Building Authentic Relationships to Foster Early Career Physician Loyalty, with Jackson Physician Search

In this episode of the MGMA Insights Podcast, host Daniel Williams, Senior Editor at MGMA, sits down with Tony Stajduhar, President, and Neal Waters, Regional Vice President of Recruiting, Jackson Physician Search, to discuss insights from the new research report From Contract to Connection: How Authentic Relationships Foster Early Career Physician Loyalty and Retention.

The conversation explores how healthcare leaders can strengthen physician relationships beyond the recruitment phase — from pre-boarding and onboarding to long-term engagement. Tony and Neal share actionable strategies to close the gap between administrative expectations and physician realities, emphasizing culture, communication, and connection as key drivers of retention and satisfaction.

Key Takeaways

• Bridging the Expectation Gap (1:39)
  Nearly 60% of physicians leave their first job within three years, yet administrators expect six-year tenures. This misalignment reveals a critical need for better communication and expectation-setting during recruitment and onboarding.
• Spotting Red Flags Early (3:57)
  Engagement is a strong indicator of longevity. Lack of participation in staff events, community involvement, or peer engagement can signal an at-risk physician.
• Generational Shifts in Retention (09:44)
  Newer physicians approach employment differently than past generations. They expect employers to prove that a practice is worth their long-term commitment, rather than assuming loyalty from the start.
• The Power of Pre-boarding (11:09)
  Relationship-building begins before day one. Consistent communication — such as assigning mentors, sending local updates, or small welcome gestures — keeps new hires connected and prevents cold feet during long start-date gaps.
• Compensation Gets Them In, Culture Keeps Them There (18:10)
  Financial packages may attract candidates, but organizational culture — where physicians feel heard, valued, and connected — is what sustains engagement.
• Establishing Feedback Loops That Work (22:25)
  Effective feedback systems pair structured mentorship (monthly check-ins) with informal peer relationships, ensuring physicians have safe spaces to share concerns before they escalate.
• Culture as a Retention Engine (25:34)
  A thriving culture is personal, not transactional. When physicians feel known as individuals — not employee numbers — they’re more likely to stay and invest in the organization’s success.
• Action Step for Leaders (29:19)
  Administrators should “put themselves in physicians’ shoes,” understanding their personal and professional motivations to create environments where physicians feel supported and seen.

Resources mentioned:

• Full Report: From Contract to Connection: How Authentic Relationships Foster Early Career Physician Loyalty and Retention
• Jackson Physician Search resources
• More MGMA Insights podcast episodes

Episode Transcript

Daniel Williams (00:02):
Well, hi, everyone. I'm Daniel Williams,
senior editor at MGMA and hostof the MGMA Podcast Network. We
are back with another businesssolutions podcast with one of
our favorite groups that we workwith here. It's Jackson
Physician Search. We work withJackson on data reports, on

(00:24):
market research, and on liveevents like we saw in Orlando
recently.
Today, we have Tony Stajduhar,who's president of Jackson
Physician Search. We've also gotNeal Waters, regional vice
president of recruiting at JPS.Gentlemen, welcome back to the
show.

Neal Waters (00:44):
Thank you. Thanks for having us.

Tony Stajduhar (00:46):
Thanks, Daniel.

Daniel Williams (00:47):
Great having y'all here. And it's really
interesting y'all because asMGMA and JPS have been doing the
last several years, put togethersome market research, and we're
gonna look today at a report onhow organizations can move from
contract to connection. Andthat's by building those

(01:09):
authentic relationships thatfoster physician loyalty and
retention. Tony, let's startwith you and let's go big
picture. Talk about thisresearch, what stood out to you,
anything you want to share withus that really emerged.
I know I've talked to you foryears and years now, and you

(01:29):
already know the market, butthere's always wrinkles in there
or things that just reallyresonate with you from the
research. What stood out to you?

