Monday, November 17, 2014

5 Key Benefits of Working with a Dental Practice Recruiting Firm

There’s no question about it. Every new dental staff hire you make is critical to the success of your practice. When new hires are a bad fit or your employees are unfulfilled, the impact on your business is all-encompassing.

Finding and keeping good employees is critical to your ability to compete successfully in the new healthcare economy


On average, U.S. corporations lose half of their employees in four years.* Almost 33% of baby boomers surveyed say a lack of trust in leadership is a top turnover trigger; only 28% of generation X employees expect to stay with their current employers; Millennials need employers with a strong commitment to corporate responsibility, volunteerism, and making work “fun.”**

One out of every two workers (50%) report that they are dissatisfied with or indifferent toward their current job.*** In a 2013 study by CareerBuilder, 27 percent of U.S. employers surveyed reported that a bad hire cost their company more than $50,000.

How can you – a dentist or dental practice manager – expect to grow a profitable business with the threat of employee turnover this high?

Too many dental practices don’t have or are careless about their talent acquisition process. When dental practices fail to implement a thoughtful hiring process, they can make costly mistakes. Dental practice recruiters can help you find dentists, hygienists, and office staff while streamlining the process and getting better results.

Below are 5 benefits are why you should be working with a dental practice recruiting firm like Strategic Practice Solutions.

1) Receive Guidance and Advice Through-out the Process

You need more than just someone to handle the paperwork. Dental practice recruiting firms know your industry specifically, and offer case-by-case guidance for every hire.

Whether you need a part-time receptionist or a new dentist on the staff, recruiters look at every staffing need as a matter of human resources and financial decision-making. When you need to hire someone, why not get valuable business advice that can lead to better staffing and better use of resources?

2) Find True Best Fits for Your Dental Practice

Your dental practice depends on the quality of patient care delivered—and the ability of your staff to communicate and work together effectively. Dental recruiters have inside knowledge of what it’s like to work in a dental office, and we work with you to understand your practice’s particular team culture and needs.

Recruiters utilize tools such as the DiSC team culture assessment to read between the lines to find the best culture fits for your practice among candidates with the highest qualifications. Better matches leads to improved patient care and less turnover so the right people will be with you for the long haul enhancing overall patient experience.

Recruiters also have established working relationships with many local dental practices and are able to find out more confidential information when calling to perform reference. They can identify if a candidate is telling the truth or hiding something.

3) Gain Access to Desirable Passive Candidates

Many of the best dental professionals are already employed and succeeding at their jobs, of course. You want their talent, and your practice may actually be a better fit for them. We identify these matches, open up communication, and convince talented passive candidates why they should join your practice.

Dental practice recruiting services have proactive methods to not only identify these talented, passive candidates—we also know how to predict which ones are good fits for your practice’s culture and who are most likely to become interested in joining your team.

Ultimately, your practice benefits from the expanded and improved talent pool made possible by partnering with a recruiting firm.

4) Enjoy a Better Chance of Offers Being Accepted

Dental practice recruiting makes people more likely to accept your job offer. The recruiting firm offers objective reasons why your practice is a good fit for them, and makes sure that you provide a compelling and competitive offer.

Valuable dental professionals can choose to work in virtually any geographic location and at a number of practices. We make sure that offers are extended to excellent choices and that your prospective new colleagues see the benefits of joining you. Recruiters can even overcome tempting counteroffers from other employers.

5) Fill Your Positions Faster

Recruiters expedite the entire process so your practice can move forward with the right people in place. While you continue running your practice, we reduce the time spent waiting for new employees.

Without professional dental practice recruiting, you risk experiencing a slow hiring process that damages your business. Great candidates can disappear, and your daily operations will suffer while you search for good applicants.

Dental Practice Recruiting Success Story


There was a dental office that was growing and recently expanded their practice. They needed to replace one of their main dental receptionists who presented most of the treatments to patients. They finally hired someone that seemed to be a good fit. She came from a busy practice, presented treatment to patients, and she was with that practice for over 10 years. So far so good…right?

After the first month of being hired, the practice started to show a $10,000 drop in gross production. After the Second month, there was another $15,000 drop in production and a lot of “open time” in the schedule.

Strategic Practice Solutions was brought in to analyze the situation. We found that the newly hired dental receptionist was a nice person and very professional, but allowed the patient to decide when and if they were moving forward with treatment.

