How to Apply to Ochsner Health

8 min read Last updated April 20, 2026 376 open positions
Blake Crosley
Blake Crosley Researched using publicly available information, hiring data, and ATS analysis.

Key Takeaways

  • Ochsner Health is Louisiana's largest employer and the Gulf South's dominant academic medical system, with roughly 36,000 staff across about 47 hospitals.
  • The ATS is Workday at jobs.ochsner.org; a clean, single-column resume and a fully completed Workday profile are the table stakes.
  • Pete November has led as CEO since 2023, following Warner Thomas's departure to Sutter Health; growth is still the story, especially in Mississippi and Alabama.
  • Pay bands sit below coastal academic centers, but New Orleans cost of living, sign-on and relocation packages, and teaching affiliations are real offsets.
  • Hurricane exposure, Medicaid-heavy payer mix, and regional labor shortages are genuine operating realities candidates should acknowledge in interviews.
  • Epic experience, service-line relevance, and a credible Louisiana or Gulf South commitment story meaningfully improve your odds.
  • Competitors for your talent and patients include LCMC Health, FMOL/Our Lady of the Lake, CHRISTUS, Willis-Knighton, and regionally Memorial Hermann, Houston Methodist, Baylor Scott & White, and UAB.
  • Treat the tour, community conversation, and references as part of the interview; Ochsner hires for fit with a group-practice, mission-first culture.

About Ochsner Health

Ochsner Health is Louisiana's largest nonprofit academic medical center and, by headcount, the state's largest private employer. Founded in 1942 by five Tulane physicians (Alton Ochsner, Edgar Burns, Guy Caldwell, Francis LeJeune, and Curtis Tyrone) as a multispecialty group practice modeled on the Mayo Clinic, the system has grown into a roughly 47-hospital network spanning Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and southeast Texas. Headquartered in New Orleans at Ochsner Medical Center on Jefferson Highway, the system employs approximately 36,000 people across flagship campuses in New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Covington, Lafayette, and Jackson, Mississippi, plus dozens of community hospitals, urgent care sites, and clinics. Its historical affiliation with Tulane University School of Medicine continues alongside newer academic partnerships with LSU Health Sciences in New Orleans and Shreveport, and with Xavier University of Louisiana's new School of Medicine announced in 2024. Pete November became CEO in 2023 after serving as COO; he succeeded Warner Thomas, who left to run Sutter Health in California. Clinically, Ochsner operates the region's only Level I adult trauma center at Ochsner Medical Center, runs a high-volume transplant program, and anchors specialty care through the Gayle and Tom Benson Cancer Center, the Ochsner Heart and Vascular Institute, and institutes for neuroscience, bariatrics, digital medicine, and pediatrics. The system invests heavily in robotic surgery (da Vinci and Ion platforms), telehealth, and the Ochsner Digital Medicine chronic-disease management program. Growth over the past two decades has been shaped by post-Katrina consolidation, when Ochsner acquired several struggling New Orleans hospitals, and by joint ventures and affiliations: Ochsner Rush Health in Meridian, Ochsner LSU Health Shreveport, Ochsner Lafayette General, Ochsner Acadia General, and the 2023 acquisition of Mississippi Baptist Health Systems. The tagline 'Your Care. Our Purpose.' reflects a mission-forward nonprofit identity, but candidates should understand the operating environment: Louisiana Medicaid expansion in 2016 reshaped payer mix, hurricane exposure is a real facilities and staffing risk, rural hospitals in the region continue to close or consolidate, and post-pandemic clinical labor shortages remain acute. Most roles are non-union, though some food-service and environmental-services positions are represented by local unions.

Application Process

  1. 1
    Start at jobs

    Start at jobs.ochsner.org and search by keyword, facility, or job family; the backing ATS is Workday, so expect a Workday-style application flow and candidate profile.

  2. 2
    Create a Workday candidate account early and save your profile; the same login i

    Create a Workday candidate account early and save your profile; the same login is reused across every Ochsner requisition, and recruiters can see your application history.

  3. 3
    Tailor your resume to the exact job title and requisition language; Ochsner recr

    Tailor your resume to the exact job title and requisition language; Ochsner recruiters screen against Workday keyword matches before a human review, especially for high-volume RN, tech, and support roles.

