Derek Fontaine, CSP, PHR — Locum Tenens Recruiter & Healthcare Talent Acquisition Specialist | Hanford, CA

Derek Fontaine grew up in the San Joaquin Valley and has spent his entire recruiting career focused on solving one of the region's most persistent challenges: getting qualified healthcare professionals into the rural and state-operated facilities that need them most. After studying Human Resources at Cal State Fresno, he joined a Central Valley-based healthcare staffing firm and quickly built a reputation as one of its top-performing locum tenens recruiters for nursing and allied health roles.

Over 11 years of full-cycle healthcare recruitment, Derek has sourced, screened, credentialed, and placed more than 450 healthcare professionals including registered nurses, licensed vocational nurses, certified nursing assistants, psychiatric technicians, primary care physicians, and behavioral health specialists. His core strength is in rural and state facility placements — he has deep knowledge of the staffing needs and credentialing requirements at California's Department of State Hospitals system as well as state-operated facilities in New York, two markets where candidate pipelines are consistently thin and recruiter expertise makes an outsized difference.

Derek earned his Certified Staffing Professional (CSP) credential from the American Staffing Association, his PHR through HRCI, and added his AIRS Certified Internet Recruiter (CIR) designation to sharpen his digital sourcing capabilities — a critical skill set when building pipelines for hard-to-fill nursing and physician roles in underserved markets. He is highly proficient with applicant tracking and credentialing platforms commonly used in healthcare staffing, and has developed internal sourcing playbooks adopted across his organization's nursing recruitment team.

His content for Imperial Locum is built around candidate education and recruiter transparency. Derek writes about what the locum tenens hiring process looks like from the inside: how recruiters screen candidates, what makes a strong locum application, how to navigate the credentialing and licensing process efficiently, and what questions healthcare professionals should ask before committing to an assignment. His practical, insider-focused writing is especially valued by RNs, LVNs, and CNAs who find most locum tenens content aimed at physicians.

Derek contributes to the American Staffing Association's California chapter and has been featured in regional healthcare workforce discussions focused on closing nursing staffing gaps in the Central Valley.