When it comes time to begin the search for your first physician job out of residency or fellowship training, it’s normal to feel a bit at sea. Gathering information on potential healthcare employers—many of which are large, complex organizations—can be a challenge.
There are ways, though, to learn enough about the role so that you can feel confident you’re making the right decision for your future—and for the career you’ve worked so hard to train.
Here, experts offer key pathways to getting the inside scoop on any healthcare employer before you sign on the dotted line.
Cast a wide net
Even if you do not yet know exactly where you want to work, identify the kinds of places you want to wind up and make an early go of establishing connections there, said Greg Chang, general manager and vice president of CareerMD, a platform that helps connect resident and fellow physicians with job opportunities.
The kind of insider information you’ll get will be invaluable.
“Network at the type of organizations you want to land in, many years in advance of actually doing your job search, and being proactive about it” can yield big dividends, he said, adding that he recommends “tapping into your residency or fellowship program and alumni association and trying to get connected, also attending association conferences and finding mentors who can relate to you and want to help you. Because these people have been in your shoes before.”
Chang, a former hospital administrator, also said career fairs and job boards can be another jumping-off point.
Physician job seekers also should explore the JAMA Career Center®, which presents physician career opportunities, news and information relevant to the full spectrum of medical practice. Search for physician jobs by specialty and location or browse all of the physician jobs by specialty.
Can you leverage AI in your job search?
In short, the answer is “absolutely,” with the caveat to always keep its limitations in mind.
Now that augmented intelligence (AI)—often called artificial intelligence—has become a part of most physicians’ daily lives, physicians searching for their first job after training may find it only natural to access those tools. When used carefully, the technology can be enormously helpful.
“Now, we’re not talking life or death in a job search, but certainly this is a really critical decision,” Chang said. “The more critical the decision, the more high stakes the use case, the more you want what's called a human-in-the-loop in the process. You don’t want to just let AI loose and do its thing.”
He added that “at the end of the day, generative AI, which is the most common type of AI, is not deterministic—it's probabilistic. So, it predicts what's the most likely thing that should happen next. And anytime you're working with a probability, there's a chance that prediction can be wrong. Candidates should be highly engaged and use AI as a way to increase efficiency and be able to drive more output in their search.”
But, he warned, job-seeking doctors “should not think of it as a way to remove themselves from any steps of the process.”
One way of using AI might be a prompt like: “Find me 10 different employers that are Level 1 trauma and have a certain service line in a two-hour drive from my hometown so I can be close to relatives,” Chang offered, while adding that “a job search is a very human thing. It's by definition a people-centric process. My recommendation is for people to lean into that and embrace that.”
Dig into the finances
Once you are employed at a healthcare organization, the relationships it has with payers can affect your financial bottom line.
“Anytime you have any sort of employment or partnership directly related to your day-to-day work, you should always make sure you fully understand what you're getting yourself into,” said Christopher Botts, director of value-based care for the AMA. He recommended that physicians investigate any accountable care organization (ACO) that is a part of the setting where they will work.
Publicly funded initiatives such as the Medicare Shared Savings Program have publicly available data online for physicians to review. The performance of ACOs that take part in that program will be tracked and published.
Commercial ACOs are a bit tougher to investigate. Physicians, however, can do some internet sleuthing that may help. For example, healthcare organizations sometimes have in-house publications intended to highlight programs or people within the organization.
“There's no guarantee that the entity is going to show up in any of those places,” Botts said. “But, as always, doing a wide swath of in-depth investigation is worth the time, especially if it will have a significant effect on your daily workload and overall compensation.”
Botts also suggested examining the AMA’s guide to ACOs (PDF), which has detailed information on how to perform due diligence and evaluate contractual agreements, or the AMA’s ACO model checklist (PDF).
And if you’re searching for your first physician job after residency, get your cheat sheet from the AMA now.
Go to your future co-workers
To find out the true situation at a potential employer, ask to speak with physicians and other members of the care team at the practice, said Brandi Ring, MD, the chair of obstetrics and gynecology at a 115-bed hospital in Keene, New Hampshire. From the people you would be working with, you can gain insight into the day-to-day realities of job.
“Someone who is in that practice who can answer those questions is extraordinarily valuable,” she said. That firsthand reality check will tell you, for example, whether “an eight-hour day really is as rosy as the eight-hour day that they're picturing. Or is it really a 12-hour day and you never get a chance to stop and breathe?”
Learn more on evaluating practice environments to match your priorities with the AMA STEPS Forward® toolkit, “What to Look for in Your First or Next Practice.” It is enduring material and designated by the AMA for a maximum of 0.5 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™. Read up on AMA accreditation.
