How to Choose a Healthcare Staffing Agency: 8 Key Factors 
Choosing the right healthcare staffing agency can affect how quickly your organization fills critical roles, manages credentialing requirements, and responds to changing workforce needs.
But finding the best healthcare staffing agency for your organization isn’t simply about choosing the one with the largest candidate database.
The right healthcare staffing partner should understand your hiring challenges, healthcare requirements, and the staffing model that best fits your needs.
Before choosing a staffing partner, here are eight important things to look for:
- Does the agency understand healthcare?
- How are candidates screened and credentialed?
- How quickly can it respond to staffing needs?
- Which staffing models does it offer?
- How well does it communicate?
- Is pricing transparent?
- Can it support your specific roles and specialties?
- Can it scale across your locations and hiring volume?
How to Choose a Healthcare Staffing Agency: Quick Checklist
Before choosing a healthcare staffing partner, evaluate these eight areas:
- Healthcare staffing experience
- Credentialing and compliance processes
- Candidate screening and quality
- Time-to-fill and staffing responsiveness
- Available staffing models
- Communication and account support
- Transparent pricing and contract terms
- Ability to support your roles, locations, and hiring volume
If an agency cannot clearly explain how it handles these areas, dig deeper before entering into a staffing agreement.
Why Choosing the Right Healthcare Staffing Partner Matters
Healthcare workforce planning has become increasingly complex.
The American Hospital Association’s 2026 Health Care Workforce Scan identifies persistent staffing shortages and rising patient demand as pressures pushing hospitals and health systems to rethink staffing models, workflows, workforce development, and cost management.
At the same time, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects approximately 1.9 million openings across healthcare occupations each year, on average, from 2024 to 2034, resulting from employment growth and workers leaving occupations.
It is about finding the right people, for the right roles, through the right staffing model, within the required timeline.
It is about finding the right people, for the right roles, through the right staffing model, within the required timeline.
First, Identify the Healthcare Staffing Problem You Need to Solve
Before comparing agencies, define the actual workforce gap.
A hospital dealing with an unexpected nursing absence has a very different need from a health system recruiting for a difficult-to-fill permanent position.
Which Healthcare Staffing Model Is Right for Your Organization?
Your staffing need | Staffing model to consider |
Unexpected shifts or short-term coverage gaps | Per diem staffing |
Coverage for a defined temporary period | Contract staffing |
Temporary physician or advanced-practice coverage | Locum tenens |
Evaluate a candidate before permanent employment | Contract-to-hire |
Fill a long-term position | Direct hire |
Temporary management or leadership requirement | Interim staffing |
Not every healthcare staffing agency offers every model.
A strong staffing conversation should therefore begin with questions about your roles, location, timing, schedule, required qualifications, and long-term hiring objectives before a solution is recommended.
Looking for a healthcare staffing partner that understands your specific hiring needs? RAPS works with healthcare organizations to provide flexible staffing support based on their roles, workforce requirements, and hiring timelines. Contact our team to discuss your staffing needs.
Top 8 Things to Look for in a Healthcare Staffing Agency
If you’re wondering how to choose a healthcare staffing agency, these eight factors can help you compare potential partners more effectively.
- Does the Agency Understand Healthcare Staffing?
Healthcare recruiting is different from general staffing.
Clinical and healthcare positions may involve professional licenses, certifications, specialty experience, competency requirements, facility-specific documentation, and other requirements that vary by profession and organization.
Ask potential staffing partners:
- Which healthcare roles do you regularly recruit for?
- Which specialties do you understand?
- What types of healthcare facilities do you support?
- Do you work with temporary, contract, per diem, or permanent positions?
- How do you handle hard-to-fill healthcare roles?
An agency doesn’t necessarily need to recruit for every healthcare profession.
What matters is whether it understands your hiring requirement.
- How Does the Agency Handle Credentialing and Compliance?
For clinical staffing, candidate availability is only part of the equation.
You also need confidence in how required credentials and qualifications are reviewed.
Ask the agency to explain its process for areas relevant to your positions, such as:
- Professional license verification
- Required certifications
- Employment history
- Background screening
- Competency documentation
- Exclusion screening
- Facility-specific requirements
- Expiration and renewal tracking
The HHS Office of Inspector General maintains the List of Excluded Individuals/Entities (LEIE) and advises healthcare entities to routinely check it because hiring an excluded individual or entity can create civil monetary penalty exposure.
What About Joint Commission Certification?
The Joint Commission offers a Health Care Staffing Services Certification for eligible organizations providing temporary clinical staffing.
Its current healthcare staffing measures include areas such as personnel-file completeness, job-appropriate credentials, competency, background checks, and performance measures for per diem and travel staffing.
Certification can therefore be one useful evaluation point when it applies.
However, it should not be treated as the only criterion for choosing an agency. Eligibility for this certification to certain types of temporary clinical staffing organizations.
- How Does the Agency Evaluate Candidate Quality?
A resume tells you what a candidate says they have done.
A staffing process should help determine whether their background actually aligns with your position.
Ask how candidates are evaluated before reaching your hiring team.
Depending on the role, this could include:
- Experience review
- Recruiter screening
- Specialty experience
- Credential verification
- Competency assessment
- Work-history review
- Availability
- Schedule expectations
- Location requirements
- Assignment expectations
The Joint Commission notes that competency assessment may draw on factors including previous employers, peer recommendations, specialty certifications, testing, performance information, and skills of observation.
- How Quickly Can the Agency Respond to Your Staffing Needs?
