Primary Care Insights: Benefits of permanent work over locum work

Prior to joining Menlo Park in 2020 one of our Nursing and Allied Health consultants; Alice Edwards worked for a Locum Recruitment company for three years.

Since joining Menlo Park and now focusing on recruiting into permanent positions it has been a real eye opener for Alice, so she wanted to express the benefits she has found in dealing with Permanent posts as opposed to Locum posts.

“The work that I carry out on a daily basis has the goal of appointing the perfect candidate for the surgery I am working with, or vice versa, the perfect role for a candidate that I am working with. In short the aim is to find the perfect long-term match.

“I have found that in permanent recruitment I am able to take the time to gain crucial and intricate details about surgeries and candidates’ requirements so that I am able to conduct my search for jobs and candidates to effectively matching them as a pair, rather than filling a short-term gap.”

Benefits

The benefits of being a permanent member of staff within primary care is that you will have job security and stability. You won’t have to jump from one location to another week after week. This will help you to reduces stress because you don’t have to worry about your placement coming to an end at any moment; which is what can happen when working as a Locu. This is exactly what most of the UK’s Locums discovered when COVID-19 hit last March.

Having permanent employment also means that you have set contracted hours. And you may even have the chance of flexibility (perhaps a job share) so that you know exactly where you are working each week. Enabling you to have a better work-life balance.

In addition to a permanent salary, you can have additional benefits which include CPD time, study leave (where the practice will accommodate for courses that you may wish to attend), paid sick and maternity leave, paid annual leave and an NHS pension.

Support

As a permanent clinician you will become part of the practice family. Where the clinicians and team all support each other and build long lasting relationships with staff. Many practices encourage regular meetings for coffee throughout the day and the clinical team might have lunch together to build a bond which only helps in delivering the best care possible to their patients.

Above all as a permanent clinician you also get to build relationship with regular patients. Rather than working in many different sites, and rarely seeing the same patient twice. This is good for the patient but also good for you. Knowing the patient’s history and giving you a head-start in your consultation.

Who can help?

Menlo Park specialise in permanent recruitment within primary care. You can be kept informed regarding permanent vacancies we are handling for GPs, Nurses and Allied Health professions.Please get in touch on 0113 350 1308.

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