How healthcare recruiting firms find clients

Private buyers and government buyers

Most of your messages will go to private organizations: for-profit and non-profit hospital systems, independent physician groups, outpatient and surgery centers, post-acute care and skilled nursing operators, and clinical laboratories. They have a recruiting budget and a person who can approve a fee. Government-run facilities such as VA hospitals, county hospitals and state systems follow procurement and hiring rules that vary by agency and by state. We do not detail them here, and you should not assume your usual terms apply: call the HR or physician-services office and ask how the facility works with outside firms before sending a proposal.

Inside a large system, the person who feels the vacancy is not the person who signs. A chief nursing officer, a service-line director or a nurse manager lives with the empty shift; the contract with a search firm is usually negotiated by talent acquisition, physician recruitment or a regional vice president. Write first to the person who feels it, and expect to be pointed upward.

Where the shortage actually is

The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects 6 percent growth for registered nurses between 2025 and 2035, with about 180,800 openings a year and a median wage of $97,550 in May 2025 (BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook). NSI's 2026 National Health Care Retention and RN Staffing Report puts the national hospital RN vacancy rate at 8.6 percent and the time to recruit an experienced RN at 78 days, with RN turnover at 17.6 percent (NSI Nursing Solutions). The same report estimates that replacing a bedside RN costs a hospital an average of $60,090, which is the number a nursing leader has in mind when you mention your fee.

For physicians, the Association of American Medical Colleges projects a shortage of up to 86,000 doctors by 2036 (AAMC). Physicians, advanced practice providers and clinical leadership are where a firm adds the most. Staff nurses are usually filled by travel agencies and the hospital's own pipeline, and in our view they rarely justify a retained search.

Who answers, and who does not

Across all sectors, among more than 2,000 decision-makers Odyn contacted from June to September 2026, operational managers and business owners, at equal numbers contacted, produced about four times as many interested replies as in-house recruiters, who more often decline on principle (finding the hiring decision-maker). Those are mostly French contacts and mostly non-healthcare, so keep the direction rather than the ratio. In a health system, it suggests that a service-line director or a practice administrator tells you more than a recruiting department that already has a process. Operational managers often answer "that's not my area", which does not close the door: it frequently names the right person.

Competition from locums, travel agencies and in-house teams

Your competition depends on the role. For physicians, it is locum tenens agencies, which fill a gap for a few weeks or months, and internal physician recruiters who run their own pipeline. For nurses, travel nursing agencies and per-diem pools. A permanent search is a different need from a temporary fill, and your first message should say so clearly: you recruit a clinician who will stay, not a stand-in.

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Every day, Odyn spots the companies hiring in your specialty, writes to decision-makers from your own email and LinkedIn account, follows up, and hands the conversation back to you the moment they reply.

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A first message to a hospital executive

Hi Dr. Patel, I saw that your hospital has been recruiting a hospitalist medical director since August. I recruit hospital medicine physicians and clinical leaders in the Southeast, and most of the people I speak with are not looking at job boards. If the role is still open, I can introduce one or two physicians who have led a program of your size. Do you have ten minutes on Thursday?

No promise of timing, no fee, no candidate name. Details are handled on the call. For cold email to US employers, the FTC's CAN-SPAM guide applies to B2B email: honest subject line, your physical address and an opt-out you respect. The general rules for this kind of email are in writing the business development email.

When to reach out

Some healthcare roles are more tied to the calendar than others. Physicians finishing residency or fellowship typically start in the summer, so their employers often commit many months earlier, which makes late autumn and winter a sensible window for those searches. For nurses and other clinicians, openings run all year, and the posting itself is the best trigger: write within a few days of its publication.

Using Odyn for a healthcare desk

A share of healthcare job ads are posted by staffing agencies, which compete with you; Odyn drops postings from other recruiting firms and agencies by default. It starts from the job posting of a hospital, a physician group or a post-acute operator, finds the person named on the posting or the director, and writes the message around the role in the ad, from your own email and LinkedIn account. Make separate targets for physician searches, for clinical leadership and for allied health, with private employers first. For a candidate you want to introduce without naming, Push CV (in beta) sends an anonymized profile. You review every message for the first 3 business days, then Odyn sends on its own after the delay you chose. Odyn's data comes mostly from French job postings, so check coverage for your region before relying on it. The details are on the AI prospecting agent page and the pricing page. For the bigger picture, start with how to get clients for a recruitment agency.

Frequently asked questions