Designing the Future Health Workforce: Strategic Levers for Transformation

The healthcare industry is facing an unprecedented workforce crisis, exacerbated by acute clinician shortages and the austerity under which healthcare systems operate, leading to high burnout, turnover, and escalating labor costs across both clinical and operational domains. To build a resilient, cost-effective, and engaged workforce in an era of health innovations, organizations must strategically deploy and integrate three strategies: Automate, Upskill, and Outsource. These strategies and their integration are the focus of this paper.

Automation focuses on leveraging existing technology to handle repetitive, high-volume, and administrative tasks, freeing up clinicians to focus on high-value activities with patients that require critical thinking, empathy, and complex judgment. Key areas for automation include the implementation of software bots to mimic human actions in digital systems. For example, billing and claims processing, scheduling, prior authorization submissions, electronic health records data entry, and revenue cycle management. Also, using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) to process unstructured data. For example, analyzing clinical notes for quality reporting, triaging patient messages, and initial review of diagnostic images or lab results to flag anomalies for human review. Examples are the use of robotics in logistical and clinical support, automated dispensing cabinets for medications, robotic systems for sterilization, and robotic surgery assistants. Automation projects typically show a rapid return on investment. Industry benchmarks suggest that organizations can achieve 25-40% time savings in high-volume back-office functions.

Upskilling is crucial for boosting engagement and retention. Upskilling involves investing in the existing workforce by providing digital literacy and advanced technical skills needed to work with new technologies, such as AI, and managing increasingly complex patient needs. Upskilling is crucial: training staff, especially frontline workers and nurses, to effectively operate new digital tools is key for patient engagement with telehealth technologies. Additionally, educating clinical and operational leaders to interpret real-time dashboard data helps manage capacity, optimize staffing, and identify quality improvement areas as part of upskilling. As administrative tasks become automated, frontline staff can be upskilled to take on more complex roles in care coordination, health coaching, and chronic disease management, which are less vulnerable to automation. 

Offering short-term focused training programs will allow staff to quickly acquire competencies in specialized areas, such as virtual care delivery or specific medical device operations. Upskilling may mitigate the burnout crisis by shifting the focus from "charting and chasing" to direct patient interaction and higher-level cognitive work. Policy makers are called to create career ladders that reward clinicians for acquiring new digital skills and to secure funding for digital training consortia. The return on investment should be measured by improved quality of care and reduced staff turnover.

Outsourcing involves strategically transferring specific, non-core operational functions to third-party providers. In the modern context, this is often coupled with technology to ensure seamless integration and security. Selective outsourcing ensures that patient care and decision-making remain in-house, while leveraging external expertise and lower costs for specific tasks. For example, outsourcing complex billing, coding, and collection processes to specialized firms that can navigate payer complexity and optimize cash flow. In addition, moving non-clinical IT support, cybersecurity monitoring, and cloud infrastructure management to vendors with specialized expertise and 24/7 capacity. Moreover, utilizing remote staff for non-critical, yet time-consuming tasks like transcription, remote patient monitoring data review, and scheduling follow-up appointments.

Modern outsourcing relies heavily on secure digital platforms and compliance with privacy regulations. Technologies like telehealth and cloud-based EHR access allow remote workers, whether in a shared service center or a third-party location, to perform tasks efficiently while maintaining data integrity and security. The primary return on investment for outsourcing is cost reduction and the ability to immediately scale capacity without any internal hiring friction. Policymakers must focus on robust service-level agreements, data governance, and ensure that any outsourced staff meet the same quality and compliance standards as internal staff.

Integrating All Three Strategies to Mitigate the Workforce Crisis

The future health workforce model should be a hybrid ecosystem defined by the strategic interplay of all three levers. To successfully scale this integrated model, organizations and policymakers must address: a). Ensuring a secure, interoperable technological backbone is in place to support both automation tools and upskilled employees. b). Adapting licensing and regulations to allow newly upskilled clinical and non-clinical staff to work in expanded roles (e.g., medical assistants). Also, establish clear guidelines for the ethical use of AI and automation, particularly concerning patient data privacy and accuracy of clinical decisions. Furthermore, implement robust change management and communication strategies to address staff anxiety about job displacement and foster acceptance of new technologies.

By aggressively pursuing automation to eliminate waste, investing in upskilling to elevate human contribution, and using outsourcing to strategically manage capacity, the healthcare industry can navigate the current crisis and design a truly resilient, high-quality, and financially sustainable workforce for the future. Figure 1 presents the goal, impact on healthcare workers, and the operational return on investment by strategy.

Strategy	Primary Goal	Key Impact on Healthcare Workers	Operational Benchmark for Return on Investment
Automate	Efficiency and Task Removal	Shifts focus from repetitive data entry to critical thinking.	25-40% time savings in administrative tasks
Upskill	Competency & Engagement	Empowers workers to use new tools and take a higher-value, cognitive role.	Reduced turnover (10-15%), improved quality scores
Outsource	Capacity & Cost Control	Allows internal staff to focus solely on core, high-touch patient care.	20-30% cost reduction in outsourced function

Figure 1. Goal, Impact on Healthcare Workers, and the Operational Return on Investment by Strategy

Additional Readings

• Amoozegar A, Yadav R, Singh SK, Gunathilaka DH. The future of work and outsourcing: Emerging trends and predictions. Global work arrangements and outsourcing in the age of AI. 2025:177-208.

• Britnell M. Human: solving the global workforce crisis in healthcare. Oxford University Press; 2019.

• Onifade O, Sharma A, Adekunle BI, Ogeawuchi JC, Abayomi AA. Digital Upskilling for the Future Workforce: Evaluating the Impact of AI and Automation on Employment Trends. Int. J. Multidiscip. Res. Growth Eval. 2022 May;3(3):680-5.

• Sethuraman G, Agarwal S. Navigating the AI Outsourcing Wave: Threats to Employment and the Imperative for Upskilling. InGlobal Work Arrangements and Outsourcing in the Age of AI 2025 (pp. 451-470). IGI Global Scientific Publishing.Singh V, Singh G, Sharma G. The future of the healthcare workforce in the age of automation. In Driving Global Health and Sustainable Development Goals with Smart Technology 2025 (pp. 453-472). IGI Global Scientific Publishing.

• Socha-Dietrich K. Empowering the health workforce to make the most of the digital revolution. OECD Health Working Papers. 2021 Jun 25(129):0_1-67.