How to Land the Perfect Locum Job
For those of you that haven’t brushed up on your Latin in a while, “Locum Tenens” roughly translates to “take the place of” and refers to a medical job career that comes with flexibility, freedom, travel, and temporary work assignments. It’s the sort of stuff medical professionals that are tired with their boring old practice can only dream of. If you happen to be one of them, then consider yourself lucky to have stumbled across to this blog.
Here, we highlight a few helpful ways to land the perfect locum job.
Contact a Locum Tenens Recruitment Agency
This one is as straightforward as it gets. Contacting a quality healthcare recruitment agency helps you get in the touch with the employer, and not just any employer, but the one that matches your requirements. Sifting through a myriad of healthcare institutions can be time-consuming.
Hiring the services of recruitment agencies is a far better option since they usually have a database consisting of thousands of healthcare organizations looking to recruit qualified medical professionals.
Know what you want
This one’s a bit tricky but necessary if you want to avoid working a locum job only to switch to another one after working just for a couple of weeks. You need to really know what you want from a locum job. This requires spending some time thinking about which city, state or clinical setting you want to practice in. Do you want breaks in between or are you willing to work for a month straight? What pay do you expect?
The final and most important question you have to ask yourself is why you’re searching for locums. Is it the massive student loan you wish to repay quickly or are you just interested in some extra money? Are you in it for the travel and adventure? These may appear to be unimportant questions to some but it really helps your recruiter identify your interests and increases your chance of landing a great job on your first attempt.
Stay in Contact With the Recruiter
It isn’t as simple as sending your C.V and waiting for opportunities to appear. At the very least, you should stay in contact with your recruiter who works alongside managers and speaks with hundreds of healthcare providers to land you the right job.
Be sure to let your recruiter know how many hours you plan on working and what schedule you expect from the employer. This way, you’ll decrease the time it takes to land a job and secure a jump start on the competition.
Update Your C.V
A lot of resumes and C.Vs that end up on the employers or recruiters desk are poorly crafted and result in immediate disqualification. Such C.Vs generally contains a lot of unnecessary personal information and outdated details regarding certifications and work history. As much as you’d like to mention your hobbies and how good you were at baseball in high school, that’s not why the employer wants to hire you.
A concise and well-crafted C.V puts a good first impression and shortens the review time, both of which are appreciated by potential employers. Simple features such as less clutter, consistent font size, and minimalism are what help your C.V stand out from the rest.
Be Quick to Respond
The early bird gets the worm – and you’re no different. Recruiters are in touch with multiple candidates at any given time and the ones that respond quickly and display eagerness get the most attention. High engagement levels are positive traits that recruiters look out for and improve your chances of landing a job.
Remember, Terms and Pay Rates are Negotiable
New applicants tend to shy away from negotiating with their employers. Most terms within the contract offered are negotiable. If you feel that you’re being paid less than the job description, you can always negotiate for higher pay. It always helps to stay up to date with the average industry pay and use that as a bargaining tool.
Never be Rude
Not that we’re implying that it’s alright to be rude elsewhere, but displaying even the slightest aggression during interviews can be more troublesome than you’d imagine. The locum tenens industry is small and most recruiters know each other. It’s highly probable that your name can be asked by a potential recruiter to conduct additional background research. So if you really want to work in locum, be kind, easy to work with, and responsive.
And there you have it! By following these steps you stand a good chance of landing the perfect locum job. Medical Associates Consulting is a medical recruitment agency in New Jersey. It helps fresh medical graduates, as well as experienced professionals, find a job that understands their unique needs. Contact us today for more information.
