If your veterinary practice has had a veterinarian position open for months or even years without finding the right person, you are not alone. One of the most common questions we hear from veterinary employers is, “Why is it taking us so long to hire a veterinarian?”
The short answer is that hiring a veterinarian today is not simply a matter of posting a job and waiting for qualified candidates to apply.
The veterinary employment market has changed. Veterinarians—especially experienced veterinarians—have choices, and many of the best candidates are not actively looking at job advertisements. They are gainfully employed and may be reasonably satisfied where they are now. Reaching these individuals requires a proactive recruiting strategy.
At the same time, candidates are evaluating opportunities differently than they did in the past. Compensation is important, but it is only one part of the decision. Veterinarians are also looking closely at schedule, workload, flexibility, support staff, practice culture, mentorship, leadership, benefits, professional development, and quality of life.
Geographic location can make the search even more challenging. A veterinary practice in a market with a limited veterinarian population—or one that requires a candidate to relocate—has a much smaller potential candidate pool. Employers sometimes underestimate how challenging it can be to convince someone not only to change jobs, but also to move their family and their life to another community.
Another factor is the hiring process itself. In a competitive market, speed matters. A veterinarian who is willing to consider a new opportunity may be talking with multiple employers at the same time. If it takes a practice a week to respond to a resume, several weeks to arrange interviews or too long to make an offer, the candidate may already be pursuing another opportunity.
There is a difference between recruiting and advertising a job.
Posting the job opening on a job board is advertising. Recruiting, which is different from advertising, means identifying veterinarians who fit the opportunity, approaching them directly, determining what might motivate them to consider a change and then selling the opportunity to them. In a candidate-driven market, that distinction is extremely important.
If your veterinarian position has been open longer than expected, take a fresh look at the opportunity from the candidate’s perspective.
Ask yourself:
- Is our compensation competitive for our market and the veterinarian we are trying to attract?
- Is the schedule attractive?
- Are we offering the flexibility veterinarians increasingly expect?
- Do we have adequate technician and support-staff leverage?
- What makes our practice meaningfully different from other practices that are hiring?
- Are we communicating our culture and leadership effectively?
- Are we willing to consider candidates who would need to relocate? Are we willing to pay for the relocation expenses?
- Are we moving quickly when we find someone we like?
- Are we actively recruiting veterinarians, or are we primarily waiting for applicants?
Perhaps the most important question is this: Why would a veterinarian who already has a job leave that position to come work for us?
Every veterinary employer should be able to answer that question clearly. The veterinary practices having the greatest success recruiting veterinarians are not necessarily the ones offering the largest signing bonus. They are the practices that understand what veterinarians value, communicate their opportunity effectively, remove unnecessary obstacles from the hiring process and actively pursue the talent they want.
The days of posting a veterinarian opening and expecting a large pool of qualified applicants may be gone for many practices. Successful hiring now requires recruiting—not simply hiring.
And when a veterinarian search takes longer than expected, the answer is not always to continue waiting. Sometimes the better question is: What do we need to change about our recruiting strategy—or our opportunity—to make the right veterinarian want to say yes?