How to hire a speech pathologist

How to hire a speech pathologist, step by step

Here's a step-by-step speech pathologist hiring guide:

• Step 1: Identify your hiring needs
• Step 2: Create an ideal candidate profile
• Step 3: Make a budget
• Step 4: Write a speech pathologist job description
• Step 5: Post your job
• Step 6: Interview candidates
• Step 7: Send a job offer and onboard your new speech pathologist
• Step 8: Go through the hiring process checklist

What does a speech pathologist do?

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1. Identify your hiring needs

   Before you start hiring a speech pathologist, identify what type of worker you actually need. Certain positions might call for a full-time employee, while others can be done by a part-time worker or contractor.

   Determine employee vs contractor status

   Is the person you're thinking of hiring a US citizen or green card holder?

   Yes

   No

   Hiring the perfect speech 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.

   This list presents speech pathologist salaries for various positions.

   Type of Speech Pathologist	Description	Hourly rate
   Speech 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

   Show more

2. Create an ideal candidate profile

   Common skills:

   • Patients
   • Language
   • Speech
   • Patient Care
   • Rehabilitation
   • Home Health
   • SLP
   • Diagnosis
   • Compassion
   • Treatment Programs
   • Language Disorders
   • Communication Disorders
   • Diagnostic Evaluations
   • Medicare

   Check all skills

   Responsibilities:

   • Manage staff development activities including sensory integration and IEP goal writing.
   • Provide speech and language therapy under the supervision and guidance of assign SLP supervisor.
   • Administer and interpreting diagnostic evaluations on children with a variety of speech and language disorders in an out-patient facility.
   • Develop specific treatment plans and family education plans for rehabilitation patients in anticipation of discharge home or to appropriate rehabilitation facilities.
   • Participate as a member of the acute care and outpatient rehabilitation team in diagnostic and therapeutic services to neurologically impair adults.
   • Develop policies and procedures to secure Medicare and Medicaid provider numbers.

   More speech pathologist duties

3. Make a budget

   Including a salary range in the speech pathologist job description is a good way to get more applicants. A speech pathologist salary can be affected by several factors, such as the location of the job, the level of experience, education, certifications, and the employer's prestige.

   For example, the average salary for a speech pathologist in North Dakota may be lower than in Nevada, and an entry-level engineer typically earns less than a senior-level speech pathologist. Additionally, a speech pathologist with lots of experience in the field may command a higher salary as a result.

   Average speech pathologist salary

   $62,640yearly

   $30.12 hourly rate

   ---

   Entry-level speech pathologist salary

   $43,000 yearly salary

   Updated December 22, 2025

   Average speech pathologist salary by state

   Rank	State	Avg. salary	Hourly rate
   1	California	$82,860	$40
   2	Nevada	$79,431	$38
   3	New Jersey	$77,554	$37
   4	Washington	$75,307	$36
   5	Missouri	$74,891	$36
   6	Virginia	$71,285	$34
   7	Colorado	$70,519	$34
   8	Oregon	$70,372	$34
   9	Arizona	$70,246	$34
   10	New York	$69,927	$34
   11	Massachusetts	$67,944	$33
   12	Florida	$67,279	$32
   13	Pennsylvania	$67,089	$32
   14	New Mexico	$66,730	$32
   15	Maryland	$65,677	$32
   16	South Carolina	$64,849	$31
   17	Illinois	$63,394	$30
   18	Utah	$63,001	$30
   19	Georgia	$62,214	$30
   20	Rhode Island	$60,340	$29

   Average speech pathologist salary by company

   Company

   Rank	Company	Average salary	Hourly rate	Job openings
   1	Mayo Clinic	$95,675	$46.00	25
   2	University of California-Berkeley	$95,159	$45.75	2
   3	East Tennessee Children's Hospital	$94,936	$45.64	1
   4	University of California	$94,629	$45.49	5
   5	UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital	$93,974	$45.18
   6	Aya Healthcare	$91,318	$43.90	1
   7	Washington Hospital Healthcare System	$90,900	$43.70
   8	Northwell Health	$90,673	$43.59	22
   9	Stanford Health Care	$90,603	$43.56	9
   10	Erlanger Health System	$89,802	$43.17	3
   11	University of Maryland Medical System	$89,013	$42.79	7
   12	Community Medical Center	$87,770	$42.20	3
   13	GradyHealth	$87,394	$42.02	3
   14	Bozeman Health	$87,231	$41.94	1
   15	Nicklaus Children's Hospital	$87,041	$41.85	2
   16	Encompass Health	$86,814	$41.74	292
   17	Blessing Hospital Emergency Room	$86,053	$41.37
   18	Consonus Healthcare	$86,030	$41.36
   19	Baystate Health	$85,691	$41.20	11
   20	Kaiser Permanente	$85,117	$40.92	118

4. Writing a speech pathologist job description

   A job description for a speech 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 pathologist job description:

   Speech pathologist job description example

   Sign on Bonus $10,000 (Full time)

   Here is your opportunity to channel the full extent of your knowledge, skills, ambition, and experience on a daily basis. Inspire our patients to progress each day as you:

   • Provide speech-language treatment and patient care according to hospital, state and federal regulations and professional guidelines.

