Has your practice ever lost a top employee? Or found trouble getting new hires to stick around longer than a year or two? If so, you know the toll turnover can take on the overall performance and morale of the office. It can lead to a feeling of indifference towards the office experience or a “me first” instead of team first attitude that even the happiest, most dedicated employees may find difficult to stay away from.
So how can you avoid turnover?
In this first installment of a three-part Turnover Trouble series, we’ll give you a strategy to avoid turnover before an employee even joins your team by simply hiring smarter. With these three tips you’ll hire people better suited to your practice culture and more likely to remain with your practice for an extended period of time.
- Assess your current team
Before someone comes in for an interview, take some time to review everyone currently on your team. Think of how they communicate with each other, how their personalities affect their work, where their strengths are, and some potential areas that could use support. Then when a candidate comes in use what you know current staff members to guide your analysis of the candidate. Do they share similar personality traits? Do they prefer the same communication style? Will their strengths benefit the current team? By thinking of the candidate not just as an individual (no matter how wonderful they may seem) but as someone who should fit in with and improve the existing staff, you’ll be able to eliminate those who most likely won’t be a good fit. - Ask situational questions
Think of common successes or struggles the practice experiences, such as dealing with a patient with severe dental anxiety or with the implementation of new technology. Ask candidates how they would address these situations, so you have a better understanding of how they really work. A candidate speaking about past experiences is helpful, but by having them theoretically work through something they may not have done before you can get great insight into how they would act as part of the team. It also demonstrates how they work under some pressure, which is always a plus. - Use personality assessments
While they can’t replace personal intuition and assessment, personality tests can reveal information that can lead to more successful hiring. These assessments, such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, the DiSC, Gallup StrengthsFinder, and more offer understanding of how individuals like to work and communicate, of what their strengths and weaknesses are, of their types of thinking (more logical or intuitive), among other things. Before you hire your next employee, have your team take them. Then you can compare the candidates’ results with those of your staff, to assess similarities and differences. This can be a way to easily eliminate candidates who may clash with your current office culture.
At the end of the day, you can be proactive about avoiding turnover. Use these tree tips to improve your hiring process and hire more qualified—and better fitting—employees who will be with your practice for many happy and productive years!