Tony Stajduhar (01:39):
It's always interesting to me when you do
these types of papers, and Ilove that we've been doing this
with you all for the last fewyears because it gives you the
opportunity to say, we look atwhat's reality for a physician.
You know, we're asking thesequestions to physicians, but
then we also have to ask it fromthe administrative standpoint
because that's the only waywe're gonna find are are we

(02:00):
really speaking the samelanguage? Are we on the same
page? And I think the thing thatreally came out of this to me
very similar to some of the pastresearch that we've done is that
physicians go into this firstjob coming out of their
programs, and they typicallystay in these jobs, and they

(02:21):
have the anticipation thatthey're probably gonna stay in
jobs probably three years orless. So almost 60% of the
physicians coming out ofprograms will be in their first
position for three years orless.
The part that is never ceases toamaze me, though, the
administrative side, theybelieve the physicians coming
out of their first practice arewith them for at least six

(02:42):
years. So you wonder, how doesthat happen? How do you have
that big of a discrepancybetween the two sides? So that's
always a really fascinatingpiece to me of these programs
that we do. But I think theother things that came out of
this were just trying to findout the reasons why physicians

(03:05):
leave And I think we'll bediving into that and some of the
questions that that you're gonnabe asking.
Neal's gonna have some greatinsight on some of this as well.
But I think it's veryinteresting to find out that you
would think that a lot of thereasons you always hear the
reason people leave practices isbecause of the financial rewards
or lack thereof, if you will.And in essence, it's really not

(03:28):
the main focus or the mainreason why people leave their
first practices. So I think someof the things we're gonna be
talking about will open some ofthe doors to this and kinda
surprise everybody a little bit.

Daniel Williams (03:38):
Yeah. Thank you so much for that, Tony. And you
and I have had a lot ofdiscussions about that, that
disconnect there. And so,hopefully, we can shed some
light on that today and justshare a little bit more with our
MGMA listeners. So thank you forbringing up that point about
that gap in expectations.
So I'm going to turn to Nealnow. Neil, from your

(04:02):
perspective, are there redflags? And if there are, what
are those red flags that giveyou an indication as a practice
leader that that physician maynot be in it with you for the
long haul?

Neal Waters (04:15):
Yeah. Great question, Daniel. Where do we
start, Right? On the the redbike. The answer is yes.
There definitely are. But thereare some that are specific to
the individual. You know, Tonymentioned the disconnect. Right?
And and we're a disconnect.
Where does that come from? Notbeing able to truly know your
employee, your physician, thatperson who's an employee of your

(04:39):
organization, being too farapart. So I think some of those
red flags can be specific tothat individual, their
personality, what their careeraspirations are. So I think it
really starts from even beforethey start, you know, even the
the pre boarding, theonboarding. I think, you know,
our our paper touches on, youknow, all these subjects, but

(05:00):
it's making them feel heard,welcomed from the very
beginning, or even as Imentioned before they start.
But, you know, some generalitiesonce they get into a position,
whether it's the first fewmonths, first year, first couple
of years, just engagement. Youknow, are they being engaged
with staff? You know, do aredoes it seem like they're making

(05:21):
an effort outside of just theirpatient contact hours? Are they
getting involved in thecommunity? Are they getting
involved in events that thehospital might be putting on in
the area?
So that's a pretty basicbarometer across the board is
just to typically look atengagement. How happy do they

(05:43):
seem? You know, are theystressed? Is, you know, are
they, you know, worried abouttheir income guarantee going
away at the end of one year ortwo years? Those can be some
some red flags and I think opensup hopefully early healthy
discussions to get ahead ofthose things and try to get them
corrected on the right coursebefore it's too late.

Daniel Williams (06:04):
Right. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. I'm
going to turn back to Tony forthis next question. And in going
through the data, it wasalarming to me that it said more
than one in four physicians atleast consider leaving within
that first year.

(06:24):
Tony, we know that early part,that onboarding and that
integration is vital, but whatis it about that? What is it
about those early months, andwhat can be done about it?

Tony Stajduhar (06:39):
Yeah. You know, and I think we've probably
talked about this on some of ourwebinars before, Daniel. Right.
But recruiting and relocatingsomebody to a new location,
especially when it's a newposition and it's their first,
you know, the first opportunitycoming out of program.
There's such a psychology torecruiting and and bringing

(07:02):
people into a into the fold, soto speak. But keep in mind,
these physicians are coming outof programs where they're in a
very protected environment, andthey're where they know they
know people. They've knownpeople for years. Their family's
kinda gotten ingrained in thecommunity. They've been there at
least three years, maybe longerif they finished med school in

(07:22):
the same place, but they'rethey're in a situation where
there's there's some feeling ofsecurity.
Now it's going off into thegreat unknown. Now in many
cases, physicians will make theeasy decision to stay either
where the physician's from orwhere their spouse is from or in
some cases where they did theresidency program. And and too

