Exceptional Dental Practice Management

Help! I Can't Get Past The Interview!

  

  A person who had worked for us temporarily last year, recently left two increasingly anxious sounding messages on my cell phone.  She's a hygienist who graduated last May and hasn't found a permanent position yet.  She wanted me to call her back and give her some feedback on interviewing.  I cringed a little because I knew the only way I could help was to be honest with her.  I knew exactly why she wasn't getting hired. 
    I called her and she was very stressed and disheartened.  She said she'd been interviewed by three dentist's wives in different practices and never got the job.  Why?  What was she doing or not doing to cause this?  I asked her if she wanted me to be honest with her, even if it hurt.  She said she did.
    I took a breath and told her that the main problem was the way she dressed for the interview.  This lovely person has one of the best figures I've ever seen. She wears very fitted clothing with camisole tops.  It's distracting for men and women.  Women both admire and envy her and men can't take the "teenage boy" look of awe off their faces.  So, if she wants anyone to get past the fact that she's got an amazing figure, she has to dress differently.  She responded, "My boyfriend said the same thing."  Whew, it's not just me.  By the way, her response tells you that she will be able to handle critical feedback and that's a plus.
    The other issue is her air of aloofness.  That was almost harder to tell her because it really is about her as a person.  She was very open to hearing it and asked for ways to overcome that issue.  That alone tells you there is more to this person than appearance and initial impression conveys.  The problem is, very few interviewers will have the time or inclination to get to it on their own.  The onus is on the candidate to paint a picture of themself that makes the interviewer want them in their office.
    This is what I suggested to her.  First, dress for success.  My first thought was that no wife is going to be that generous to her husband and hire someone with the figure of Beyonce or Heidi Klum for him to enjoy all day.  But, that's not fair to wives.  No staff member is going to think that someone who flaunts their figure will be just who they want to work with.  It gets old, believe me.  We once had an assistant who constantly reminded us of how gorgeous (she thought) she was.  After a while, we could gag just to hear her start any sentence with the word "I".  Even a smart dentist will pass on someone who dresses inappropriately for the interview.  So, I would suggest black slacks, a white blouse or top, and a black jacket or sweater, black shoes with a modest heel.  Be conservative with jewelry and makeup and no perfume.   A lightly scented, clean
smelling lotion is ok.  The reason is this, the whole impression is clean, crisp, and not at all distracting.  It says, I'm here for the job and allows the interviewer to have a clear mind to hear what you have to say.   Anything inappropriate or distracting at all will cause the interviewer's "little voice inside her head" to drown out anything you might be saying.  It recently sounded like this inside my head during an interview, "Why the heck is she wearing that metallic green eyeliner?  Where did she even find something like that?  Is she trying to make her eyes look greener?  Are her eyes really green or are those contacts?  Why is she wearing that ruffley jacket?  Is that how she dresses for work?...  Now, I have been told that I tend to extrapolate (thank you very much Dr. Morgan), but that's where my gray matter was taking me.  Now, let's get to the talking part of the interview.
    Same green-eyed applicant:  "You are going to have a high bar to meet because I loved my former boss so much.  I don't think anyone can be as great as him."  Me:  "Well, then why are you here?  Your former office is right around the corner.  We think our boss is pretty great, too and we are not looking to hire anyone so we can meet their bar.  I'm sorry, but there's really no point in going any further."  As it turns out, I saw a former co-worker of green eyes that night and she told me, "You didn't hire her did you?  You just dodged a bullet because she was the most disruptive, trouble making person I've ever worked with.  And she had a weird attachment to our boss."  See, sometimes we have to thank these people for being so obviously unfit for the position.  But, back to what to say during the interview.  First, be warm and pleasant, but not over the top or too familiar.  I recently had an applicant come into my office, plop down in the chair and put one foot up on the seat and say, and I kid you not, "Hi girlfriend, how's it going?"  The memory of my boss's appalled face will give me years of happiness, but she basically made my decision for me right there.  He gave a thumbs down sign as he walked away and I started the process of getting her out of my office as fast as possible so I could go home and feed my dog. 
    Do some pre-interview preparation.  What are your strengths?  How will you use them to help the patients, the practice, the dentist and your co-workers?  Be ready with examples of things you've done before that will make you an asset to this practice.  What are you looking for in a work environment and what are you willing to give to make it great?  Be ready with some questions of your own.  What is the culture in this practice like?  Be prepared to comment on how that fits in with your philosophy of how you want to spend your day and career.  It the fit doesn't feel right, continue to be pleasant, but be prepared to keep looking.  You will spend half your waking hours at your job.  Be fair to yourself and the people who you'll be working with and find a place that suits you. 
    When the interview is ending, thank the interviewer for their time, tell her about your positive impressions of the practice and ask when you might hear from her.  Send a follow up letter thanking her for the interview and re-stating your positive impressions.  Follow up a few days after she told you she'd call with a polite call inquiring about the status of the hiring process.  I once got the job because I did that.  The office manager said it showed that I was truly interested.
    The person who called asking me for help will be an asset to a practice if she can just get the job.  Her aloofness comes from a little bit of shyness.  I noticed that when she greeted patients she was very warm and welcoming, but very reserved with the staff.  I asked her to try to pull that warm, welcoming side out at the interview.  When we interview we are trying to find someone who is qualified for the work, presents the image that we want for our practice, fits in easily with the staff, and treats our patients like gold.  We want someone who is going to be the person they show us at the interview.  Too often, an applicant knows all the right things to say, wows us at the interview and then a completely different persona shows up for the job.  It's a nightmare, (recently it seems like a recurring nightmare) and it strikes a death knell for the longevity of the new employee in the practice.  No one likes to be fooled or used and the staff resents anyone who comes in and threatens the culture of the practice. 
    So, I guess the bottom line is this, get your head on straight, understand the right reasons for working in a healthcare profession and figure out how to master yourself and make the behavior and attitudes that you know are desirable in an employee transfer from the interview to the actual job. If possible include a letter of reference from a former supervisor with your resume.  I was happy to write one for this hygienist.  Grow up, get real and be the person you present yourself to be.  The payoff will likely be a happy work life for you and your co-workers.
    And by the way, if you are a dentist in the Hendersonville/Asheville, NC area and need a good hygienist, let me know.  I know one who needs a job.

