🍽️ Are physicians groups an undifferentiated business model?

And why they may be ripe for disruption

Physician recruitment in America is a crazy exercise consisting of throwing inordinate resources at an intractable problem.

These staffing groups spend gigantic sums of time, money, and human resources trying to recruit from a smaller and smaller pool of physicians in order to fill a growing number of vacancies. By now the nation’s physician shortage is well-known. But what is interesting is how physicians groups have responded, namely by adding benefits and beefing up marketing around their company culture.

But are these groups truly differentiated?

Professor and entrepreneur Scott Galloway, host of the excellent Prof G podcast, has a quick rule of thumb, which he laid out in a recent episode:

How do you spot an industry that’s really ripe to be disrupted? Are you wealthy, or are your wealthy friends being taken to dinner a lot by people in insurance or banking? If you’re having dinner with strangers, it typically means the person on the other side of the table is selling you an undifferentiated product.

Endless steak dinners

Let’s turn that logic on the healthcare recruiting business.