(07:42):
many times they do that becauseit's the easiest thing to do.
You know, it's the the quick andeasy thing to do. I don't have
time to really go out and findwhat's right for me.
You know, they've been in two orthree states in their entire
life, and that's pretty muchwhat they're what they know.
They don't know that NorthDakota's even a state or that
there would even be a practicethere. Right. But lo and behold,

(08:02):
they still get in these newpractices, and they're now
joining people who they haven'tknown. They're not in a
protected environment like thatanymore.
And especially when not much isdone on the onboarding or the
preboarding, if you will, aheadof time, it almost has a sense
of, like, here's the keys toyour office. Good luck. God
bless you. Hope it all goeswell. So that's on the

(08:24):
professional side.
That's daunting enough and scaryenough that now they come in,
and they're kinda left to theirown devices in many situations.
And similarly, on the familyside, if the family's going to a
new location or someplacedifferent than what they've been
accustomed to, the physiciancomes home to that scenario to
find out, hey. How are thing howare things gone for the day? How

(08:46):
are the kids? What's going onthere?
And there can be a certain levelof despair and concern and
almost like feeling overwhelmedif they don't have consistent
communication to what to Neil'spoint earlier, if they don't
have consistent communicationand feedback and and quit people
saying, hey. How's it going? Howare you doing? What can we do

(09:08):
better? What can we do to helpyou?
So I think that people who gointo that with very little
preboarding are already at adisadvantage. And then when they
get there, if they don't havethings set up for ongoing
communication, then it's apotential recipe for disaster.

Daniel Williams (09:25):
All right. Wow. Neal, I wanna turn to you for
the next question. This was yetanother statistical point that
really caught my attention. Itwas showing that recent grads
are leaving their roles evenfaster than later career
physicians.
Are there trends? What isdriving that? Because I thought

(09:49):
maybe they might want reallyestablish themselves in a place,
but no, that doesn't seem to bethe case from the data here.

Neal Waters (09:57):
Yeah. It was eye opening when we saw it, but
after we digested it a littlebit, it made more sense because
we experience it and we see it,you know, on a daily basis. But
it really comes down to a bigpart being generational. It's a
completely different generation.You know, the generation now is
much different than the babyboomer generation that in most

(10:19):
cases went into their first jobsearch and they were thinking in
their heads, I wanna pick aplace where I can see myself
starting a career and having acareer long term where where I'm
gonna prove myself and I'm gonnabuild a practice.
You know, I'm gonna give it allI've got. And not to say that
this this newer generation isn'tgoing to do that, but it's it's
been a role reversal a littlebit more so. They're in such

(10:42):
high demand that they're cominginto the first position saying,
I think this could be a goodfit. It's my best guess, and I'm
gonna give it a shot, but it'sup to you employer or group to
prove to me that this is a greatplace to work. Otherwise, I've
got a million different otheroptions.
So it gets down to again thatthe generational differences of
how they view positions,employers, or group settings,

(11:07):
and what the expectations are.

Daniel Williams (11:09):
Okay. Tony, for the next question, I want to
talk about something that Ithink you and Neil have both
brought up. It's thatpre-boarding process. I wanted
to follow-up earlier, and let'sdo that now. Let's talk about
what that pre boarding processlooks like.
What is it that sets the stageso that physician coming into

(11:32):
the practice feels wanted,needed, and everything else?

Tony Stajduhar (11:37):
Yeah. Great question. Let me give you an
example from our experience. Sohere we are, the firm that is
working with with a grouppractice, for example. They've
hired us to do this, and, youknow, there's a lot of work that
goes into it.
There's so so much so muchupfront work, anticipation,

(12:00):
planning, strategy, that sort ofthing. How do you recruit the
person? How do you find theright person? How do you get
them in for the interview? Yougo through this whole process,
and it's it's a long, arduous,drawn out process.
You know, if you're lucky, youcould be done in ninety days.
You know, in some cases, ittakes six months, a year, but
you go through this and you getthat doctor and you finally say,

(12:21):
oh gosh. We've got the one. Thisis the one. We know it's great.
There's that sense of just likean exhale to say, finally done
it.

Daniel Williams (12:28):
Right.