We also found she was not making calls out to unscheduled treatment to fill the schedule for it was uncomfortable to her. As we assessed her skills, we learned she struggled with closing on treatment. At her other practice of over 10 years, the patients were clinically closed so all she had to do was to present a treatment plan and schedule the patient.

She never learned how to deal with “stalls” or “objections” which impacted her performance at her current place of employment. Through training and coaching, we were able to improve those skills. The bigger issue is the fact that those deficiencies were not identified during the selection, interview and reference checking portion of their search. If they would have hired SPS to handle this hiring decision, we would have made sure that skills better matched what was required of the position.

What Does SPS Do That Other Dental Practice Recruiters Don’t?


 Coaching/Advocate:

  • Coach to find out what are the competencies and skills required for the open position
  • Customize a skills test or questionnaire to be able to identify the competencies/skills
  • Assist in constructing interview questions that are pertinent
  • Provide coaching on the negotiation process 
  • Act as a sounding board for clients

 Ability to Attract Passive Prospects

  • Social media exposure for your job posting 
  • Networking
  • Participate in local seminars & dental events to reach out to dental professionals
  • Visit  colleges to reach out to Dentists, Dental Hygienists and Registered Dental Assistants 
  • Incentivize Referral of talent
  • Active involvement in the dental community to foster relationships with dental professionals

Vigorous Interviewing Process

  • Existing relationships with dental practices that make our reference checking process more effective 
  • Ensure candidates hit our strict benchmarks on the following processes before they can qualify for an open position and presented to a client:

             a. Pre-screening
             b. checking on references
             c. Skills test,
            d. Performance Based interview questions.

 Implementation of Human Resource Strategies and Technology

  • Utilization of DiSC to point out strengths and challenges in relationship to their job description and team culture
  • Utilize Performance Interview questioning process to help identify qualified candidates 
  • Skills testing

* The Loyalty Effect: The Hidden Force Behind Growth, Profits, and Lasting Value by Frederick F. Reichheld and

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** Monster Worldwide Survey
*** Deloitte Consulting, "Talent Edge 2020: building the Recovery Together-What Talent Expects and How Leaders Are Responding."



 

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

Encourage Your Patients to Use Their Dental Benefits by the End of the Year

Another year is winding down and, as you know, most insurance companies require your patients to meet new deductibles every January 1st. If your patients wait for too much longer to schedule their next hygiene appointment or dental work that they may have been putting off, they risk losing the balance of their 2014 dental benefits. Waiting until 2015 also means starting over with paying a new deductible.

They have earned their dental benefits – why not encourage them to use their benefits in 2014 before they lose them?

Send a Simple Dental Benefits Reminder

How can your dental office remind patients to use their 2014 dental benefits before December 31, 2014? A simple letter, email or postcard can be just the reminder that your patients need. By doing so, you can proactively remind your patients to use their remaining 2014 dental benefits now and schedule any incomplete dental treatments, missed preventative appointments or additional new treatments they may have been delaying.

If they require extensive dental work, they can effectively “double” the benefits by completing some of the treatment in 2014 and the rest in 2015. In today’s changing insurance climate, it’s always a good idea for your patients to take advantage of their benefits while they are certain.

Example Dental Benefits Reminder

To get you started, we have provided an example dental benefits reminder below to use as an email, letter or postcard.

«DATE»

«FIRS TNAME» «LAST NAME» 
«ADDRESS»
«CITY», «STATE» «ZIP»  


Dear «FIRST NAME»,

I hope this letter finds you well. It is so hard to believe that fall is here. The air is getting crisp and cool, the leaves are falling and the holidays are just around the corner. 2014 will be over before you know it.

Our records indicate that you have remaining insurance benefits that are available to you this year. I would like to take this opportunity to encourage you to complete any dental treatment you may have delayed before the end of the year. As you know, most insurance benefits expire at the end of December - they do not usually roll over! At the beginning of the year, you will gain a new yearly supplement, but the unused benefits of the previous year are nothing more than lost money that could have been applied to your care. We have had a few tough years in the great state of Michigan and I have found we all are trying to maximize the use of our funds. I would like to extend to you a special pre-holiday offer of applying a 10% courtesy discount on the out of pocket expense. 

Call us today and we will prepare a quick analysis to determine how your benefits can be best utilized to allow you the maximum benefit provided by your plan. The schedules will be limited due to the upcoming holidays so we respectfully request that you book your appointments as soon as possible. 

Please call with any questions you may have. I look forward to seeing you before the New Year. 

Your partner in dental health.

Sincerely,


«PROVIDER NAME»