   • Delegate tasks and supervise fellows, technicians and assistants.

   • Maintain open and ongoing communication with hospital departments to ensure that patient, staff and hospital needs are met.

   Credentials:

   • Current state licensure or certification on or before the first day of employment required.

   • CPR certification preferred unless otherwise required by hospital policy essential.

   • Successful completion of an accredited master’s degree program or an accredited bachelor’s degree program plus sufficient experience in the field a must.

   • Demonstrated competence in speech-language pathology evaluation, assessment, care planning and treatment required.

   • Effective communication skills for working with patients, families and caregivers required.

   Enjoy competitive compensation and benefits that start on day one, including:

   • Benefits that begin when you do.

   • Affordable medical, dental and vision plans provided to meet the needs of full and part-time employees and their families.

   • Generous paid time off that increases with tenure.

   • Tuition reimbursement and continuing education opportunities.

   • Company-matching 401(k) and employee stock-purchase plans.

   • Flexible spending and health savings accounts.

   About Us:

   Helping patients regain hope and independence, Encompass Health is a national leader in post-acute care. We operate rehabilitation hospitals and offer home health and hospice care in 36 states as well as Puerto Rico. Following the Encompass Way, we are driven by our core values: We proudly set the standard, lead with empathy, do what’s right, focus on the positive, and remain stronger together.

   Realize the powerful difference you can make. Take this opportunity to join our team.

   Equal Opportunity Employer

   
   
   Address: 300 Park Hill Drive, Fredericksburg 22401
   Shift: Day Job
   Schedule: Full-time

   Copy this example

   

5. Post your job

   To find the right speech pathologist for your business, consider trying out a few different recruiting strategies:

   • Consider internal talent. One of the most important sources of talent for any company is its existing workforce.
   • Ask for referrals. Reach out to friends, family members, and current employees and ask if they know or have worked with speech pathologists they would recommend.
   • Recruit at local colleges. Attend job fairs at local colleges to recruit speech pathologists who meet your education requirements.
   • Social media platforms. LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter now have more than 3.5 billion users, and you can use social media to reach potential job candidates.

   Post your job online:

   • Post your speech pathologist job on Zippia to find and recruit speech pathologist candidates who meet your exact specifications.
   • Use field-specific websites such as healthcarejobsite, health jobs nationwide, hospitalcareers, medreps.com.
   • Post a job on free websites.

6. Interview candidates

   Your first interview with speech pathologist candidates should focus on their interest in the role and background experience. As the hiring process goes on, you can learn more about how they'd fit into the company culture in later rounds of interviews.

   It's also good to ask about candidates' unique skills and talents to see if they match your ideal candidate profile. If you think a candidate is good enough for the next step, you 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.

7. Send a job offer and onboard your new speech pathologist

   Once you've decided on a perfect speech pathologist candidate, it's time to write an offer letter. In addition to salary, it should include benefits and perks available to the employee. Qualified candidates may be considered for other positions, so make sure your offer is competitive. Candidates may wish to negotiate. Once you've settled on the details, formalize your 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.

   After that, you can create an onboarding schedule for a new speech pathologist. Human Resources and the hiring manager should complete Employee Action Forms. Human Resources should also ensure that onboarding paperwork is completed, including I-9s, benefits enrollment, federal and state tax forms, etc., and that new employee files are created.

8. Go through the hiring process checklist

   • Determine employee type (full-time, part-time, contractor, etc.)
   • Submit a job requisition form to the HR department
   • Define job responsibilities and requirements
   • Establish budget and timeline
   • Determine hiring decision makers for the role
   • Write job description
   • Post job on job boards, company website, etc.
   • Promote the job internally
   • Process applications through applicant tracking system
   • Review resumes and cover letters
   • Shortlist candidates for screening
   • Hold phone/virtual interview screening with first round of candidates
   • Conduct in-person interviews with top candidates from first round
   • Score candidates based on weighted criteria (e.g., experience, education, background, cultural fit, skill set, etc.)
   • Conduct background checks on top candidates
   • Check references of top candidates
   • Consult with HR and hiring decision makers on job offer specifics
   • Extend offer to top candidate(s)
   • Receive formal job offer acceptance and signed employment contract
   • Inform other candidates that the position has been filled
   • Set and communicate onboarding schedule to new hire(s)
   • Complete new hire paperwork (i9, benefits enrollment, tax forms, etc.)

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How much does it cost to hire a speech pathologist?