Tony Stajduhar (12:29):
So so you basically you've now signed the
contract. You've got it done.And in reality, there's more
work to be done, but it's like alittle bit of an exhale because
you're saying, well, thisposition is probably not
starting in some cases a year,eighteen months. You know, it's
that far ahead, especially whenthey're finishing their program.
Sometimes it's a little quicker,but usually there's that much

(12:50):
time between.
So what happens? We are on toour next client, our next
assignment, and the the clientnow who signed the contract is
is feeling like, okay. I've gota lot of other fires to put out.
I've got things to do as we alldo in our daily routines, and
you just start losing track andyou forget about the people that

(13:10):
you've just signed. You're justassuming they're ready to go.
It's done. You really don't haveto do much. You'll see them when
they get there. You know, we'llwe'll talk to you when the
moving vans are on the way. Sonow in reality, what happens is
that as Neil alluded to, there'sa huge physician shortage as
we're all well aware of, and soeverybody's looking for these

(13:32):
physicians.
So in the meantime, thesedoctors, even though they've
signed a contract, the worlddoesn't know this, so the these
doctors continue to get pepperedwith opportunities. And if
they've you know, if it's like,okay. Well, great. You know, I
just got engaged to this to thisguy. I haven't heard from him in
three months.
I think we're still engaged. I'mnot sure, but, you know, they're

(13:53):
still getting courted by otherpeople. So this is really the
reality of what what can happen.So while physicians don't
purposely go out and try to lookfor ways to break their
agreements, they're gettinghounded by these people. And if
they're not being contacted bythe people who've already signed
them, they start wondering, iseverything okay?
Am I missing something? Should Ibe communicating? And it's

(14:15):
incumbent on us as clients to beable to continue to start
immediately reaching out tothem. You know, I've heard some
interesting things of, you know,for example, clients signing up
the newsletter from thecommunity or the you know, in my
day, would have been thenewspaper, but now now the
online version, of course, goingto them, you know, setting up

(14:36):
communication, maybe a littlegift once a month from something
from the city or the area orsomething like that to continue
to let them know, we can't waitto get you here. And in addition
to that, also kind of assigninga mentor right off the bat.
Somebody that they can startrelating to and just talking to
occasionally, maybe once amonth. Maybe somebody who's

(14:57):
gonna be peer because as we'lltalk in a little bit, peers are
very important to new physiciansas well. So somebody that they
can talk to, and sometimes thatpeer doesn't always have to be
with the on the physician side.It may be somebody who resonated
with the spouse on the interviewas well who hit it off with
another spouse in the community.They have some similar

(15:17):
interests, and they justcontinue to reach out to them as
though we can't wait to get youhere.
What can I do to help you in themeantime? So this communication
is vital. If if you if you don'tdo it, you run the risk of them
thinking that, okay. Great.They're taking me for granted or
they've forgotten about me, ordo I still have a job?
I'm not sure. So doing thesethings, will it keep physicians

(15:41):
from from, from this type ofsituation for good or all the
time? Not necessarily, but it'llit should sure really lessen
your odds of that physicianeither not coming at all or
leaving early.

Daniel Williams (15:54):
Yeah. I love that analogy of it's like an
engagement, so to speak, whenyou have signed that contract
and then, yeah, you want tocontinue to get those touches
that you know I'm out here andwhere's the love? So I really
appreciate that. Neil, I'll turnto you. What it really sounds

(16:14):
like, in a lot of ways, whatwe're talking about is
relationships.
Tony hit on so many key pointsabout building those
relationships. Anything else youwant to add to that as far as a
practice, perhaps putting itinto operations, putting it into
processes so it is a reallyseamless venture there in

(16:35):
bringing those physicians onboard?

Neal Waters (16:39):
Yeah, absolutely. I mean relationships, just that
word, you know, says so many, somany things. Tony touched on the
mentor, you know, relationships.The peer to peer really came out
in this study. It's people whoyou're gonna be working next to
every single day.
And, you know, how how can we orthe employer or the group make

(16:59):
this person that we put so mucheffort into recruiting to our
group that we had touted asbeing amazing and great? How do
we make them feel as comfortableas possible that first day and
ongoing? So there's alreadygonna be so many systemic things
that they're just gonna have tolearn when they get there,
electronic medical records, youknow, all those things. But what

(17:20):
are some possibilities forintroductions, as Tony
mentioned, assigning them amentor before they start, make
introductions to staffphysicians before they start
leading up to it. Even staffthat they're gonna be working
with, NPs, PAs, medicalassistants.
I mean, nice would it be thateverybody's not a brand new face
the first day? And it's like,oh, hey, you know, it's you

(17:43):
know, I've I've kind of knownyou for six months or three
months. These are idealscenarios, some ideas, but what
can we do to start sooner thanthat first day?

