Person-job fit: an exploratory cross-sectional analysis of hospitalists

Person-job fit is an organizational construct shown to impact the entry, performance, and retention of workers. Even as a growing number of physicians work under employed situations, little is known about how physicians select, develop, and perform in organizational settings.

Our objective was to validate in the hospitalist physician workforce features of person-job fit observed in workers of other industries.

The design was a secondary survey data analysis from a national stratified sample of practicing US hospitalists.

The measures were person-job fit; likelihood of leaving practice or reducing workload; organizational climate; relationships with colleagues, staff, and patients; participation in suboptimal patient care activities.

Responses to the Hospital Medicine Physician Worklife Survey by 816 (sample response rate 26%) practicing hospitalists were analyzed. Job attrition and reselection improved job fit among hospitalists entering the job market. Better job fit was achieved through hospitalists engaging a variety of personal skills and abilities in their jobs. Job fit increased with time together with socialization and internalization of organizational values. Hospitalists with higher job fit felt they performed better in their jobs.

Features of person-job fit for hospitalists conformed to what have been observed in nonphysician workforces. Person-job fit may be a useful complementary survey measure related to job satisfaction but with a greater focus on function.