author(s): National Governors Association
• Posted by: Youth Connections TA 1
• Posted in: Career Pathways