Veronica Richardson is “rare gold” if you ask her employer, Sally Gibson of Early Connections in Taree.

The graduate occupational therapist moved from Melbourne with her partner and recently acted to purchase a house in the Manning Valley.

It is a cause for celebration as it reveals the couple has created connections in our community that compel them to stay, and break from the 12-month exodus pattern that plagues regional areas.

Veronica is one of 100 new professionals that have settled in the Mid Coast in less than two years, and the number jumps to 255 people when you include their families.

General practitioners, allied health professionals, nurses, engineers, senior managers, and manufacturing staff have acted to uproot their lives to move from other States and countries to the Mid Coast.

Contributing to the rising recruitment and retention rate is the Mid Coast Community Connector Program and its use of the Attract Connect Stay Solution, founded by Dr Cath Cosgrove. The program is a success story even in its infancy, and Sally is proud that Early Connections acted to embrace the innovative opportunity.

Sally is part of the program’s origin story that involves the formation of the ‘AH202 – Support when we need it’ initiative. She worked with other allied health industry representatives from health, education, community and disability services to design and invest in a community connection service.

In 2023 she convinced the Early Connections management committee to take a risk, to invest money in a trial to deliver proof-of-concept that could evolve to a fee-for-service model.

“For our management committee it was a huge leap of faith. Most not-for-profit organisations are really struggling under the NDIS and there was a huge discussion around whether we could afford to invest in this, and whether it was going to make a difference,” explains Sally.

AH202 employed Kate Dunn as the Mid Coast Community Connector and set a goal to attract 20 new allied health professionals to the region in two years – the initiative expanded to engineers and manufacturing, and it recently celebrated the milestone of attracting and supporting 100professionals, including 37 nurses for Manning Base Hospital.

“The management committee is very impressed. It’s now a fee-for-service model and it is absolutely money very well spent on so many levels,” says Sally.

Kate works on the service delivery frontline as the Community Connector, and her support to customers ranges from identifying suitable housing, school and childcare options, identifying partner employment, as well as supporting social and professional connections.

Veronica embraced some of the program’s opportunities, welcomed Kate’s generous and friendly support and attributed the creation of two friendships to the attendance of one Community Connector Dinner.

“I met two of my good friends at one of the Connector Dinners,” says Veronica. “It was through them that I connected into local sporting clubs.

“Socially, it’s an older demographic and so you have to go searching for younger people. The program initially did that, and then it’s like a chain reaction … someone else that you know, also knows another young person. Without the program, you could easily be living in this area and think there are no young people.”

Kate’s support of Veronica also involved helping the couple to find a rental property, and local business and service recommendations.

“It was nice to have that extra person who knew the area and was willing to help, offering us support and reassurance,” says Veronica.

“Kate was open and friendly, and I knew that I could text her at any time with questions. It was reassuring and made the transition from a city to a small town much easier.”

Veronica says it was the lifestyle and opportunities to work with a greater variety of clients that motivated her to look at the Mid Coast area and Early Connections job advertisement.

“I am originally from Tassie and like small towns. I knew I would be busy learning lots of new things as a new graduate, so I thought it would be nicer to go somewhere quieter, a bit slower paced,” explains Kate.

“There is a lot to be gained working in regional areas, and if other allied health professionals haven’t tried it, I really urge them to try it at least once.”

Sally Gibson echoes Veronica’s appeal to other allied health professionals to consider regional placements, and specifically, the Mid Coast.

“Waitlists are extensive. Every organisation and even private companies will say the waitlists are extensive. Our speech and psychology waitlists are closed, and we are desperately trying to seek more staff in those fields,” explains Sally.

“Most children will be on numerous waitlists. For an organisation of our size, we can have 80 children sitting on a waitlist.

“Unless we build our staffing numbers the waitlists are not going to change.”

Finding allied health professionals, but more importantly, keeping allied health professionals is critical, and every success, such as Veronica and the ‘100 milestone’ of the Mid Coast Community Connector Program warrants celebration.

“Veronica brought a partner, she wants to integrate into the community and stay, it’s just rare gold. It means we stand a greater chance of not having to recruit again, but even if she decides not to stay with our organisation, she might stay in our community. Our aim to is to try to keep them [allied health professionals] in our community.”

The exodus of allied health professionals is not founded in professional dissatisfaction, in fact Sally says a recurring comment that is given when exiting the position is, “If only we could take this (work)place to the city…”. She says the dissatisfaction stems from the lack of social and community connections.

“They always felt they had to go back to the city to find the social element,” says Sally. “They would build relationships around the work team but not a lot externally, and so they would choose to go back to the cities to be closer to family and in search of partners.”

Before the Mid Coast Community Connector Program Sally says, “we would try to go out for dinners with the new staff and do some of the things that create connections.”

“We knew the gaps, tried our best but also recognized that they really needed to make friends outside of the workplace, which is good for your mental health – but we just didn’t know to make that happen.”

Sally says the program also delivers key supports to business.

“Through the program we had education sessions on advertising, guidance on what to put in the ad and key phrases to help attract new graduates. We introduced a relocation bonus because we had to start thinking outside the box to encourage people to come – that was the first step, getting them to apply – it is reassuring to know that we have Kate to deliver the next layer of support.”

Sally says Early Connections promotes access to the Mid Coast Community Connector Program in its job advertisements.

“It’s part of our standard ad now, and we include the figure of its financial equivalence as another incentive – they basically have an assistant to help them to find a home, find a school, connect with peers and so many more elements outside of the workplace,” says Sally.

“The benefits of paying to access the program outweigh the super expensive recruitment agencies – it is far more effective. For us, it’s not just about getting the person to start, it’s getting them to stay, and historically that was our problem with young professionals.”

She says they also chose to “pull back from advertising on Seek.com because we had to look at how much we were spending.”

“We probably had two ads up every month and would often receive zero appropriate applicants.”

Sally says innovative thinking is critical if the Mid Coast is to attract and retain professionals. She sees the Mid Coast Connector Program as part of the solution.

“In the last couple of years there has not been that same pattern of leaving after 12 months. We have had many more staff come in, and Veronica is one of them, who have purchased homes in the region, and so once they start to grow those roots in our community, we start to feel a little more comfortable and that’s a nice place to be – but I know it can change in a moment!”

Words and Image by Ainslee Dennis