

You’ve likely made the decision to hire employees for your
dental practice based on one of two reasons (though I’m sure there are a few
others):
1. You have a need for a specific skill in your practice;
for instance, a treatment coordinator.
2. Your dental practice is experiencing some growth
and you need to increase your staff in order to have an adequate number of team
members to cover the influx of patients/appointments.
Dental B-School
has put together a comprehensive 6 step guide to hiring employees for your
dental practice.
Let’s dig a bit deeper into each of those six steps.
When setting out to create a job listing,
you must first identify what it is that you need for your dental practice. Knowing what you’re looking for can help you
craft the perfect job listing. Your job
posting should include job position, the scope of work for that position,
anticipated work schedule, what the physical and environmental requirements
are, as well as any additional requirements that you have for the role such as
education, years of experience, certifications, and so on.
You’ll need to take an objective
stance when fielding candidates that apply to your job posting. It is recommended that you complete a phone
interview first because it’s an easy, less time-consuming way to weed out any
candidates that are not a good fit for your dental practice.
This is an important topic so if you’re only skimming the
article, this is the point you need to pay closer attention.
During the interview process, it is important to not
ask questions that could be seen as discriminatory. Only ask questions that are specifically
related to the job and its daily functions.
For example, a discriminatory question could be “Do you have children?”,
“How old are you?”, and “Are you religious?”
In order to remain compliant, you’d need to change the wording of those
questions to something like “Are you able to meet the attendance requirements
of this position?”, “Are you over the age of 18?” or “Are you available on
weekends?”
What did you notice about those discriminatory
questions? They’re almost beating around
the bush, right?! Try to be direct and
professional to avoid conflict - unless your direct questions could in turn be
discriminatory.
Once you’ve narrowed down your list, or even decided on a
particular candidate, you may want to screen your final candidates through
background checks and/or reference checks.
It’s best practice to have all candidates complete an employment
application during the hiring process which provides their consent for
reference checks. Reference checks may
provide you with better feedback than the information you’d be able to obtain
through a background check.
An offer letter is not a contract of employment. Your offer letter should clearly state
that employment with your practice is at-will, as well as the details of
their employment such as their schedule, who they report to, what their wages
will be, their employment classification, as well as any benefits that they may
be eligible for as an employee. If they are an employee that will be earning
wages based on a commission, then a commission agreement should be in place
which is a legal document that needs to be drafted by legal counsel.
If you decide to conduct the background check we mentioned
in the previous step, you’ll need to make sure that your offer letter states
that the offer is contingent on a successful background or reference check.
Hiring employees can be stressful to say the least. However, keeping this six-step guide in mind
can help you maintain compliance and put your best foot forward in finding the
perfect employee.
Dental
B-School has a wealth of information and resources available to you on our
website. Have a look through our free resource section for more information or get in touch
with us to schedule your strategy session.
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Wouldn't it be a good idea to create a course?