Pair support with expectations to lead Allied Health teams

What we covered

• Physiotherapy recruitment has picked up in the last four weeks, with Aged Care and private practice employers getting pickier about candidate quality
• How to keep new grads who have signed contracts engaged through the four months before their start date
• Why Trystan advocates for clinicians and providers going regional, and how regional pay compares with metro roles
• New grad salaries, the award creeping closer to private practice pay and the case for valuing career capital over a $5,000 difference
• Speed of progression, the gap in leadership training and why clinical and operational leadership are separate skill sets
• Designing bonus structures, incentives and salary bands that reward performance above target

Key moments

“You’ve got four months until they probably start working with you. And just because they signed the contract does not mean a student is not going to be getting offers from other companies.” (Chris)

“If you’re in a capital city or a metro location, if you go an hour or two hours outside, there’s infinite referrals there and there’s so much demand.” (Trystan)

“Because there’s so much change, it’s so easy to just be reactive rather than do some actual planning.” (Trystan)

“The floor’s gone up by 10,000 in those four years. And you can easily say that the ceiling has not moved at all.” (Chris)

“I don’t think you should reward people for doing the base expectation of their job.” (Trystan)

If you run an Allied Health business

• Give every signed new grad a monthly contact point, such as a recurring task on the 15th of each month or an invite to the team Christmas party
• Track referrers and candidates the same way: a spreadsheet works as a CRM and applicant tracking system, with last contact and start date for each person
• Plan 2027 now using Three Horizons: the rest of 2026, the year ahead and where you want to be by 2030
• Band salaries so similar roles are paid the same, back them with KPIs and pay incentives only on billable hours above the target, with support and consequences both in place

If you are a clinician

• As a new grad, choose the role with the best support and career progression; a $5,000 salary difference was worked out on stream as $2.53 an hour
• Build varied experience early, since a narrow caseload such as paediatric NDIS is harder to move on from
• Spend your first year in one good job with one reporting line before adding part-time, contracting or sole trading work
• Give regional work a go: Chris’s rule of thumb is 10 to 15K above a metro salary, and your dollar goes further outside the city

Questions from the chat

• Do regional roles pay more than metro roles, and by how much
• Have new grad salaries gone up
• Is speed of progression a bigger issue than starting salary
• Are there any good leadership training courses for operations roles
• What bonus structures work well in primarily NDIS clinics