You See...I See...

   

It's all about your point of view.  You see yourself as fair, They see you as confusing.  You see them as being utterly ridiculous, They see themselves as thinking out of the box (just like you told them to).  You see me as being a meany, I see you as being childish.  So...what is the great equalizer?  The patient, of course.
    While we're all batting our points of view around, the patient may be waiting, and listening.  And wondering, "Where do I fit into all of that?"  The other day one of our hygienists had a few cancellations due to patients coming down with the flu.  The other, trying to be a nice, team player, moved one of her patients to the other's schedule.  The other hygienist ended up having a difficult prophy to do and was running behind.  The one who now didn't have a patient went to the waiting room to let the patient (that was supposed to be her's) know that it would be a few more minutes.  Then she anxiously walked back to her operatory and sat there with nothing to do while the patient continued to wait.  I shook my head (noticed lots of things rattling around up there), blinked (yes, I was awake even though I was hoping I was dreaming this)  and walked back and asked why the patient was being kept waiting.  I listened to the fairness explanation and then said, "Fair to the patient is what's important.  Bring her back and get going."  The other hygienist would have kept the patient waiting another 20 minutes.  How could we be seeing the same thing so differently?
    When all was said and done, I was fairly forceful in expressing my dissatisfaction with that scenario.  I knew the two staff members probably felt a little misunderstood about it, but I was surprised at how they described the scenario at lunch the next day.  We were out to eat and the front desk assistant was with us.  They brought it up and basically skimmed over the fact that the patient was kept waiting and flashed forward to "Linda was really angry."  Now, I didn't see myself as angry, per se, more like astonished that after working on perfecting patient service that anyone would think it was ok to keep someone waiting. 
    I could have reacted with annoyance, but I realized some dissection of the obviously not dead issue was necessary.    So, I thought about their intent.  Did they intend to make the patient wait?  Of course not.  They were trying to be good to each other.  They were inside their own heads thinking about how to work well together and not make one look better than the other.  Admirable thing for co-workers to care about each other that way.  The problem with that kind of thinking is that it's one dimensional.  They didn't think about how that would affect the patient, and in turn, how it would whip back around to affect them.  So, they saw two nice hygienists working well together, I saw two hygienists who didn't think it through and get to the bottom line, taking the best care of the patient.  I now also see one office manager who took a long time to consider the fact that at least they care about working well together and that's the positive in all of this.  Finally, knowing that, we can share a way to do it better next time.
    There are so many chances for I see, You see in a small community that is a dental practice.  I see you give her something, You see me acting envious.  I see her kissing up, You see her being friendly.  I see them gossiping, They see themselves chatting.  Flip it.  What's it all mean?  Where are those thoughts coming from?  Ask.  You may be surprised.  But, ask and be willing to listen and try to understand.  Otherwise, next time they'll just shrug and walk away, they won't trust you anymore.  Listen, try to understand, and try to come to a solution that works.  I see that you feel________, tell me about it.  I see it this way_______________.  I understand what you're saying, do you understand how I see it?   How can we make this work? 
    The key is in developing a common point of view on everything that affects patient care.  Otherwise, you can spend all day talking around thoughts and feelings while your patients grow discouraged and disappointed until finally they disappear.  Then, you'll be able to agree on, "I see the unemployment office."  "Oh yes, I see it, too."  "Why didn't we see it all more clearly when we still had the chance?"

