Building a Scalable Recruiting Engine for Hard-to-Fill Pharmacy Roles

Executive Summary

Neighborhood LTC Pharmacy faced a difficult but common growth constraint: critical pharmacy roles had to be filled in markets where licensed candidate supply was thin, manager execution varied by location, and recruiting work was falling heavily on operators. The issue wasn’t simply “not enough candidates.” It was a constrained labor market combined with inconsistent hiring infrastructure, limited ATS leverage, and insufficient dedicated recruiting capacity.

StratTech helped Neighborhood LTC Pharmacy shift from a reactive posting model to a more disciplined recruiting operating system: activating Paylocity functionality, improving candidate engagement, standardizing manager-facing process, using Predictive Index more effectively, and adding dedicated recruiting ownership. The strongest validation is that senior operators described the improvement in practical operating terms — better candidates, faster and more consistent process execution, and less day-to-day recruiting burden on leaders.

“Adding a dedicated recruiter has significantly improved hiring — it’s freeing leaders from doing day-to-day candidate work.” — Marissa McMahon, COO

Problem: Hard-to-Fill Pharmacy Roles and Inconsistent Hiring Execution

Neighborhood LTC Pharmacy faced persistent hiring challenges in critical, hard-to-fill pharmacy roles, particularly in smaller and less competitive markets such as Columbia. The company needed a model that could support near-term hiring demand while also scaling with future store growth.

• Real candidate supply constraints within licensed pharmacy talent pools
• Underutilization of the Paylocity ATS, with limited automation and workflow discipline
• Inconsistent hiring practices across locations, including variable manager execution and limited structured intake
• Manual candidate engagement and scheduling, which slowed speed-to-contact and interview coordination
• Recruiting burden falling on leadership and operators, creating operational strain and limiting scalability

Diagnosis: Scarcity Was Real, but Execution Was the Multiplier

The core constraint wasn’t a single broken process. It was an interaction between limited market supply and inconsistent execution. In thin labor markets, every delay, weak screen, missed follow-up, or unstructured interview carried a higher opportunity cost because the available candidate pool was already narrow.

• Limited candidate supply required proactive outbound sourcing rather than reliance on passive job postings
• ATS features such as automation, knockout questions, communication tools, and candidate workflow stages weren’t being fully used
• Lack of structured process reduced conversion rates in already thin pipelines
• No single recruiting function had enough dedicated ownership to drive consistent throughput across roles and locations

Solution: Targeted Process Improvements and Proactive Sourcing

1. ATS Activation and Workflow Discipline

StratTech focused first on making the existing system work harder before adding complexity. Paylocity capabilities were activated and tightened to reduce manual effort, improve screening consistency, and create a cleaner candidate flow.

• Introduced knockout questions to automatically filter unqualified candidates
• Improved candidate progression discipline through clearer workflow stages
• Standardized communication expectations and manager-facing process steps
• Moved interview guide delivery into the pre-interview workflow so managers had consistent screening criteria before meeting candidates

“Interview guides weren’t being used; we’re now emailing guides to managers before interviews so screens are consistent.” — Nicole Butterbaugh

2. Candidate Engagement and Scheduling Improvements

Neighborhood LTC Pharmacy improved speed-to-contact by incorporating more direct candidate engagement methods. This mattered because pharmacy candidates in constrained markets often required faster, more personal outreach than a standard applicant workflow could provide.

• Implemented texting capabilities to improve candidate responsiveness
• Used direct calls and texts for hard-to-fill roles and markets
• Reduced lag between application, outreach, and interview coordination
• Tested short leadership video snippets to communicate the role value proposition and build candidate interest

“We’ve started trying direct calls/texts and short leadership videos for hard-to-fill markets — those tactics are producing more responses than passive job posts.” — Carrie Laible, Director of Office and Compliance Operations

3. Proactive Sourcing Strategy for Constrained Markets

For smaller markets, StratTech helped Neighborhood LTC Pharmacy shift from a reactive model to a proactive sourcing motion. The revised approach combined AI-assisted sourcing, state licensure data, direct outreach, and community engagement to identify and reach candidates who were unlikely to convert through job posts alone.

• Deployed AI sourcing tools to support outbound candidate identification and outreach workflows
• Leveraged state licensure lists for targeted candidate identification
• Executed direct outreach through phone and text, especially in smaller markets
• Used local community engagement to improve visibility and credibility in markets where traditional job posts underperformed

“Columbia, MO was tough, but direct outreach and community engagement have moved the needle.” — Carrie Laible, Director of Office and Compliance Operations

4. Recruiting Capacity and Ownership

A process cannot scale without accountable capacity. StratTech supported the sourcing and hiring of a dedicated recruiter and helped define recruiting ownership more clearly. That shifted day-to-day recruiting execution away from operators and toward a function capable of sustaining follow-up, pipeline hygiene, and role-specific outreach.

