Research Summary. Some key points about hiring a speech language pathologists in the United States include:
Recruiting speech language pathologists involves both the one-time costs of hiring and the ongoing costs of adding a new employee to your team. Your spending during the hiring process will mostly be on things like promoting the job on job boards, reviewing and interviewing candidates, and onboarding the new hire. Ongoing costs will obviously involve the employee's salary, but also may include things like benefits.
You can expect to pay around $62,340 per year for a speech language pathologist, as this is the median yearly salary nationally. This can vary depending on what state or city you're hiring in. If you're hiring for contract work or on a per-project basis, hourly rates for speech language pathologists in the US typically range between $20 and $42 an hour.
To hire a speech language pathologist, you should create an ideal candidate profile, determine a budget, and post and promote your job. Here's a step-by-step guide on how to hire a speech language pathologist:
The first step to find speech language pathologists for hire is determining what type of worker you actually need. Certain roles might require a full-time employee, whereas others can be done by part-time workers or contractors.
Hiring the perfect speech language pathologist also involves considering the ideal background you'd like them to have. Depending on what industry or field they have experience in, they'll bring different skills to the job. It's also important to consider what levels of seniority and education the job requires, and what kind of salary such a candidate would likely demand.
The list breaks down common speech language pathologist roles and compares their salaries.
Type Of Speech Language Pathologist | Description | Hourly Rate |
---|---|---|
Speech Language Pathologist | Speech-language pathologists (sometimes called speech therapists) assess, diagnose, treat, and help to prevent communication and swallowing disorders in patients. Speech, language, and swallowing disorders result from a variety of causes, such as a stroke, brain injury, hearing loss, developmental delay, Parkinson’s disease, a cleft palate or autism. | $20-42 |
Graduate Student Clinician | Graduate student clinicians can be a nurse practitioner, pharmacist, or doctor whose primary job is to work with patients and assist patients in managing their medical condition or illness. They perform varied duties and responsibilities that include maintaining a good relationship with patients, discussing the treatment progress to patients, and documenting patients' medical history... Show More | $19-40 |
Student Clinician | A Student Clinician is a healthcare practitioner who works as caregiver of a patient in a hospital or clinic. They integrate knowledge obtained in courses into the clinical practicum assignments. | $19-40 |
Ideally, you should have the perfect candidate profile in mind before you write a speech language pathologist job description. This means you should have a clear idea of the skill set they need to be proficient in, what their main responsibilities will be, and what kind of background they'll have.
Speech language pathologists typically have the following skills:
Here are the responsibilities that most speech language pathologists perform:
Beyond the basics, you should also consider how well a candidate fits into your company culture. In other words, you should think about how your ideal speech language pathologist will live by the company's mission statement and contribute to the team dynamic you already have in place.
Rank # | State | # Of Jobs | % of Population | Avg. Salary |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | California | 1,957 | 5% | $82,600 |
2 | Florida | 1,166 | 6% | $62,208 |
3 | Massachusetts | 620 | 9% | $60,251 |
4 | Virginia | 565 | 7% | $74,834 |
5 | Washington | 440 | 6% | $74,039 |
Including a salary range in the job description is a good way to get more applicants. A speech language pathologist salary can be affected by several factors, such as the location of the job, their level of experience, education and certifications, and the prestige of the employer. For example, the average salary for a speech language pathologist in Minnesota may be lower than in California, and an entry-level engineer typically earns less than a senior-level speech language pathologist. Additionally, a speech language pathologist with lots of experience in the field may command a higher salary as a result.
Rank | State | Avg. Salary | Hourly Rate | Job Count |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | California | $85,108 | $41 | 9 |
2 | Nevada | $79,424 | $38 | 33 |
3 | District of Columbia | $76,504 | $37 | 59 |
4 | Washington | $74,974 | $36 | 19 |
5 | New York | $73,009 | $35 | 158 |
Rank | Company | Average Salary | Hourly Rate | Job Openings |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Northeastern University | $100,856 | $48.49 | |
2 | Oculus | $100,138 | $48.14 | 13 |
3 | University of California-Berkeley | $98,131 | $47.18 | |
4 | Bank of the West | $97,746 | $46.99 | |
5 | The TJX Companies | $96,089 | $46.20 | 6 |
6 | Valley Children's | $95,883 | $46.10 | |
7 | University of California | $95,217 | $45.78 | 7 |
8 | Mayo Clinic | $95,164 | $45.75 | 12 |
9 | DXC Technology | $95,042 | $45.69 | 8 |
10 | Professional Healthcare Resources | $93,760 | $45.08 | 1 |
11 | DC Prep | $91,960 | $44.21 | 1 |
12 | Tenet Healthcare | $91,959 | $44.21 | 32 |
13 | Blue Bird | $90,475 | $43.50 | 3 |
14 | New York University | $90,368 | $43.45 | 1 |
15 | Amazon | $89,850 | $43.20 | 2 |
16 | Innovative Services | $88,186 | $42.40 | |
17 | Bozeman Health | $88,164 | $42.39 | |
18 | Stanford Health Care | $88,006 | $42.31 | 6 |
19 | National Mentor Holdings Inc. | $87,240 | $41.94 | |
20 | University of Maryland Medical System | $87,016 | $41.83 | 10 |
A job description for a speech language pathologist role includes a summary of the job's main responsibilities, required skills, and preferred background experience. Including a salary range can also go a long way in attracting more candidates to apply, and showing the first name of the hiring manager can also make applicants more comfortable. As an example, here's a speech language pathologist job description:
There are various strategies that you can use to find the right speech language pathologist for your business:
Post your job online:
During your first interview to recruit speech language pathologists, engage with candidates to learn about their interest in the role and their experience in the field. During the next interview, you can go into more detail about the company, the role, and the responsibilities.
Don't forget to include a few questions that give a candidate chance to expand on their strengths in their own words. Asking about their special skills might reveal things you'd miss otherwise. At this point, candidates who are good enough can move on to the technical interview.
The right interview questions can help you assess a candidate's hard skills, behavioral intelligence, and soft skills.
Once you've selected the best speech language pathologist candidate for the job, it's time to write an offer letter. In addition to salary, this letter should include details about the benefits and perks that you're offering the candidate. It's essential to ensure that your offer is competitive, as qualified candidates may be considering other job opportunities. The candidate may wish to negotiate the terms of the offer, and it's important to be open to discussion. After you reach an agreement, the final step is formalizing the agreement with a contract.
It's equally important to follow up with applicants who don't get the job with an email letting them know that the position has been filled.
Once that's done, you can draft an onboarding schedule for the new speech language pathologist. Human Resources should complete Employee Action Forms and ensure that onboarding paperwork is completed, including I-9s, benefits enrollment, federal and state tax forms, etc. They should also ensure that new employee files are created for internal recordkeeping.