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| Kennedy Healthcare Recruiting: Leading the Way |
| Health Solution Spotlights | |||
| Written by Amanda Gaines | |||
| Tuesday, 30 September 2008 | |||
 Rather than accepting standard international nurse recruiting practices, the founders of this agency developed a better way to bring new talent to the US.
 Patrick Curran, director and CEO With founder and chief Counsel Joseph Curran and his law firm, Curran & Berger, handling the immigration part of the process, Patrick Curran, director and CEO of KHR, developed the customer service end of the process, from finding and training nurses to deciding what job will offer the best fit, both culturally and from a skill-based perspective. “You have to help the nurses pass their certification tests, offer them a job in an area where they’ll succeed, and do your best to not set them up for failure,” Curran said. “We have been able to concentrate on families, find good school districts, and help with the cultural transition and housing issues. That’s been the vision of KHR since the beginning.” Vision transformed That vision has transformed into a business that touches the lives of thousands of well-trained nurses from around the globe, including Kenya, India, the Philippines, Grenada, Lebanon, and Brazil. But unlike most international nursing recruiters, rather than answering to ads on Web sites or newspapers, KHR goes directly to the nurses, visiting their countries and spending a significant amount of time interviewing recruits. Another significant point: KHR nursing recruits pay the company absolutely nothing for its services. And although there are immigration costs to family members, KHR takes care of everything else: from the training, which often takes place before the nurse comes to the US, to the testing fees, which range from $400 to $600, to the nurse’s immigration costs, which are often upward of $4,000, to the cost to fly the nurse to the US. And while other companies might provide nurses “corporate housing,” which Curran equates to a hotel room, KHR finds the best apartment for the nurses’ circumstances, including apartments capable of housing a nurse and her family, making sure public transportation is available if necessary. “They fly into Logan Airport, and someone from our staff picks them up,” Curran said. “If it’s a family of three or four, we go directly to the apartment, drop the family off, and make sure they have a temporary cell phone and Internet connection so they can tell their family they got here safely. We then take the husband shopping for food, have him fill the shopping cart with whatever the family needs, bring him home, and leave them alone for a couple of days.” If there are children involved, KHR sets up testing so they know what grade their kids tested into and where they will go to school. And despite the enormity of the other support KHR provides to its nurses, Curran said it’s the consideration given to families that has spread the word about the honesty and integrity of KHR, both to nurses and the facilities that would hire them. From the hospital/client point of view, KHR is also quite a perfect fit. Rather than charging its clients a daily fee for nurses like travel nurse agencies, which often charge up to $90 per hour for a nurse, providers pay a one-time fee that guarantees the nurse will remain with the hospital for a minimum of two years. “We get nothing else but that initial payment,” said Curran. “And if we do our job right, we can pay the law firm, do our job, and make a profit. But the nurse never pays us a nickel.” Removing the anxiety Although it’s been only five years since KHR was founded, Curran continues to look for ways to improve the services he offers to both his healthcare clients and the nursing recruits. Set in Pioneer Valley, which is surrounded by five of the country’s top colleges, Curran sat down with some students and told him the company needed to reach the world through technology. Six months later, a student came back to Curran with what he describes as a YouTube-type platform Web site (www.khrglobal.com) that provides streaming videos of nurses, with live interviews, a five- to six-page self-assessment of the nurse’s skills, and the nurse’s resume. “We have testing we developed online that’s foolproof; no matter where you are in the world, I can link you to a practice test, and, two hours later, you’ll know how prepared you are for the test, your strengths and weaknesses. We can then tweak your training to get you ready,” Curran said. “It also removes a lot of the anxiety hospitals have about recruiting international nurses. This way, the nurse is right there, speaking to you, and telling you about her work experience.” One way Curran knew he was on the right path was when people started calling him before he’d ever contacted them. Many healthcare companies have been burned by the same people who inspired Curran and his brother to start KHR. The best marketing policy, he said, is to gain the trust of both healthcare providers and nurses. After that, word of mouth will take care of the rest. “We get roughly 2,000 applications a year, and that’s from word of mouth and the Internet,” Curran said. “If you really come through for these people, they tell others. That shift happened about three years ago for us, and, although we maintain places to train the nurses, we don’t have to go out, do the talks, or advertise anymore.” |
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