Step Up

Now, more than ever, the entire dental team needs to step up and take responsibility for the health of the practice.  If you've been riding on the bus and enjoying the view, BOOM!, your bus might have a flat tire or two.  At the very least, take some responsibility and check the tire pressure.

A lot of the time the staff sees the dentist as the person who is responsible for worrying about the health of the practice.  After all, it's his business, his profit, his baby, right?  Well, it's time to face reality.  If we all don't take responsibility for the health of the practices we work in, we will all be out of a job.  It's that plain and simple.

Look around you.  People are struggling and losing their jobs every day.  We all happen to be fortunate to work in an area that can survive longer than luxury or non-essential type services.  People need to be pain-free.  It's your responsibility to make them understand that preventing problems now, will prevent expensive, painful problems in the future.  You must add value to their treatment and make them feel like it was money well-spent.

There is a popular acronym right now, "WIIFM."  "What's In It For Me?"  Does that describe your thought pattern?  If it does, let me tell you what's in it for you when you work to keep the practice healthy.  You get to keep your job.  There are no other jobs out there.  That's the way it is right now.  If you don't work to keep the practice healthy, the dentist has no choice except to look at the staff and see who he can get along without.  If I were the dentist, I'd eliminate the person with the WIIFM attitude first. 

Often, practices evolve into a familial pattern with the dentist in the patriarch or matriarch role.  Sometimes there is a staff member who can and will assume the other parental role.  The staff seems to take on a dependent role.  They wait to be told what to do and even though they may be obedient, they don't bring any additional support to the family dynamic.  In other practices, there may even be an element of dysfunction and those practices will suffer the most in a poor economy.  That is because the focus will always center more around personalities and problems for the staff.  The dentist or manager will not be able to redirect their attention to the practice and the patients because they will always be more concerned with what's fair and getting what's "theirs." 

It's time to step up and help change the flat tires, or even push the bus if that's what it takes to keep forward momentum and progress.  Take a good look at the leaders of your team and think about what it is like for them right now.  Chances are they spend most of their time thinking of ways to keep the practice healthy.  Stop watching a start participating.  Even if you're not an idea person, get in there and serve your patients better than you ever have before.  Educate them about their oral health and let them know what needs to be taken care of immediately as opposed to what can wait.  During staff meetings, brainstorm, come up with ideas and solutions.  Talk about what works and what needs tweaking. 

Step up and take some ownership of "your" practice.  Ownership involves more than a signature on a document.  It can mean caring about something so much that it doesn't matter who profits if it does well. It means realizing that any loss in the practice, is your loss, as well.  It means wrapping your arms around your practice and helping it weather any storm.  It means thinking of something as yours because you realize that you are a part of it's success or failure...and it is a part of your's. 

Dentists, foster this feeling of ownership among your staff by admitting you need their help.  Let them know that without them behind you, you can't carry the whole practice.  Ask them to pull together with you and tell them you understand that the role that each of them play is a vital one.  Keep your eye on the horizon and tell them what you see.  Paint them a picture of the success you envision.  Then paint them into that picture and help them visualize a time in the future when you will sit down for a staff meeting and say, "We did it."

You Just Don't Know

You just don't know what someone else is going through.  The grumpy patient, the snippy co-worker, the boss who seems to have a chip on his shoulder, the manager who you just can't please today no matter what! What's going on that you just don't know?

I was just watching, or at least in the same room while my husband was watching, ESPN.  Larry Fitzgerald of the Arizona Cardinals was being interviewed.  The interviewer asked him about his long dreadlocks, which I had thought seemed ridiculous streaming from his helmet during the Super Bowl.  He told the interviewer that he began growing his hair when his mother died in 2003.  This dignified young man went on to explain how much his mother meant to him and his family.  He said that he'd been called home when she'd come to the end of her battle with cancer, but that she'd slipped into a coma before he'd gotten there, and he'd never made his peace with her.  He said that he'd gotten annoyed with her for reprimanding him about a month before she died, so he had put off calling her.  He never spoke to her again.  If he had the chance, he said he tell her, "I'm sorry for disrespecting you."  I was in tears by the end of the interview.  Who would have guessed that this seemingly carefree, maybe even arrogant player was actually a poised, sensitive and sincere young man.  Not an arrogant bone in his body, never mind carefree.  That was just the story my eyes were telling me without any justification whatsoever. 

