Recruiting medical staff officers

Dear medical staff leader:

In today's complex health care environment, it is increasingly difficult to find physicians willing to take on the responsibilities of medical staff leadership. However, it is important, now more than ever, to recruit, educate, train, and retain excellent medical staff leaders.

Historically, the selection and election of medical staff leaders was less than ideal. The potential leader was required only to be alive, on active staff, and not present when the election took place. Further, many organizations allowed medical staff members to nominate fellow physicians for leadership position who had no desire, experience, or the time to do the job. These practices left a lot of room for improvement.

Many medical staffs across the country have now defined leadership selection criteria that often include the following prerequisites:

• A certain number of years on the active medical staff in good standing (no sanctions, suspensions, behavior, or quality issues)
• A certain number of years of experience in a medical staff leadership position or equivalent
• Training in medical staff leadership or demonstrated willingness to attend training five days per year
• Agreement to the time commitment necessary to perform medical staff duties
• Agreement to not accept a  medical staff or board leadership position at any other hospital during his or her term
• Recognition of  the responsibilities and demonstrated ability to communicate well with the medical staff, administration, and board

Many staffs have established a committee that nominates and screens all candidates to make sure they meet the pre-determined threshold criteria. Anyone may nominate a candidate but he or she must do so at least 14 days in advance of the election to allow the committee to screen the nominee. Adopting these new practices eliminates last-minute nominations and ensures only physicians with the knowledge, skill, desire, or time to fulfill the responsibilities of medical staff leadership are appointed to the position.

Developing current, up-to-date processes for the selection of medical staff officers has never been more important!

All the best,

Joseph Cooper, MD
The Greeley Company