Daniel Williams (17:53):
Okay. I'm gonna switch gears a little bit, but
we're we're gonna get back tothose relationships. But Tony,
we know that compensation playsa major role. It certainly
starts the conversation. Itmight get that foot in the door.
But what it showed in the studywas that long term, now we get

(18:15):
back to the relationship side.That relationship side so the
the money part, the compensationpart got them in the door, but
that may not keep them, though.So talk about that dynamic.

Tony Stajduhar (18:28):
You know, with so much information out there
today about starting salariesand RVUs and, you know, what's
what's the going everybody kindaknows their value these days.
You know, it's like the NFL. Youknow, this this quarterback
makes this much money. Everybodyin the world knows it, so now
the next quarterback's gonnamake the same amount of money or
more.

Daniel Williams (18:46):
Right.

Tony Stajduhar (18:46):
Right. Shooting for now. Physicians,
unfortunately, don't have thatfree agency, feel, so they do
have some kind of limits, but atleast they know what their
market value is. So, yeah,getting them in there at
something fair and giving themsome upside if they choose to
work at that kind of level,then, you know, that's that's
all well and good, but nowthey're there.

Daniel Williams (19:05):
Mhmm.

Tony Stajduhar (19:05):
And the things that just kinda resonate, you
know, culture and theenvironment and that sort of
thing. There's an old sayingthat people don't leave
positions. They leave bosses.

Daniel Williams (19:20):
Mhmm.

Tony Stajduhar (19:21):
So that is from the from the top down, and it's
all about culture and what youbuild there. You know, that's
one of the things we reallypride ourselves in here is to be
culture. I was proud the othernight. I I don't know if I told
you this or not, but we just gotten years in a row. We were
rated in the top 10 in TheUnited States places to work.
Wow. That's because you work atbuilding a culture of a place

(19:44):
where people wanna be, and youdo that by making things
inclusive. You do that by makingthem feel that they are heard,
that their voice matters, andyou do all these sort of things
and build a culture where peoplewanna be. And you not only do
that just based on what theyfeel with their leadership, but
that you feel within theorganization. And while I would

(20:05):
love to say that, oh, culture isall because of me.
No. Culture is because thesepeople here at JPS, they all
care about each other, they getalong well. And you build that
culture internally, and you butyou've gotta start somewhere.
You've gotta get it startedsomewhere and show the reason
why we're doing this. And if youwanna be part of this, it's

(20:25):
something really cool.
So if you can do that, peoplerarely leave really good
cultures. And, you know, I thinkif you can do that and show
people that the leadershipcares, the leadership lessons,
and that your peers feel thatway, then, you know, you've got
a much, much better chance ofretaining people than you do the
other way. And by the way, Ikeep saying we keep talking

(20:47):
about retention and retaining.I'm trying to get away from
those words because I sometimesI feel like retention almost
feels like you're shacklingsomeone. Yeah.
As opposed to just saying, workon building the relationships,
and the relationships will keeppeople who wanna be there.

Daniel Williams (21:02):
I love that. Alright. Neil, in looking at the
study, there were some biggestless likely to stay triggers.
Some of those were bureaucracy,workload imbalance, poor
leadership interaction,etcetera. So where does
administration go?
What do you start tackling? Doyou just dive in, get them all

(21:24):
at one time, one at a time? Howdo you address these triggers?

Neal Waters (21:28):
Yeah. So, you know, to get the starts, it's gotta
start early. And it's it'saccessibility, availability, and
putting the word out there thatthose things are there. You
know, so many times maybe theymight meet the CEO on the
interview. Maybe not.
You know, they don't they don'tknow or the leader of their
department or the medicaldirector, tends to be
disconnected. We've had thatword come up a few times. So,

(21:52):
knowing these things, addressingit early on, and having it be an
open door policy so that theyfeel like their voice is heard.
These things, you know, poorleadership interaction. Well,
when you're interacting, that'shard to define it that way.
But get just getting ahead of alot of these things, I think
bureaucracy kinda ties intothat. It's a lot of times
probably not bureaucracy, butthe lack of knowledge of what's

(22:14):
going on at a different levelfrom the administrative
standpoint. So, you know, opencommunication early, ongoing,
can help a lot of these thingsin the bud.