Speed matters in healthcare staffing—but speed without candidate quality creates another problem.
Rather than asking only:
“How fast can you fill this?”
Ask:
- What is your typical time-to-submit for this type of role?
- What is your time-to-fill for comparable positions?
- How does specialty affect the timeline?
- What could slow the search?
- How quickly will you tell us if the requirement is unrealistic?
- What information do you need from us to begin recruiting effectively?
Look at more than one metric
When comparing healthcare staffing agencies, ask about both speed and the quality of the staffing process. If available, evaluate:
Time-to-submit – How quickly relevant candidates are presented.
Time-to-fill – How long it takes to complete the hire or placement.
Fill rate – How frequently does the agency successfully fill requested positions.
Retention or assignment completion – Whether candidates remain in the roles or assignments for which they were hired.
Don’t compare numbers without context.
A per diem nursing request in a large labor market and a highly specialized physician search should not be expected to follow the same timeline.
- Does the Agency Offer the Staffing Flexibility You Need?
Healthcare workforce demand can change.
Seasonality, patient census, employee leave, expansion, difficult-to-fill vacancies, and new programs can all change staffing requirements.
It’s useful to understand whether an agency can support multiple hiring models.
For example:
Per Diem Staffing
Useful when organizations need flexible shift-based coverage.
Contract Staffing
Useful when additional talent is required for a defined period.
Locum Tenens
Designed around temporary physician and advanced-practice coverage.
Contract-to-Hire
Allows an organization and candidate to work together before a potential permanent hire.
Direct Hire
Focused on recruiting candidates directly into permanent positions.
The best option depends on the problem being solved.
A staffing partner should help clarify those trade-offs rather than pushing the same model for every requirement.
- How Does the Agency CommunicatewithClients?
Communication becomes particularly important when hiring timelines are tight.
Before signing an agreement, understand:
- Who will manage your account?
- Who do you contact for an urgent requirement?
- How frequently will you receive updates?
- What happens when candidates aren’t available?
- How are interview delays handled?
- How quickly are problems escalated?
- Will the agency tell you when compensation or requirements are limiting the candidate pool?
A useful staffing partner shouldn’t disappear between sending a job order and submitting a resume.
Good communication also means being willing to provide difficult market feedback when necessary.
For example, if compensation is well below competing opportunities or an interview process is taking too long, the staffing partner should be able to raise the issue rather than continuously submitting candidates without addressing the underlying problem.
- Is the Pricing Transparent?
The cheapest staffing agency isn’t automatically the best option.
But neither should pricing be difficult to understand.
Healthcare staffing costs vary depending on factors such as:
- Role
- Specialty
- Geography
- Market demand
- Assignment type
- Candidate availability
- Contract requirements
- Benefits and payroll structure
- Credentialing requirements
Rather than focusing only on one headline rate, ask:
What is included in the bill rate?
Also clarify:
- Additional administrative fees
- Overtime treatment
- Travel-related expenses, when applicable
- Contract-to-hire conversion fees
- Cancellation provisions
- Payment terms
- Renewal terms
- Any other separately billed costs
The objective should be to understand the total staffing arrangement, not simply compare one percentage or hourly number.
- Can the Agency ScalewithYour Healthcare Organization?
A staffing partner that performs well for one position may not necessarily be able to manage 20 positions across different facilities and specialties.
Ask about:
- Geographic coverage
- Specialty coverage
- Candidate-pool depth
- Ability to manage multiple requisitions
- Urgent staffing capacity
- Support for multiple facilities
- Centralized account management
- Reporting and communication
If your organization expects its staffing needs to grow, evaluate the agency based on where you’ll need support next—not only on the position you need to fill today.
Check Relevant Experience and Client References
Before choosing a healthcare staffing agency, ask whether it can provide relevant examples, references, or experience supporting organizations with similar staffing needs.
Look for experience related to:
- Your facility type
- Your healthcare roles
- Your geographic coverage
- Your staffing model
- Your hiring volume
A staffing agency may be successful in one healthcare niche but have limited experience with your specific workforce challenge.
Choosing the Right Healthcare Staffing Agency
The right healthcare staffing partner should understand the specific workforce challenges you’re trying to solve—whether you need temporary coverage, help filling difficult-to-recruit roles, long-term hiring support, or staffing assistance across multiple locations.
Looking for healthcare staffing solutions? RAPS works with healthcare organizations to help address a wide range of workforce and hiring needs. Contact our team to discuss your staffing requirements and find the right solution for your organization.
What Questions Should You Ask a Healthcare Staffing Agency?
Before choosing a healthcare staffing provider, consider asking these questions:
- Which healthcare specialties and roles do you recruit for?
This establishes whether the agency actually works in your hiring area.
- How do you verify candidate credentials?
Ask for the actual process, including who checks what and when.
- How do you assess candidate competency and experience?
Understand what happens between receiving a resume and submitting the candidate.
- What is your typical time-to-fill for roles like ours?
Ask for comparable specialties and locations rather than one company-wide number.
- Which staffing models do you provide?
Clarify per diem, contract, contract-to-hire, direct hire, locum tenens, and other relevant options.
- What is included in your pricing?
Get the structure in writing.
- Who will manage our account?
Know who is responsible before you have an urgent need.
- How do you handle difficult-to-fill positions?
A good answer should involve more than simply “we have a large database.”
- Can you support multiple facilities or locations?
Important for growing healthcare organizations and health systems.
- Can you provide relevant references or examples?
Look for experience that resembles your facility, specialty, or hiring challenge.
