Ohio’s Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center prides itself on being among the nation’s best pediatric hospitals and a leader in boosting overall retention rates among a highly diverse group of frontline workers. A factor in its success is that it has embraced and excelled at key practices such as job coaching and counseling. In fact, the organization is a distinguished pioneer in this area, forming a development team over 10 years ago to learn the reasons for high turnover rates. The findings? Most of the workers were late or absent from their jobs because of child care and transportation issues. So, Cincinnati Children’s rolled up its sleeves and went to work to remove barriers, improve worker support and training, and offer job coaching. Not only have terminations decreased by 80%, but the organization has saved as much as $4 million dollars, some of which can be redirected toward creating more frontline worker and community programs.
Cincinnati Children’s also works hard to help local teens with high school dropout recovery programs, funding life skills training and job readiness prep, as well as post-secondary certifications – all of which ultimately go toward filling future pipelines. Since its start, 68 at-risk young adults have been hired and the program boasts a retention rate of 84%. Along these same lines, the organization has dedicated dollars to ensure that workers from the area’s (and nation’s) highest poverty zip code are given healthcare jobs skills training and opportunities.
