Today, we face many staffing challenges, including finding and retaining the right person. This task is harder than ever.
Throughout the years, I have found that finding the right person with the right personality is only half of the probing. The candidate must also be receptive and dedicated to joining our dental team.
With so many practices competing for the same limited pool of candidates, it can be challenging to hire the best candidate. Let's be honest, looking for a new team member can be overwhelming, time-consuming, costly, and exhausting.
Coreen Thompson.
I have put together a few tips to help dental offices search for their next new hire. It all starts with the perfect help-wanted ad, which helps attract the right candidate for your position.
I prefer to start with a phone interview. I started this during the COVID-19 pandemic, and I quickly became a fan.
I can usually tell within minutes of the conversation if this person is a good fit or candidate for our team. From the way they answer the call to how focused they are with the conversation.
If they are driving in a car or carrying on other side conversations, they are not making the interview a priority. I view this as a red flag! They are sending a signal that they are too busy or distracted to join the team.
Once they complete the phone interview, I invite them in for an in-person interview.
This is another situation where I can usually tell within the first few minutes what type of candidate I am interviewing. Does the candidate arrive early and prepared? If they arrive late, it often means they will not be punctual once they are hired.
If they are late and carrying their Starbucks, it is even worse. They prioritized getting their coffee over being on time. If they have not completed the application neatly or in its entirety, this concerns me, because it suggests they pay no attention to detail and do not care about the quality of their work.
You can assume these things will not change once they are hired. In most front-office positions, attention to detail and organizational skills are key. If they were unable to complete an application form correctly, they are likely to lack mindfulness in their duties as well.
The interview is their only chance to make a first impression; this should be their best. If they cannot arrive on time, what is the likelihood that they will arrive on time every day?
During the interview, you get a sense of what their previous employment situation was or how it ended. If the candidate is bad-mouthing a previous manager or office, I proceed with caution.
People can part ways and have differing opinions without bad-mouthing their previous supervisor. Disparaging others shows a lack of professionalism and integrity.
Another concern of mine is when candidates don't allow you to check references and have no letters of recommendation. I understand that not all candidates want their current employers to know they are looking elsewhere, but you should have at least one former employer or co-worker who is willing to provide a good reference.
My next step is to invite the best candidates back to the office to shadow for a few hours. In my state, we cannot conduct working interviews, so they are shadowing voluntarily.
Shadowing is a fantastic opportunity for the candidate to see the office flow, but it also gives them a chance to see how they interact with other employees. It allows you to see whether they ask appropriate questions about the position. Often, this is the moment you can tell whether their resume matches their experience.
With common tasks and terminology in the dental office, shadowing in the dental office is a chance to see how familiar they are with these. I have had many people inflate their resumes only to learn after they started that they had no bona fide experience or knowledge of specific tasks.
Job shadowing is a fantastic opportunity to see whether the candidate interacts with other employees and patients and communicates professionally and appropriately with other staff members and patients. Do they share opinions or past experiences in handling certain situations? Sometimes I have had candidates try to implement changes to our office systems before they have been hired.
Our workday is valuable, and wasting time is wasting money. If we can spot a red flag before we invest our time and energy, we can save ourselves from making a timely and costly mistake.
Coreen Thompson has been in dentistry for over 30 years, starting as a certified dental assistant and working her way up to practice manager. Thompson is involved with her local and state dental associations, serving as a consultant on the professional development committee for the Connecticut State Dental Association. Thompson has been a member of the American Association of Dental Office Management (AADOM) since 2020. She holds the AADOM Fellowship and Mastership distinctions and has been nominated twice for AADOM's Dental Office Manager of the Year award.
The comments and observations expressed herein do not necessarily reflect the opinions of DrBicuspid.com, nor should they be construed as an endorsement or admonishment of any particular idea, vendor, or organization.