  4. 4
    For clinical roles, have your active Louisiana (or compact state) license number

    For clinical roles, have your active Louisiana (or compact state) license number, NPI, BLS/ACLS/PALS dates, and degree verification ready; Workday will ask for these during the application, not after.

  5. 5
    Expect a recruiter phone screen within one to three weeks for in-demand clinical

    Expect a recruiter phone screen within one to three weeks for in-demand clinical and digital roles, longer for administrative or corporate positions where hiring managers drive the timeline.

  6. 6
    Panel interviews are standard: typically one recruiter screen, one hiring manage

    Panel interviews are standard: typically one recruiter screen, one hiring manager interview, and a team or peer panel; leadership and physician roles add executive rounds and sometimes a presentation.

  7. 7
    Be prepared to interview onsite at the hiring facility when possible; Ochsner va

    Be prepared to interview onsite at the hiring facility when possible; Ochsner values candidates who have physically walked the unit or campus, especially for nursing and allied-health roles.

  8. 8
    Background checks, drug screens (including nicotine for some clinical roles in c

    Background checks, drug screens (including nicotine for some clinical roles in certain years), occupational health clearance, and vaccination verification are required before a start date is confirmed.

  9. 9
    Offer letters come through Workday; negotiate on sign-on bonus, relocation, shif

    Offer letters come through Workday; negotiate on sign-on bonus, relocation, shift differential, and PTO rather than base, because nonprofit pay bands are comparatively rigid.

  10. 10
    New hire orientation is centralized in New Orleans for many corporate and clinic

    New hire orientation is centralized in New Orleans for many corporate and clinical roles; plan for travel even if your home facility is in Shreveport, Lafayette, or Jackson.

Resume Tips for Ochsner Health

recommended

Mirror the exact job title from the requisition in your resume header or summary

Mirror the exact job title from the requisition in your resume header or summary; Workday keyword screens reward literal matches over clever paraphrasing.

recommended

For nursing roles, lead with specialty (ICU, ED, L&D, med-surg), years of experi

For nursing roles, lead with specialty (ICU, ED, L&D, med-surg), years of experience, trauma/stroke/cardiac center level, patient ratios, and EMR experience (Ochsner runs Epic).

recommended

Call out Epic certifications or proficiencies explicitly; Ochsner is an Epic sho

Call out Epic certifications or proficiencies explicitly; Ochsner is an Epic shop and recruiters filter for it across clinical, revenue cycle, and IT roles.

recommended

Quantify volume: bed count of your current unit, admissions per month, procedure

Quantify volume: bed count of your current unit, admissions per month, procedures per year, panel size, or supervised headcount; Louisiana hiring managers respect concrete scope.

recommended

For physicians and APPs, list board certification status, DEA, state licenses he

For physicians and APPs, list board certification status, DEA, state licenses held, fellowship, and procedural volumes; also note any Tulane, LSU, or Xavier teaching affiliations if you have them.

recommended

For corporate and digital roles, map your experience to Ochsner institutes or se

For corporate and digital roles, map your experience to Ochsner institutes or service lines (Digital Medicine, Transplant, Heart and Vascular, Cancer, Neuroscience) so your relevance is obvious.

recommended

If you are relocating, state it plainly near the top ('Relocating to New Orleans

If you are relocating, state it plainly near the top ('Relocating to New Orleans, LA, June 2026'); Louisiana physician and specialty recruiting from northern states is a known pain point and a stated relocation signal helps.

recommended

Include Spanish, Vietnamese, or French/Cajun French fluency if you have it; thes

Include Spanish, Vietnamese, or French/Cajun French fluency if you have it; these matter for patient communication in specific parishes and rural clinics.

recommended

Keep the resume to one or two pages for non-physician roles and use a plain, sin

Keep the resume to one or two pages for non-physician roles and use a plain, single-column layout that Workday parses cleanly; avoid tables, text boxes, and headers or footers.

recommended

Export as PDF unless the posting specifically asks for

Export as PDF unless the posting specifically asks for .docx, and name the file 'FirstName_LastName_Role.pdf' so it is easy to track in the recruiter's inbox.

