Do a Site Visit Right
Make the most of this chance to visit a new community by knowing ahead of time
what you want to learn about the practice, the key players in the medical
community, and what the area has to offer. It can be a fun few days, but
remember, it’s still an interview.
You’re doing well on your job search. You’ve narrowed your focus and have gotten past preliminary interviews to the point
where it’s clear that there is a likely match between what you are seeking in a new job
and what a hospital or practice has to offer. It’s time to go take a look.
A site visit, which may be as short as one day or as long as three, is your
opportunity to size up both the practice and the community. On a typical site
visit, you might fly in on a Thursday, have meetings, tours, and interviews on
Friday, enjoy dinner with key physicians or administrators that evening, and
then tour the community with a real estate agent on Saturday. You may choose to
stay through Sunday in order to further explore the community.
Jolene Yates is a physician recruiting consultant with Banner Health in Greeley,
Colorado. She says that a site visit is critical for any physician considering
a job offer. “Through phone conversations they can get the essence of the job, but
they really need to experience it firsthand,” says Yates.
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Before you leave home
Afshin Malaki, MD, was completing his OB/GYN residency in Brooklyn, New York, when he and his wife, Lis Annette, began thinking about where to settle down
with their two young children. They read articles about career options and
researched cities as potential job opportunities came their way. “We made a checklist of criteria,” says Malaki. “We wanted to live somewhere not too small, but not a metropolitan area either.” Malaki and his family ultimately chose Ames, Iowa, where he now practices at
the McFarland Clinic, a 166- physician multi-specialty, multi-site group. Ames,
a university town, has a population of about 55,000 and Des Moines is less than
an hour away.
As soon as you know you’re going on a site visit, request information about the area and the practice
opportunity. Visit the Chamber of Commerce website, read the local newspaper
online, and use the internet to dig deep. Resist the temptation to limit
research to only what you hope you’ll find. Play “private eye” to uncover both positives and negatives about the community. Ask your residency
program director and colleagues if they know of other doctors who have settled
in the community you are considering and don’t be shy about calling those individuals. They can share their experiences and
clue you in about what to be on the lookout for.
Request a copy of your interview agenda in advance. Who you meet with will
depend on many factors including the size of the group or hospital, the
structure of the organization, and the length of your visit. Be prepared to
meet many new people over a short period of time. It’s not uncommon for a hospital to host an informal breakfast or lunch buffet and
invite the entire medical staff. “We want to be sure candidates meet everyone who they might be affected by in the
practice and give our providers a chance to meet the candidate,” says Amy Chang, the primary care physician recruiter at Pacific Medical Centers
in Seattle. Expect to have one-on-one or small group meetings with other
physicians, administrators, and even board members.
If you are making your own travel arrangements, schedule flight layovers to
accommodate delays. Confirm your reservations and flight status the day before
you travel. Don’t take a red-eye; you’ll want to be rested for your interview. Schedule a buffer day on each end of
your trip if at all possible, and be sure to carry on your interview clothes
and other essentials in case your bags are delayed.
When in doubt, inquire in advance about how to dress for your interview. Chang
says physicians should simply ask about appropriate attire. “If you’re in a rural area, a three-piece suit might scare people. But in Seattle, a
polo shirt and Dockers won’t fly,” says
Chang.
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Four Questions
Roger Bonds is the president of the American Academy of Medical Management and
has worked with hundreds of doctors as they’ve made life-changing career decisions. Bonds says there are four key questions
that physicians must have answers to when considering a new opportunity.
1. Do you need me? Be certain before you accept a
2. Can I treat my patients how I see fit? Talk to enough physicians to find out if you share a common patient care
philosophy. Bond encourages physicians to find out if the group or hospital has
the latest technology and whether the medical staff in general has an interest
in keeping up with advances in clinical care.
3. Can I live here? Research the community as carefully as possible, but be patient about big
decisions. “I beg physicians to rent at first,” says Bonds.
“Don’t buy a big house and go into debt.” By the time it’s clear that your new job is working out you’ll have had time to explore the area and know with greater certainty where to invest in a home.
4. Can I trust you? “Look at everything critically, be the devil’s advocate,” says Bonds. He says young physicians are often —intentionally or unintentionally — misled about the realities of a practice opportunity. Can I trust you to run
this practice? Can I trust what you are telling me about income potential? Can
I trust that this practice is financially viable? Can I trust you to take your
share of call? These, says Bonds, are the kinds of issues you should been
comfortable with before saying yes to a new job.
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If you want to look around the community with the help of a real estate
professional, find out if your recruiter is arranging that appointment and, if
not, ask them to recommend someone. Decide in advance whether your want to look
at houses on the market or just become familiar with neighborhoods. Be sure to
quiz the real estate agent about the community while you are driving around. “They know everything,” says Justin Tidwell, the managing director of physician recruiting at Martin,
Fletcher, a Dallas-based search firm. “They’ll tell you the truth and connect you with people in the community...schools,
religious facilities...if they don’t have the information you want, they can usually find it.”
If you have children (or plan to), find out as much as possible about the local
schools and arrange to meet with the principals of the ones that are likely
options. Educational opportunities were important to the Malakis on two levels.
First, they wanted to make sure their children, ages 5 and 7, would have access
to good schools. They visited both public and private schools and recently
enrolled their children in a private Christian school. Before moving to the
United States for Malaki to do his residency, Lis Annette was an anesthesiology
resident in Denmark. Now that the couple’s children are in school, she plans to resume her career. “This was a criteria...that we would be in a place where she could finish her
residency without a long commute,” Malaki says.
Decide in advance if your spouse or partner is going to explore career
opportunities during the site visit. If that’s the case, ask your recruiter for ideas. While he or she probably won’t be able to arrange interviews, you can probably get local information and
leads that will be useful and time-saving.
Who pays?
It’s standard for the hospital or practice you are interviewing with to pay for
travel expenses including airfare for you and your spouse or significant other,
airport parking, rental car, hotel, and most meals. If you have any doubt about
what you are responsible for versus what will be taken care of, simply ask your
recruiter which receipts to turn in. “We pay reasonable expenses and most candidates are very considerate and
sensitive,” says Deborah Akins, the manager of medical staff recruitment at Pacific Medical
Centers in Seattle. Only occasionally, she says, does a physician turn in
excessive expenses, and when they do, it doesn’t make a good impression.
Akins encourages physicians to socialize with friends they know locally during
the site visit, but says they should not take advantage of the fact that their
expenses are being covered. “If you go out for dinner with another couple, don’t turn in the ticket for all four,” she says. Also, don’t nickel and dime the facility by turning in receipts for the bottle of water
you bought at the airport or the bag of chips you ate out of the hotel vending
machine.