• Personally sourced and helped hire a dedicated recruiter
• Centralized recruiting execution under a more accountable function
• Moved technician hiring closer to store-level operators in established locations where that work could be managed more locally
• Reduced reliance on senior leaders for day-to-day candidate management, travel, and hands-on coordination
• Linked future HR/recruiting capacity planning to store growth and operating complexity

“Pharmacists in established stores now handling technician hiring, freeing up leadership’s time.” — Erica Raymond

“Hiring that role is critical because our recruiter capacity drives everything.” — Scott Louderback

5. Behavioral Hiring Framework

StratTech introduced and supported better use of Predictive Index (PI) to strengthen role alignment and hiring discussions. PI didn’t replace judgment; it gave managers a more structured lens for evaluating fit, interview focus, and potential role risks.

• Integrated PI more effectively into the hiring workflow
• Used behavioral data to support role alignment and manager awareness
• Improved efficiency in matching candidate profiles to role requirements
• Reinforced consistent decision-making without treating assessments as a stand-alone selection mechanism

“Predictive Index integration is now working and has significantly improved our efficiency in matching candidates to roles.” — Carrie Laible, Director of Office and Compliance Operations

Results: Operational Improvements in Hiring Execution

The strongest proof points are operational, not cosmetic. The COO tied the recruiting changes to freed leadership capacity, while the Director of Office and Compliance Operations tied the same change to improved quality of candidates for key roles. That’s a stronger case than a generic “process improvement” claim because the benefits show up in the operating model: less leader drag, better candidate flow, more consistent screens, and more targeted outreach in hard-to-fill markets.

Because this case study does not yet include validated numeric baseline and post-intervention metrics, results are positioned here as observed operational improvements rather than quantified ROI claims.

Time savings / freed leader time

Dedicated recruiter capacity, localized technician hiring, and clearer recruiting ownership reduced day-to-day candidate work for senior leaders.

→ Business effect: Leaders had more bandwidth for store operations, leadership work, and growth planning.

Quality of hire / candidate quality

Carrie Laible reported that the new recruiter materially improved hiring and that the team was finally seeing quality candidates for key roles.

→ Business effect: Improved confidence in pipelines for critical roles, including Pharmacist-in-Charge and other difficult hires.

Time-to-fill / process efficiency

PI integration, direct calls/texts, short leadership videos, and consistent interview guide delivery improved matching, response, and screening discipline.

→ Business effect: Reduced process friction and improved candidate conversion in markets where passive job posts were insufficient.

Scalability

Recruiting leadership identified HR Manager capacity and formalized recruiter responsibilities as critical, since recruiting improvements need to scale as stores are added.

→ Business effect: Created a more durable recruiting operating model rather than a one-off intervention.

Playbook: Scalable Hiring Model for Hard-to-Fill Pharmacy Roles

• Treat candidate supply as a real constraint, not merely a sourcing inconvenience
• Activate existing ATS functionality before layering on additional tools
• Use knockout questions and structured workflows to reduce noise and increase consistency
• Improve speed through texting, direct outreach, and lightweight scheduling automation
• Combine AI sourcing tools, licensure data, community engagement, and direct phone/text outreach for constrained markets
• Centralize recruiting accountability with dedicated capacity before growth amplifies the workload
• Move appropriate hiring work closer to store-level leaders only after process, guides, and accountability are clear
• Use behavioral frameworks such as PI as decision support, not as a substitute for structured interviews and managerial judgment
• Tie recruiting capacity planning to store growth, role demand, and operating complexity early

Why This Approach Worked

The intervention worked because it addressed both sides of the problem: the external supply constraint and the internal execution model. Neighborhood LTC Pharmacy couldn’t manufacture unlimited licensed pharmacy talent in small markets, but it could improve how quickly, directly, and consistently it found and converted the candidates that did exist.

• The strategy acknowledged the true constraint: thin licensed candidate supply in specific markets
• The operating model improved conversion efficiency inside a limited talent pool
• The work used existing systems more effectively instead of defaulting to unnecessary platform complexity
• Dedicated recruiting capacity created accountability, consistency, and execution discipline
• Manager-facing tools, PI integration, and structured interview guides improved hiring quality and reduced variability
• Leadership burden decreased because recruiting work was redistributed to the right level of the organization