ATS System: Workday

Ochsner Health uses Workday as its applicant tracking system, with the careers site at jobs.ochsner.org routing into a Workday tenant. Workday stores a candidate profile you reuse for every application and parses your resume into structured fields that recruiters filter on.

  • Upload a plain, single-column PDF resume; Workday's parser mishandles tables, multi-column layouts, text boxes, and graphics.
  • Fill in the Workday application fields manually after upload rather than trusting auto-parse; recruiters search on the structured fields, not the attachment.
  • Use standard section headings (Experience, Education, Licenses and Certifications, Skills) so Workday maps them to the correct profile sections.
  • Enter licenses and certifications with issue and expiration dates; Ochsner's Workday configuration filters clinical candidates on active credentials.
  • Answer every EEO, voluntary self-identification, and work-authorization question; incomplete applications are often auto-routed out of the active pool.
  • Set up job alerts inside your Workday candidate profile for target titles and locations; Ochsner posts new requisitions daily across dozens of facilities.
  • Check your Workday candidate home page and the email tied to your profile regularly; interview invites and offer letters land there and expire.
  • Do not submit the same application twice for the same requisition; Workday flags duplicate submissions and it looks careless to the recruiter.

Interview Culture

Ochsner interviews are mission-driven, operationally grounded, and Louisiana-flavored.

Expect early questions about why Ochsner specifically and why the Gulf South, because retention and relocation risk are real concerns for the recruiting team, especially for physicians and specialty nurses brought in from the Northeast, Midwest, or West Coast. Interviewers will push on how you handle high patient volumes, complex payer mixes including a large Medicaid population, and the realities of a region with active hurricane seasons and occasional mandatory staffing surges. Clinical panels lean heavily on behavioral and scenario questions grounded in safety, teamwork, and patient experience; be ready to talk about a time you caught a safety issue, managed a difficult family, or led a code or rapid response. Physician and APP interviews include a service-line leader, a section or department head, and often a peer-practice dinner or campus tour; cultural fit with the group practice model matters, and candidates who treat the tour as part of the interview tend to do well. Corporate and digital interviews are structured around Ochsner's institutes and system priorities (digital medicine, access, growth into Mississippi and Alabama, operational throughput); bring examples that translate to scale across 47-plus hospitals rather than single-site wins. Dress is business professional for physician and leadership rounds and business casual for most clinical and corporate interviews. Tone is warm, direct, and Southern-polite; interviewers will ask about family, relocation logistics, and community fit, and you should be ready to discuss them without oversharing. Ochsner takes references seriously and often calls beyond the list you provide, especially for leadership and physician hires.

What Ochsner Health Looks For

  • Demonstrated commitment to Louisiana and the Gulf South, or a credible, specific reason you want to relocate there.
  • Clinical competence with high-acuity, high-volume environments and Epic fluency for roles that touch the EMR.
  • Comfort with a mission-driven nonprofit environment where pay bands are below coastal academic centers and the value proposition is scope, teaching, and impact.
  • Team orientation and group-practice mindset; Ochsner was founded as a multispecialty group and still hires for collaboration over lone-wolf performance.
  • Service-line or institute relevance: candidates who can tie their experience to Digital Medicine, Transplant, Heart and Vascular, Cancer, Neuroscience, Pediatric, or Bariatric institutes stand out.
  • Resilience around hurricane season, surge staffing, and the post-pandemic labor environment; interviewers will probe how you handle disruption.
  • Teaching and academic interest for physicians and APPs, given affiliations with Tulane, LSU Health Sciences, and Xavier.
  • Cultural humility with diverse patient populations, including rural Louisiana and Mississippi communities and New Orleans' Black, Vietnamese, and Latino populations.
  • Operational mindset for corporate roles: scale across 47-plus hospitals, standardization, throughput, and cost discipline in a Medicaid-heavy payer mix.
  • References who will speak concretely to your reliability, judgment, and behavior under pressure, not just your technical skills.