Daniel Williams (22:25):
Tony, we were talking a lot about getting that
engagement going in the preboarding process, the onboarding
process. Part of that engagementis feedback. So how does the
practice establish a feedbackloop with the physician where
there's trust involved but notoverwhelm, like, oh my god,

(22:46):
they're coming to talk to meagain. They're giving me more
feedback. So how do you makethat balance, and what does it
look like?

Tony Stajduhar (22:53):
Yeah. I think there's a few different
approaches to this. One is thatmentor and peer relationship.
Again, Mentor is kinda if youpicture that as somebody who's
been a leader or been with anorganization for a long time.
Mentor doesn't always mean theirboss necessarily.

(23:15):
It's somebody who's been there.We actually have a mentor mentee
program here at JacksonHealthcare as well, and it's
really cool to see that happenbecause people get to kinda
choose who they wanna be with inin many cases. So if you give
with the right mentor, I kindasay that's the person you wanna
set a monthly meeting with, butthat meeting is set in stone to

(23:36):
say that every second Tuesday ofthe month, we're gonna meet and
it's right here. There's nocanceling unless there's an
emergency, but this is what wedo, and we're gonna go over
what's been going on for themonth. So let's talk about the
pros and cons, things that we'veobserved, that sort of thing,
and have that kind ofcommunication with them.
The peer program is much morelike, okay. This is my buddy who

(23:58):
say, hey. Let's go grab a cup ofcup of coffee at Starbucks this
morning. So we just go out. Wesit and talk and say, man, did
you run into this when you werehere?
You know, this is what I noticedtoday. Did you notice notice
this with the nursing staff? AmI being too tough? You know,
just somebody that you can talkto and really bounce things off
of and feel it's safeenvironment where you can talk.

(24:20):
So for me, that's really thebest way.
If you can get those kind ofconnections, that's the
immediate feedback. But theother piece of immediate
feedback is, you know, what ifthere's something that comes up
that may not be able to wait forthat monthly meeting with the
mentor? What if it's adepartment head that needs to

(24:41):
talk about it? Well, if there'ssomething that's out there that
the physician has a question orvice versa, maybe we have a
question for the physician thatwe're not sure we understand,
then let's let's call a quicktime out. Let's schedule fifteen
minutes at the end of the day,and let's sit down and chat
about this and pull the Band Aidoff, so to speak, and just have
some intellectual honesty to saythat help me understand, you

(25:03):
know, what's going on and whatcan we do to make this better.
Yeah. And I think that's whatthey're looking for. Because if
you have that that certain thingthat happens in the second week
of the month and you're notscheduled to meet anybody higher
up until two more weeks, it itcan feel like it drags on
forever. It can fester. It canget worse instead of just

(25:24):
saying, Let's just address thishead on.
And I think physiciansappreciate that. They'd rather
just be straightforward, honest,and just have that kind of open
communication.

Daniel Williams (25:34):
Neil, I've got a question for you. And the word
culture has been brought up acouple of times. It can
sometimes be this nebulous termlike, Okay, we've got culture
here, we've got culture there.But how do you see it? How do
you see it defined where it issupportive of that physician,

(25:54):
where they feel supported, theyare part of an organization and
a group where there is trustfrom day one.
There's trust, there's thatengagement, all the things that
we've been talking about. Howare you envisioning culture in
that regard?

Neal Waters (26:12):
Yes. There's so many of things we talked about
today and we talked about inthis paper are the formula that
makes up culture or part of theformula that makes up culture.
So we talked aboutrelationships. You know, we we
talked about creating theserelationships, peer to peer,
mentor, staff. You know, some ofthe most successful

(26:33):
organizations from a culturalstandpoint that I've seen over
the past twenty years have beenones where people really like to
be around each other.
You know, Tony mentioned, youknow, I feel like that's how,
you know, our campus here is atJack's Health Care. It's, you
know, people are smiling notbecause they have to, but
because they like being. And,you know, people are doing
things outside of work. Youknow, their families are

(26:54):
friends. They know about eachother's kids.
So, you know, encouraging thoserelationships and it getting
breaking it down to you're notphysician number 0021 on the
payroll. You know, you'reDoctor. Smith's. You know? And,
you know, I know you've gotthree kids, and one of them
plays soccer and and so on andso forth.
So, you know, thoserelationships developing over

(27:16):
time are really, really whathelps to bring that culture
together long term.

Tony Stajduhar (27:21):
Okay. I just got Daniel, I saw that I jumped the
gun on your next question. So,so I kinda answered that on the
last one, but I let me answer adifferent question that I'll
throw out there. But the onething that I'm gonna harken back
to our previous research that wedid together, and that was on
retention. So relationshipsagain.

