Parallel placements

We often hear from locums who’d love to be placed somewhere near their friend or life partner.

The perks of having a working holiday together are obvious - seeing the country side while earning a good income and so on. In situations where we’re able to organise a group placement it’s incredibly rewarding for us a team, and the feedback we get from candidates who have placements like this is universally positive.

However, there are several important trade-offs that are worth mentioning when it comes to parallel placements. This article aims to explore all of the major opportunity costs to be aware of when considering group placements, as well as provide some tips for how to maximise your chances of successfully getting placed together.

Being clear on your aims

Understanding your goals as a group is important as it has significant implications on how your year can or should proceed. I’ll use two common patterns we see frequently as examples:

• Example Group 1: A couple who are hunkering down for 12 months, trying to earn as much money as they can to buy a house. Their primary goal is to maximise their income.
• Example Group 2: Another couple who are having a gap year to allow for some time off and quality time together. Their primary goal is to be placed together at all costs.

These examples groups will be referenced in the discussion below.

Understanding how this industry works

At the risk of telling you things you already know, here’s a very quick outline of how the locum industry works. Locum opportunities arise when an employer becomes aware they are unable to meet their roster demands in the coming weeks. They advertise these vacancies to any number of agencies who make their best effort to find an appropriately credentialed candidate who can work the vacancy.

Agencies present their candidates to the employer who then makes an offer to the candidate who they feel will be the best fit for their department, based on experience, references, and other factors.

Some vacancies are highly desirable, perhaps because the reputation of the employer is positive and the pay rate is considered lucrative. These vacancies attract a lot of candidates and can fill very quickly, sometimes in as little as one hour.

To secure these vacancies, you need to act quickly.

Other vacancies are less desirable, perhaps because the location is remote and the pay rate is below industry averages. These vacancies do not attract as many candidates and can remain open for extended periods, or even go unfilled entirely.

How fast you apply does not generally impact your success rate with these vacancies.

For now, we will assume that an employer will always make an offer to the first appropriately skilled candidate who applies. This is not always the case in practice but it’s a reasonable assumption for the purposes of our article.

This mechanic has significant consequences for candidates looking for group locums using a “simultaneous job applications” approach, and I will use the romantic partners from Example Group 1 to demonstrate this below.

The “Simultaneous job applications” approach

In this example, partner 1 has identified a desirable vacancy that is a good fit for them based on skillset and pay. They now go and talk to partner 2, to explore if there could be a nearby opportunity that would fit their skillset. There isn’t an immediate fit, and so they spend 48 hours looking, at which point, they are eventually able to find a good option for partner 2.

However, because the vacancy intended for partner 1 was desirable and quickly attracted lots of applicants, partner 1’s application was late and they were ultimately unsuccessful, and the couple is back to square one.

As you can see, couples looking for parallel placements inherently require vacancies that stay open for an extended period to allow time for the second person to find a good fit. This has the unintended consequence of biasing their opportunities towards undesirable vacancies, as these are the ones that remain open long enough to allow coordination.

This is a fundamental problem that arises when relying solely on a “simultaneous job applications” approach.

When applying for jobs in this way, you really need one of two things to happen:

1. Multiple desirable vacancies that match your group’s skillsets need to be advertised at the same time. This does happen from time to time, but is generally speaking a rare occurrence relative to the broader locum market. You essentially need to get lucky. Groups who rely on this approach could easily spend more than 50% of their time not working, waiting for the perfect opportunities to pop up. It could also be worse than 50% if the scope of roles you're prepared to work in is narrow, such as only wanting day shifts in a metropolitan area. For Example Group 2 who are interested in more time off, this may be palatable. For Example Group 1 who are primarily financially motivated however, this is less than ideal.
2. Members of your group need to be prepared to work in less desirable vacancies that are open for long enough that enable you to coordinate your applications. This facilitates the parallel placement in a practical sense, but often means the roles come with less competitive pay or location, for example.

