Benefits That Make Your Search Sizzle
If you are an SHM member, the “Job Agent” functionality allows you to receive weekly updates of new jobs added that match your search criteria. (Note: You can join SHM online through the Career Center or by visiting www.joinshm.org) This function is located in your account. It allows you to specify the date you would like to stop receiving notification e-mails. Your account also tracks applications submitted.
After you log in, click “Job Applications” to display any jobs you have applied for and the date that the application was submitted. When a job posting expires (according to a pre-established date set by the employer) a strikethrough line will appear through the job application. Applications remain in your account for 90 days from the submission date. Clicking on the “Apply for this Job” icon opens a new screen, and it allows applicants to edit applications even after you’ve sent it and until the job posting closes. Once the job posting is closed, no application changes can be made.
Employers post their vacancies for 30 days at a time, and they can select packages that include print advertisements in The Hospitalist and/or the Journal of Hospital Medicine. Approximately 85% of employers who advertise in print media also advertise on the Career Center, although a few advertise only on the Career Center. To cover your bases, look in all three places.
Just as some applicants prefer anonymity, some companies choose to list their ads confidentially. In these cases, you will submit your online application, and the employer will contact you via the system with more information if you are a good match.
Employer responses will be forwarded to your e-mail account through the Career Center. Once you begin talking with a prospective employer, it is up to you to use good research and interview skills to ensure that this is indeed a good match. When you find a position, you can remove your resume from circulation. Or, you can store it in the Career Center database for future opportunities by clicking “No, do not post my resume.”
Alternatively, you can remove your information from the database permanently: Go to “My Account” and select “Delete Account.”
What the Future Holds
SHM’s information services team will keep tabs on the recently launched SHM Career Center Web site and invites user feedback—specifically any demographic information that will help them build the most practical, useful career site for hospitalists.
With the average age of a hospitalist about 37, SHM expects that visitors and users to comprise a youthful, computer savvy group. Eventually, SHM wants to expand the site so it tells you more than just what jobs are available (e.g., how to create a resume, interview techniques, and how to build desirable hospital medicine skill sets). They will also track how many employer-employee matches are made using the Career Center.
Conclusion
When unemployment is low, as it most certainly is for hospitalists, leverage rests with job seekers, not employers. While employers are looking for talent and availability, career opportunists crave convenience. The SHM Career Center represents the most comprehensive collection of hospitalist opportunities available on the Internet.
Users will find site navigation easy, and prompts and cues offered by the site designers clear and accurate. Traffic on the site is expected to grow quickly as it becomes what SHM hopes is the most indispensable tool for hospitalists conducting job searches.TH
Jeannette Yeznach Wick, RPh, MBA, FASCP, is a freelance medical writer based in Arlington, Va.
SHM: BEHIND THE SCENES
Membership: Listen, Then Act
By Todd Von Deak
As I write this column, there are only seven days left before the start of this year’s annual meeting. At last check, more 1,100 hospital medicine professionals were registered to join us in Washington, D.C., for the most important meeting in hospital medicine. Our office is abuzz with activity and last minute preparations. I’m sure there’s something else that I’m supposed to be doing right now, but I need the break.
While I take my break and write, I can’t help but think, “what’s next,” once the Annual Meeting is over? SHM is fast approaching the start of a new fiscal year, and, like any membership director, I am eager to hit the ground running.
The more I reflect on what’s next, the more I realize that part of my answer lies within the pages of The Hospitalist. Our research continues to show that you consider The Hospitalist to be one of the most valuable benefits of membership.
What strikes me as I read through past issues is that we have another story to tell. So this month we’re launching “SHM: Behind the Scenes.”
There are many reasons why we need to share this story. Key to those reasons is the fact that our sole purpose is to serve the hospital medicine community. You entrust us with your dues and meeting registrations to provide resources that will enable you to better serve your patients and grow your careers in the process. So it’s important that we, the staff, tell you firsthand what we are doing with your investment, and how we plan on continuing to earn your trust in the years to come.
Each month a different member of our senior staff will take turns writing this column. During the coming year you’ll hear from the heads of education and quality initiatives, business operations, membership, information services, marketing, legislative affairs, and research. In each column you’ll find a mix of current news, future plans, and tips for maximizing the value of your membership. If we do our jobs correctly, each month you will have a clearer picture on the true return of your membership investment.
We want you to clearly understand why—if you only belong to one organization—it has to be SHM.
This month I’ll focus on membership and our plans for the coming year. (See below.) Next month you’ll hear from Scott Johnson, SHM’s director of information services. Scott is our chief technologist in many ways and is leading the charge to use today’s latest technology to expand the reach of our educational products and enhance your membership investment as well.
Each year, membership departments at non-profit organizations write their strategic plans for the coming year. SHM is no exception.
For most, these strategic plans are based on a set of assumptions. In more offices than you’d like to believe, the staff just sits around and makes their best guesses in order to answer critical questions, including “what do members want to get out of their membership?”
Based on these guesses, the staff then plots their course expansion and enhances the benefits and services that the organization offers. These organizations are doomed to mediocrity.
Successful organizations, including SHM, actively seek to better understand their membership and use a variety of media to get to the heart of the questions that matter. I am proud to say that SHM is among the second group.
Building on previous efforts, the SHM Membership Department has been actively engaged in a “listening tour.” Our goal is to not rely on assumptions but rather to use your feedback in formulating our plans for the coming year.
Here’s some of what we’ve identified.
Top reasons for being a member:
- Education and quality improvement resources;
- The ability to affect the hospital medicine movement; and
- Subscriptions to The Hospitalist and Journal of Hospital Medicine.
Your main goals as a member:
- To learn from educational and quality improvement resources;
- Take advantage of networking opportunities; and
- Gain exposure for career advancement.
The benefits of membership that matter most:
We’re already using this data, along with other information that we’ve gathered, to enhance the SHM experience and increase the return on your investment. Just look at the new SHM Career Center (www.hospitalmedicine.org/careercenter).
Like any good membership department, we realize that our data collection has just begun. So I’d like to pose a couple of questions:
- Do you agree with our findings?
- Should we offer a new benefit of membership?
- What can we do to enhance your SHM experience?
I’d love to hear your thoughts. Send them to me via e-mail at [email protected]. Anyone who e-mails will be entered in a prize drawing.
In my next column, I will share a selection of the responses I receive and tell you the concrete steps we’re taking to improve communication with you and other members.
Von Deak is SHM’s director of membership and marketing.