(27:42):
Right? Relationships and notretention. But but when you ask
administration, it was somethingdon't know if you remember this
or not, but it was somethinglike 79% of administration said,
oh, yeah. We've got a greatretention and great program set
up. Physicians love it.
And then on the flip side, thephysicians that were asked,

(28:02):
like, less than 25% said, whatretention plan? No. We don't
have a retention plan. You know?So so it's like, okay.
Another major disconnect. So thekey is how do you make this
better, and how do this this isa great way to help people
become part of that culture,part of the organization is
bravo for wanting to build aprogram and build something that

(28:24):
you can hear. But what you'vegotta do to do that, you've
gotta first start it. You'vegotta make sure you get
something set up so you getconsistent feedback from people
to see, is this actuallyworking? Is this actually
resonating?
Where are we missing missing themark? But before any of that,
you've got to get those peopleinvolved. If the key targets of

(28:46):
building a program for forhelping people want to be there
is for the physicians, it mightbe a good idea to actually ask
them what they think or how theyfeel or what would you think we
should be doing. Get them onpart of your committee for
retention so you can haverepresentation from the medical
staff side, whether that'sphysicians, APPs, nurses,

(29:08):
whatever, or all of the above.But that's a huge way to get
them feeling like they're partof something.
And you can do that right away.They don't have to be there for
two years to be part of that,but still if if only two people
out of a 100 physicians are onthat committee, so to speak, at
least the physician the rest ofthe physicians feel, well, at
least we have representationhere. And we can we're we're

(29:32):
being heard so we can get ourvoices heard through those
people.

Daniel Williams (29:35):
Yeah. I love that. Thank you for sharing
that. And I've got a finalquestion here, and y'all can
both chime in on this if youwant to. I'll start with Neil.
We've been hitting all thesedifferent points, but if you had
one piece of advice to give ourMGMA listeners who are running
medical practices, who want toimprove physician loyalty so

(29:57):
their physicians aren't lookingfor that exit sign within that
first year or two or three, whatwould it be?

Neal Waters (30:07):
Yes. I think, one simple thing is, and it applies
in many different parts of life,is put yourself in their shoes.
You'll under get to know them.Get to understand what makes
them tick. Each individualperson, what are their career
aspirations?
What are their personal goals?You know, understanding those
things about a person early on,is gonna help shape how you can

(30:28):
make them happy in the immediateterm and the long term. So
developing relationships. Talkedabout it quite a bit. Work on
that in the very beginning, andit's gonna make things so much
smoother and easier long termfor sure.

Daniel Williams (30:43):
Alright. Tony, anything you wanna share as a
final thought then?

Tony Stajduhar (30:47):
Yeah. I think just getting people early on
involved with others and helpthem get introduced to many
people and continuing to try andfoster those kinds of
relationships. Sometimes, guesswhat? Sometimes we may think,
oh, this would be a really goodrelationship, but maybe it's not

(31:07):
quite right. That doesn't meanyou say, oh, shoot.
I this guy or gal can't getalong with anybody, so I might
as well just give up. No. Youkeep trying. You know? You keep
saying, oh, we're gonna have alittle social get together.
Let's get everybody together.Let's do this and that. And just
continue to do that and makepeople feel that they're a part
of something bigger than justtheir own individual practice or

(31:28):
or or So that that's the bestadvice I could give is just make
sure to just keep trying. Don'tever give up.

Daniel Williams (31:36):
Alright. Well, Tony, Neil, thank you so much
for coming back on the MGMApodcast. Great talking to y'all.

Neal Waters (31:43):
Pleasure. Great seeing you. Thanks, Daniel.

Daniel Williams (31:45):
Alright, everybody. So the full research
report, I'm going to give youthe full title to it here, and I
want to make sure I get thisright. From Contract to
Connection, How AuthenticRelationships Foster Early
Career Physician Loyalty andretention. Although Tony's
telling me we may change thatword retention there. We may do

(32:06):
a late edit here.
But this research, y'all, hasbeen co published by Jackson
Physician Search and MGMA. We'reboth organizations very proud of
this research. There's somegreat stuff in there. What I'm
going to do is provide a directlink so y'all can access this.
You can read it.
And we'll also provide that linkin our episode show notes. So

(32:32):
until then, thank you all forbeing MGMA podcast listeners.