In the last two BB posts, we’ve discussed the terrific challenge of attracting and keeping great staff. I’ve shared my belief that we’ve reached an all-time apex in the extent of this challenge, and we likely realized this in private practice a good year before other industries and certainly the media seemed to notice. I’m paying really close attention, Friends, and by all indications, this is the new and likely lasting normal.
That well established in our discussion, we remember one of the great truisms of achievement: Challenge always equals opportunity. Although it sometimes takes a little creativity to see it, it is literally an equation. That established, the great challenge, and therefore opportunity, of our day is to make a paradigm shift from the traditional task of hiring (filling a position) to a here-forward and always present effort of recruiting. It’s a time to shift our thinking from getting candidates for a position to creating a pipeline that’s always there.
We’ve also established that we recruit based on purpose and deliberate culture. Then when it’s time to hire, we do so based on a person’s alignment with the purpose of culture. We hire for purpose first, position second. Clearly, this is the new and likely lasting normal.
So, Colleagues, we’re on a mission to deliberately establish, and be always building, the winning practice/team culture (the reason people stay or go in the end) and steadily, continuously recruit into that culture. Pretty much every day from now on, not just when hiring. And as we often do in the blog, I’d love to share a few specific strategies colleagues are implementing of late to do just that, as opposed to just trying to outbid Raising Canes, COSTCO and the others in the news for their starting wages. (Not to say wage and wage inflation isn’t part of all this, but for us in small business, it will to have to be more.)
So, let’s have a look at what colleagues out there are doing in real-time.
- A colleague brought her team together for lunch to brainstorm the adjectives they would choose to describe their most desired workplace. The workplace of their dreams, we called it (as distinguished from the job of their dreams – the latter is likely a unicorn in my experience). From this, we formed the practice’s first ever Culture Statement, and what a difference this is making! We know people support what they help create, and we’ve created a self-fulfilling prophecy here.
- A colleague’s bonus structure had been in place for years and as a result, lost its luster. It had become an expectation rather than a motivation, as stagnant bonus systems always do, which is clearly not what we intended (sound familiar? Make no mistake, the idea of a bonus system is now and always was incentive, not expectation!). So we decided to shake and stir, and with team input, established a greatly improved bonus system where 50 percent of the allocated bonus going forward is based on our team-selected three production metrics, and 50 percent is based on “conduciveness to culture.” Yes, we actually pulled that off, and the practice mood is (forever, I think) different. People have actually come in to ask if we’re hiring based on what they’ve heard about this practice’s team culture from its team members. WHAT?! Yes, in this new normal. It’s going to be harder and harder, Colleagues, to outbid the hourly wage of all the businesses (local AND national) coming after your staff. Let’s pay as well as we can, of course, but let’s be more creative than they are.
- We’re designating a new organizational position in client practices we’re calling Communication Coordinator, and focusing on better, clearer, more upbeat team communication as a distinct Leadership Team role (this as distinguished from their “regular job”). This person is also posting quotes from patients and team members every month on the socials. Rather than posting something about National Coffee Week (frankly, a complete waste of everyone’s time – leave that one for Starbucks!), they’re posting about changing lives through vision! Communication is like all subjects management -- it’s a decision first.
- Some of our teams are doing a monthly team newsletter featuring something about the life and times of a given team member. In one such practice, we branded this letter The Navigator, after some fun team input strategies. Another colleague team is highlighting a patient quote of the month and a team member quote of the month, generating all kinds of positive “I like working here” energy!
- We’ve been implementing what we’re calling Culture Club in a lot of client practices this past year, planning quarterly team events, and teams are loving it! One practice recently had a Top Golf event, and even the non-golfers had a blast just hangin’ with the team with the “off duty” light on!
- A number of colleagues have also implemented during the strain of the “Virus Era” a “Love the Effort Award,” which they’re giving to team members when we … well… love their effort! One group is calling this the “Crushed It Award.” This is exactly the kind initiative that creates a self-fulfilling prophecy for culture.
- An oldie-but-goodie we’ve dusted off and rekindled in many client practices is a monthly potluck lunch in the office, and we’re having a ball with this. The practice supplies some kind of main dish, and it’s crazy how creative people get with what they bring. By the way, patients coming and going in the practice during these times love seeing this, and on several occasions have commented that they’re going to do that at work. Great culture is contagious, Colleagues.
