How to retain team members?
Retaining team members has always been a challenge to the dental professionals. Our education system has never promoted dental assisting as a long-term career opportunity to the students. Those who are currently working as dental assistants, usually keep finding newer career opportunities while they are still working in a dental clinic.
Why do dental assistants keep exploring new career opportunities?
Is there a way to change the mindset of the dental assistants?
W have been trying to find answers to these questions since a very long time. We have been interviewing store managers, salesmen, office boys, receptionists & students who are searching new career opportunities.
They were asked questions related to their salary expectations, job roles & responsibilities, and related to their vision related to personal & professional growth when they are looking for a new career opportunity or in their existing career.
My observations were as follows
1. Employees are generally looking for a stable job with a reasonable growth prospectus.
2. Employees are not the leaders and they are always awaiting some direction from the employer or the boss.
3. Employees generally do not have a long-term vision about their own personal life & professional career.
4. Employees do not have idea about the vision and mission of the business and so are lost without a clear long-term direction for their performance.
6. Employees always have insecurity of their job which always keeps them under pressure.
7. Employees need a comfortable & friendly work environment / work culture in their workplace.
Can we correlate above observations to our dental practice and team members?
Is it possible to change few things in our practice that can change mind set of the team members?
Our Dental Clinics are a very small places with a very few people entering in the practice on a daily basis. This makes most of the dental clinics a lonely place. There is usually no inspiring work culture in the practice. Our team members do not have a specific job role, responsibility & accountability. Most importantly, our employees are not able to align their personal and professional growth with the vision, mission & related growth of the practice.
Things that can make a difference and help you to retain your employees over a long term are –
1. Assign a role for each team member in your practice.
2. Make a list of responsibilities for each team member. Allow your team members to make decisions within the scope of their job role.
3.Discussion of vision & mission of the practice with the team members not only helps to improve the productivity but also helps them to foresee a future growth opportunity for their personal & professional career in your practice.
4. Monthly appraisals will help you to fairly evaluate employee’s performance & the weaker areas where you can train them more.
5. A schedule of training will also help us to keep them motivated and improve the performance.
We at DBM are trying to make simple resources available so that it can address all the upcoming challenges that your dental business may face, in a more effective way.
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