Frequently Asked Questions

What ATS does Ochsner Health use and where do I apply?
Ochsner uses Workday. Apply through jobs.ochsner.org, which routes into Ochsner's Workday tenant. Create a candidate profile once and reuse it for every requisition across Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Texas facilities.
Where is Ochsner headquartered and how large is it?
Ochsner is headquartered in New Orleans, Louisiana, at Ochsner Medical Center on Jefferson Highway. The system operates roughly 47 hospitals and employs approximately 36,000 people, making it the largest private employer in the state.
Who runs Ochsner Health?
Pete November has been president and CEO since 2023, promoted from COO. He succeeded Warner Thomas, who left Ochsner to become CEO of Sutter Health in California.
Is Ochsner a teaching hospital?
Yes. Ochsner has a historical affiliation with Tulane University School of Medicine dating back to its 1942 founding by five Tulane physicians, and it partners with LSU Health Sciences in New Orleans and Shreveport, as well as Xavier University of Louisiana's newer School of Medicine announced in 2024.
Does Ochsner pay competitively compared to coastal academic centers?
Honestly, base pay bands generally sit below top coastal academic systems for comparable roles. Ochsner often competes on sign-on bonuses, relocation packages, PTO, shift differentials, cost of living in New Orleans and smaller Louisiana markets, teaching opportunities, and mission fit. Negotiate on the full package rather than base alone.
What should I expect about hurricane season as an Ochsner employee?
Gulf Coast hurricane exposure is a real part of working at Ochsner. Clinical staff may be designated as essential and required to ride out storms on campus, and the system has detailed emergency-operations plans. Interviewers often ask how you feel about that commitment, and it is worth a candid answer.
Is Ochsner unionized?
Most Ochsner roles are non-union. A limited number of food-service and environmental-services positions are represented by local unions, but clinical and corporate staff are generally not.
What specialty programs is Ochsner known for?
Level I adult trauma care at Ochsner Medical Center in New Orleans, transplant, oncology at the Gayle and Tom Benson Cancer Center, cardiology and cardiac surgery at the Heart and Vascular Institute, neuroscience, pediatrics, bariatrics, and the Ochsner Digital Medicine chronic-disease management program are the most prominent service lines.
What languages help candidates stand out at Ochsner?
English is the primary working language. Spanish is broadly useful, Vietnamese helps in parts of the New Orleans metro, and French or Cajun French can matter in some rural Acadiana clinics. Listing any of these fluencies clearly on your resume is a real differentiator.
How long does the Ochsner hiring process usually take?
For in-demand clinical roles, a recruiter screen typically happens within one to three weeks, followed by a panel interview and a conditional offer within another two to four weeks. Corporate and leadership roles run longer, often six to ten weeks, and physician and APP searches can extend several months including credentialing and licensure.
Does Ochsner sponsor visas?
Ochsner sponsors J-1 and H-1B visas for certain physician and specialized roles, particularly in hard-to-fill specialties and rural service areas. Sponsorship is not automatic. Ask the recruiter directly and early; for most support, clerical, and general clinical roles sponsorship is not offered.
What are Ochsner's main competitors for talent in Louisiana?
Inside Louisiana, LCMC Health (Children's Hospital and University Medical Center in New Orleans), Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System and Our Lady of the Lake in Baton Rouge, Willis-Knighton in Shreveport, CHRISTUS Health in Shreveport and Texas, and Baton Rouge General are the main talent competitors. Regionally, candidates also weigh Memorial Hermann, Houston Methodist, Baylor Scott and White, UAB Medicine, and Tulane's separate health system.

Open Positions

Ochsner Health currently has 376 open positions.

Check Your Resume Before Applying → View 376 open positions at Ochsner Health

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Sources

  1. Ochsner Health Careers —
  2. Ochsner Health About Us —
  3. Ochsner Health Leadership —
  4. Pete November Named CEO of Ochsner Health (2023) —
  5. Ochsner Health Locations and Hospitals —
  6. Gayle and Tom Benson Cancer Center —
  7. Ochsner Digital Medicine —
  8. Xavier University of Louisiana School of Medicine Announcement —
  9. Ochsner and Mississippi Baptist Health Systems Combination —
  10. Ochsner LSU Health Shreveport —
  11. Louisiana Economic Development: Ochsner as Largest Private Employer —
  12. Workday Candidate Experience Documentation —