Essentially, there is a direct trade-off between the likelihood of being placed with your partner and how much you’ll be paid when using this approach. If you want a guarantee of working together, the spectrum of roles where this is feasible will likely result in lower pay.

A natural followup question might be, “Well couldn’t partner 1 apply for their vacancy, and then just withdraw if partner 2 couldn’t find suitable work? That way they would still have a high chance of securing the desirable vacancy?”

Unfortunately this approach is unsustainable for Go Locum as a business. The hospital partners we work with regularly express frustration with application withdrawals and cancellations because of the significant effort that goes into onboarding new locum staff, not to mention the potential interruptions to clinical services caused by last minute attrition.

As a result we are audited on our cancellation and withdrawal rate very closely. If it goes above given thresholds, hospitals will be less inclined to choose our candidates in the future.

This means that any strategy that relies on the ability to cancel or drop out of roles is untenable for Go Locum, and in practice we do unfortunately have to de-prioritise candidates who prove to be unreliable in this regard. We can only really send job applications on behalf of candidates who have high intent to work in a given role.

So - now we know that when using a “simultaneous job applications” approach, we either have to choose between spending a lot of time not working and hoping we get lucky, or opting for less lucrative roles. Considering this, are there any alternative approaches?

Yes, yes there are.

The “Independent job applications” approach

When using this approach, partners independently look for and apply to locum vacancies on their own. This makes them eligible for much more desirable vacancies, as they can apply without having to coordinate with their partner.

If partner 1 secures a locum role in a given area, partner 2 would then start looking for a vacancy in a nearby area at the same time. The critical difference is that partner 1 is fully committed to their role, regardless of the outcome of partner 2’s vacancy search.

The important thing to recognise in this approach is that there is no guarantee that partner 2 would secure suitable work that exactly matches partner 1's vacancy timeframe and location. This risk can be partially mitigated by targeting “high traffic” locum areas, but the parallel placement still isn’t guaranteed.

Options in that instance include partner 2 going with partner 1 on the locum trip anyway, or spending their time at home or elsewhere.

The advantages of the “independent job applications” approach include significantly more work opportunities for both partners and higher incomes overall, while the shortcomings include no guarantee that your partner will find suitable work in the same place at the same time.

Summary and general tips

Groups like Example Group 1 who want to maximise income should almost certainly use an “Independent job applications” approach, knowing that this may come at the expense of being placed together all the time.

Parties like Example Group 2 who want to maximise their time together could use a “simultaneous job applications” approach, but they should be aware this biases them towards less desirable working conditions and will likely have to prepared to work in roles with lower pay.

Here are some other, more general tips for crushing it when locuming with a partner or friend:

• Be as open-minded as you can about role types. For junior medical officers, this in particular includes the “big 3” which are gen med, ED and relieving/ward call, which comprise about 70% of all vacancies. Without these, it is nigh on impossible to find good parallel placement options.
• Regional areas are more likely to have parallel vacancies than metropolitan areas.
• Have an open and frank conversation about your partner in terms of how much time you’re prepared to spend apart and together and how that plays into your expectations with respect to pay and location. Being on the same page about this is important for best results.
• While we know it can be hard to be responsive while working clinically, Go Locum needs to be able to act quickly to secure parallel placements on your behalf. Therefore, prioritising responses to our messages about potential bookings significantly increases your chances of success.
• Ideally for doctors, at least one partner would be a registrar in an in-demand specialty such as gen med. For nurses, you have much more flexibility in general given widespread demand.
• Do your best to keep all members’ availability calendars as up to date as possible, as this also ensures we can act quickly on desirable vacancies on your behalf.
• Ensure your credentials are as polished as possible for both partners ahead of time. This includes certified ID, proof of immunity to all vaccine preventible diseases, and other documents as directed by our dashboard. Missing out on the perfect job for you and your partner because one partner’s documents aren’t ready can be very frustrating for all involved, especially when they don't come along often.
• Stay in regular contact with us about your plans, we’re very happy to guide your decision-making and discuss pros and cons at any time.

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