Have you ever asked your team a question during a meeting and received nothing but blank stares? As an owner of a medical practice, you’re busy treating patients and running the practice, you need to have self-motivated people in place to produce the best results. You need to surround yourself with GREAT people!

So here’s the key question…

Do you have the right people on the bus?

That’s the question at the core of the best-selling book, Good to Great, book by Jim Collins. (In our opinion, a must-read for any medical practice owner)

Whether you’re hiring the Front Desk Coordinator or a Doctor for your practice, focus on who they are and why they want to be there.

When it comes to hiring for medical practices, here are five tips to help you make sure you get the right people on the bus!

1. Start with a clear definition of the job: Make sure you have prepared a job description for each role, including key responsibilities and the knowledge, skills, and abilities required to accomplish these. A job description defines the criteria by which you select great talent. Without established criteria, it’s almost impossible to identify the right person for the job.

2. Don’t over-rely on the candidate’s resume: Consider a resume as simply a starting point in evaluating a candidate’s capabilities. Resumes often contain misinformation and certainly don’t provide the depth needed to differentiate between candidates. Dig deeper through probing questions that require the candidate to describe real past experiences.

3. Assess for fit: It’s one thing for a candidate to have the ability to fully perform the job’s tasks, it’s a completely different thing to “mesh” with your practice’s culture and existing team.

4. Involve your current team: This is related to the previous point. Involving your team in the selection process is critical. It’s common for a candidate to interact differently with different people (for example the practice owner vs. the office manager). Detecting these interpersonal differences are key to assessing fit. Also, specialized employees in your practice are best positioned to judge specialized skills that may be important to the role you’re hiring for.

5. Check references: It’s amazing how many folks never check references. DON’T be one of them! Once a candidate reaches a “finalist” stage, require him/her to provide at least 5 (yes…. At least 5) references – including both business and personal references. It’s easy to “stack the deck” with a couple good references, but it MUCH more difficult to do that with five.

One final point… One question I receive from practice owners is “what incentives should I offer employees to motivate them to do their work”. That’s where this post comes full circle. Incentives simply won’t work if you don’t have the right people in the right positions.
However, with the right team in place, incentives can be a powerful tool to drive performance and increase retention over the long haul!

Hiring for medical practices can be challenging but following these simple tips can help! When you are ready to grow your practice to the next level, don’t hesitate to reach out to the experts at STAC Bizness Solutions!

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