It's a reminder for me to keep my judgments in check.  You can not tell how someone is by what you see.  You can not tell everything about someone by how they are acting at the moment.  You can not expect an explanation for why they are behaving in a way that offends you at this moment.  You can only choose.  You can choose to open your mind, step outside your box and see this as another person with a story all his own.  You can choose to love him without knowing the story.  You can choose to let him act without sucking it all into your own ego and making it about you, it probably isn't. 

You can understand that you don't know what you don't know and try to just let him live his pain today.  Maybe tomorrow someone will realize they don't know what they don't know about you.  Or maybe you'll be lucky and there'll be nothing to wonder about.

Excellent Is The Enemy Of Good Enough

You're kidding right?  That's what I thought when someone said those very words to me the other day.  "Excellent is the enemy of good enough."  I tried to convince her that she'd misspoken, "You mean, good enough is the enemy of excellent, don't you?",  I semi-pleaded.  This was someone who seemed pretty sharp.  Weren't we on the same wave length? 
I was reading an essay on contentment on Tom Morris' website The Morris Institute for Human Values.  The essay was titled The Tyranny of the Ideal.  The following passage really hit home for me:

"When we let our yearning for perfection, or the ideal, rob us of our joy and ability to find contentment in what’s here and now real—at least when what’s real is indeed worthy of our love and appreciation—we’re not being wise or philosophical. We’re being fools, having abdicated most all the joy of which we’re capable in this life."  ~Dave Baggett~

As I read that I thought about what my friend said the other day and it made sense.  Here's why:  excellence is a worthy thing to strive for, but good enough is what we'll find ourselves with more often.  If we spend too much time bemoaning the absence of excellence, we are wasting time and ensuring less excellence.  There are things that we should really pursue excellence for.  The placement of an implant, the quality of our interactions with our patients and our families, but there are many things that are good enough when they're good enough. 

Most people are good enough.  We can all work to have moments of excellence, but we can accept ourselves as the humans we are and go with good enough sometimes.  We can surely accept good enough in others.  If we don't we may find ourselves wondering why we're so misunderstood.  You may have heard, "it's the little things that count", but often, we get hung up on little things that really don't count for much of anything.  It's the nit-picking little things that can cause big stress.  You can focus on why the new assistant can't set up the room exactly like you showed her.  "Look, the cotton rolls go here."  Or...you can be content that she did her best this time and will likely remember where the cotton rolls go before long.  In that case, excellent may be a work in progress.  Sometimes excellent takes it's time and we have to be satisfied with good enough for a while until excellence finally arrives.  And if it never quite makes it to the station?  Can we live with good enough?  I hope so, or there'll be a lot more disappointments than contentments.

Persist

I had a surprisingly unpleasant exchange on the Hygienetown forum recently.  Surprising because I'd always had good and pleasant responses on that forum in the past.  Unpleasant because of the in your face nastiness.  A hygienist had posted a story complaining about how some assistants in her office were acting.  Some of the responders replied that assistants should clean hygienists rooms if they weren't working on something important.  Another suggested a good smack in the back of the head.  Of course she added just kidding with a smiley face afterward, but let's face it, there's usually a bit of truth in those statements.  When I objected I was basically told to shut up and get lost, not quite in those words, but the message was clear.
You might think this is just silly, and who cares what happens on an online forum.  I think it's a little like peeking into a girl's night out.  Is this really how it is?  Is this the way we want our staff members to think about each other?  I think that having the ability to think about other team members in such a negative way is a threat to the health of the team.  Lest you think I'm picking on hygienists, I'm not.  There are plenty of assistants and front desk employees who indulge in this nonsense, too.  Even dentists themselves can fall prey to believing in stereotypes.
It's all a waste of time and a distraction.  We really need to look at the person, not the title.  I truly believe people strive to do the best they can.  The limiting factor is that they are only working with what they know at that point.  No one wants to fail or be disliked.  Sometimes people just don't know how to do better.  Sometimes I don't.  There are times that I'm astonished to find myself in the same uncomfortable situation yet again.  Sometimes people find themselves repeating defeating behaviors over and over, all the while promising themselves never to do that very thing again.
Maybe the answer is persistence.  Persist in loving that person no matter what they do.  Persist in modeling positive attitudes and behaviors.  Persist in turning the other cheek.  Open dialogue and listen.  What is really behind the attitude?  I have done it in the past and it's not easy.  The result was worth it though.  It feels great to work through a very difficult situation to resolution.
When you keep trying to make positive changes you at least assure yourself of one thing.  You're not being negative and that's a big thing.  The da vs rdh scenario is a bad habit that needs to be broken.  We've done that in our office.  How about you?  What's your story?