You built a compliant practice. You hired the right people. You put in the work to keep them engaged. And then life happens, because with long-tenured employees, it always does. A chronic attendance problem. A pregnancy announcement. A cancer diagnosis. These are not edge cases. They are the inevitable reality of having humans on your team, and handling them incorrectly can turn a good employment relationship into a liability.
In Part 5 of The DrBicuspid.com Podcast series on the dental practice employee life cycle, HR expert Alan Twigg of Bent Ericksen & Associates walks through what he calls "life circumstances" and why the legal landscape is more complicated than most practice owners realize.
On attendance, Twigg's first piece of advice is counterintuitive: Do not set a hard number in your policy. The moment you write "Absent more than twice in a month means termination," you have created a trap for yourself. What happens when your best 10-year employee has a rough stretch and hits that number?
Twigg recommends "excessive absenteeism" language instead, paired with two tracking columns: one for protected absences under state mandatory sick leave laws, one for unprotected absences. Only the unprotected column supports disciplinary action. In states like California, Colorado, Massachusetts, and New York, getting this wrong is expensive.
On pregnancy, he offers a rule that sounds simple but trips up many employers: When an employee tells you she is pregnant, the first word out of your mouth should be "Congratulations!" What follows involves three distinct phases -- while she is working, while she is on leave, and when she returns to nurse -- each with its own compliance requirements that vary significantly by state and by the size of your practice.
On medical leave, Twigg introduces a phrase worth memorizing: the good faith interactive process. When an employee needs accommodation -- modified hours, intermittent leave, a workspace adjustment -- neither party gets to make unilateral decisions. The employer who reflexively denies every request is not protecting the practice. That approach has a name: undue hardship analysis, and it is far more nuanced than a blanket no.
Learn about the Bent Ericksen & Associates HR Director Package.
You can hear Part 1 of "Pregnancy in the Dental Office" on the Dental HR Podcast.
Listen to the full conversation below.