- Another one I particularly love (and always recommend as part of the yearly marketing plan) is practice teams putting on a major charitable event. I’ve long advocated doing this annually, but it has been particularly helpful to culture and difference-making to community during the Virus Era. I love watching the outcome and the energy generated by teams building steam with their event year after year. We often invite patients and their families to participate, and even a few times, to bring the dog! And by the way, we see tons of new patients from this – Good Old Marketing Rule #6 – if it’s good for the patient (community in this case), it’s good for the practice!
- Some colleagues are giving staff their birthday afternoons (or mornings if more applicable) off. This one can bring some logistics challenges and expense, but wow, do teams LOVE this.
- A strategy I’m seeing in more and more practices is expanding staff benefits in creative ways. This does not have to mean expanding expenses. We recently significantly expanded staff benefits in a client practice that offered some help toward health insurance by setting up benefits for their staff in a neighboring dental and veterinary practice. Didn’t cost a dime and a great little perk that shows we care and we’re doing what we can. This is not at all unlike the Vision Benefits Program we offer to neighboring businesses, only this time we’re the beneficiary rather than the provider!
- When clients do promotional events in the practice (trunk shows, etc.) we work hard to include staff in the planning and follow their lead. We also have team presence prominent at these events and make it obvious we’re proud of and love showing off our team! Community recognition of our team in their workplace helps add some lasting self-fulfilling prophecy to “this is where I work.” Culture, Colleagues. Culture.
-I love the strategy of having a practice business card tailored specifically for recruiting (include your culture statement on the back) and encouraging all team members to hand this to people out there in the community whenever the opportunity presents itself (and let’s be creative about such opportunities!). When someone has provided good and earnest service in your life as a customer, compliment her/him and let her/him know she/he is exactly the kind of person we love having on our team (that’s how I like to say it). We might even occasionally hand this to patients we feel are a special fit with our desired workplace in the same way of speaking.
-We’ll often form a Practice Intern position in client practices and constantly recruit for this. Don’t hesitate to bring on more than one intern at once if the opportunity presents itself (it never rains and then it pours, right?), and don’t feel like you need all the details perfectly in place before acting on this. We are in a time when we need to get strategies out there working, even if they aren’t finely polished, and evolve as we go. Something out there NOW is often better than perfect LATER. There are companies who make a living on this concept right this minute – Dane here at THRIVE worked for one such group, and they have evolved this into their main long-term employee recruiting system. It works.
-Don’t be specific about duties when recruiting, nor overly specific when hiring, in this new normal. Keep it more to a serving and workplace mentality, meaningfulness and satisfaction of our work, changing lives, philosophy of community, etc. As a general rule, the more specific we are about responsibilities, the fewer opportunities we have. There are times we prefer to limit applicants, but these are largely not those times.
-In all client practices, we keep on keeping on with those weekly Team Vitals Huddles. Not only do they cause an unstoppable bias toward practice growth, but also an ownership-like self-fulling prophecy (i.e. “we are a team, this is our practice, these are our goals, this is how we’ll cause impact …”)
This seems a strategic time to revisit our working definition of Management. We’ve defined management as choosing to control outcomes. Like most subjects of management, managing culture is about making that choice … that decision. Then it’s powering that decision with a set of initiatives that drive that decision to fruition. This is management by objective, as opposed to management by hope; and it works a whole lot better, friends. Especially in these times.
Well, that’s a wrap, Colleagues! We’ve managed a pretty comprehensive conversation these last three posts on recruiting in lieu of hiring, purpose in lieu of position and culture in lieu of just outbidding competitors for your staff. So let’s conclude with this … People come to a team, stay on a team, or leave a team because of culture. Perceived culture from our recruiting efforts, then proven culture from our leadership. And they will no longer tolerate faking it. If it’s not real, they’re gone. Today’s generations of the workforce value the experience they have working with your team and serving your customer much more than they value the concept of employer loyalty. That can be frustrating, but I have to be straight with you and say I believe this can actually be a really GOOD thing!.
Like all THRIVE content, the purpose of BOWEN’S BLOG and SUMMIT TALK Podlecture conversations is to keep us driving toward IMPACT. If something here has struck a chord, shoot us an email or give us a call and let’s talk it out! Tbowen@mythrivecoaches.com or 402-794-4064.