Every recruiter wants the same thing. Top notch candidates who show up for work, perform at the highest level, and remain with the company for years to come. Here's the issue most recruiters fail to see. Exceptional new hires can become costly turnovers when long term health problems begin to surface. And when that happens...
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Turnover skyrockets
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Productivity drops
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Recruitment costs go through the roof
Truth: Recruiting doesn't stop on day one. It stops when they retire or move on happily for the right reasons, not because their body broke down on the job.
This article explains precisely why talent acquisition teams should care about employee wellness compliance from interview #1 and how to handle it.
Let's jump in!
What you'll discover:
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Why Employee Health Matters To Recruitment
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The Real Cost Of Ignoring Long-Term Health
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How To Build A Health-First Hiring Plan
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Simple Steps To Get Started
Why Employee Health Matters To Recruitment
Recruitment is expensive. Really expensive.
When you lose a new hire after just 12 months due to a preventable disease, all that investment is wasted. The interviews. Onboarding. The training. Ramp up time. Poof. It's gone. And now your team needs to start from square one.
Employee retention is linked to employee health. Employees who are healthy have longer tenures. Healthy employees have better productivity. Healthy employees are cheaper to replace.
Did you know? Employers spend about $2,945 per employee annually on absenteeism and presenteeism related to chronic disease.
That's per employee. Now imagine that across 500 employees and you've got almost $1.5 million dollars per year - flushed away.
That's why employee health compliance should never be an afterthought in recruitment. Partnering with qualified occupational health services early on in the hiring process allows recruiters to screen candidates effectively, understand regulatory requirements and build a foundation for a healthy workforce for years to come.
The Real Cost Of Ignoring Long-Term Health
Most recruitment teams focus only on filling seats. But here's the problem...
If they keep vacating seats like that, there's no employment cycle. Just hiring. And it's staggering how many seats there are. Employers in the US logged 2.5 million workplace injuries and illnesses in 2024.
That's 2.5 million cases where someone's health directly hurts their ability to work.
The Hidden Turnover Bill
Replacing an employee is not cheap:
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Frontline roles: around 40% of salary
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Technical roles: about 80% of salary
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Leadership roles: up to 200% of salary
When you have 100 employees making an average salary of $60,000, even a low turnover rate of 15% costs hundreds of thousands of dollars annually. And when those departures are the result of preventable health conditions, you're essentially paying for the same issue repeatedly.
That's a losing game.
The Chronic Illness Problem
Here's where it gets scary...
Close to 60% of adults in the US have one or more chronic illnesses. Essentially, most of your candidates already fall into this bucket. They will require an intentional approach to health if you want them to be productive employees long-term. You can't afford to turn a blind eye anymore.
Recruiting teams who identify health risks early are able to create genuine support networks for their staff. Those who don't catch it until burnout has occurred are stuck with a costly open position and a rushed hire.
How To Build A Health-First Hiring Plan
But how do you, as a recruiting team, actually achieve lasting health? Here are four key areas:
Screen The Right Way
Pre employment health screens are not there to weed people out. They ensure that the candidate is capable of safely performing the job and provide you with a baseline for that individual's long term health.
Good screenings include:
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Job-specific physical exams
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Hearing and vision tests where needed
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Baseline lung function tests for industrial roles
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Ergonomic risk assessments
When completed correctly, they safeguard both the employee AND the employer. Win-win.
Partner With Health Professionals
Attempting to coordinate employees' health care in-house is a job in itself. Recruiters have enough on their plates already.
Working with a professional occupational health company is one of the best decisions any hiring team can make. They manage compliance. They conduct screenings. They do the reporting. That allows the recruiting team to focus on what they do best – finding candidates.
Build Health Into Onboarding
Onboarding is more than paperwork and HR videos.
Effective onboarding experiences can significantly increase new employee retention. Incorporating health-oriented touchpoints such as wellness welcomes, ergonomic workstation setups, or PPE fittings for manufacturing employees can help employees feel that the organization cares about them.
And this is the icing on the cake... Employees who feel cared about will be more likely to stay.
Track The Data Over Time
Recruitment teams already track metrics like time-to-hire and cost-per-hire. Now start tracking:
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Turnover linked to health-related exits
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Absenteeism rates by department
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Compliance rates for annual health checks
The teams that measure these numbers get better at solving them.
Simple Steps To Get Started
Want employee health to actually factor into your recruitment plans? Here's what to do next.
Audit The Current Process
Review your previous 12 months of employees hired and employees that left. How many of those departed because of injury, burnout, or some health related problem?
The number will probably be higher than expected.
Bring In A Professional Partner
Contact a professional provider. They will explain to you specifically what is required per industry and role types.
Some industries (such as manufacturing, mining, and construction) have very particular compliance needs. Your partner should know these inside and out.
Train Recruiters On What To Look For
Recruiters don't need to be medical experts. But they should understand:
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The physical demands of each open role
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What health checks are required by law
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How to talk about wellbeing during interviews
Simple stuff. Big impact.
Bringing It All Together
Retention wellness was once an HR topic. Now it's a recruiting issue. It's a financial issue. It's a business issue.
Recruiting departments that neglect this are doomed to a cycle of turnover. Those who make employee health compliance an integral part of the hiring process experience increased retention, productivity and lower overall expenses.
To quickly recap:
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Employee health directly impacts retention and turnover costs
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Chronic illness and workplace injuries cost employers billions each year
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Pre-employment screenings and health partnerships pay for themselves
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Onboarding is the perfect place to build long-term health habits
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Tracking health-related data helps hiring teams get better over time
The top performing hiring teams know this already. Time for the rest of the recruitment teams to level up.