Staff retainment and recruitment has been one of the largest challenges facing dental practices since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
With workforce shortages affecting practices nationwide, many owners have to work at learning the best ways to keep their staff happy, especially when increased pay is becoming less of an advantage.
Three dental leaders and professionals spoke with Becker's about how dental practices can leverage workplace culture for their staff in 2023.
Editor's note: Responses were lightly edited for clarity and length.
Question: How can dental practices enhance and leverage workplace culture to retain and attract staff in 2023?
Kristen Cusack. CEO of Phase 1 Equity (Chicago): One of the best assets a dental practice can cultivate is a spirit of teamwork that clearly demonstrates the value of each person on the team. When people feel valued, they work harder, stay longer and are more satisfied. To be successful, practice leaders need to engage regularly with staff with both positive and constructive feedback and empower them to actively contribute to ongoing improvement of the practice and its culture.
A best practice I have seen at Phase 1 is a morning huddle, in which different team members take the lead each day, and all team members contribute and share their responsibilities for the day. The meeting includes a patient story and ends on a positive note with something fun like music or an appropriate joke or video. The whole meeting reinforces positive practice culture every day in just a few minutes.
Andy Droel, DDS. Droel Family Dentistry (Lino Lakes, Minn.): A workplace that is built around enriching its owners financially as its primary goal will always struggle to retain employees. Increasingly, healthcare employees want to work in settings where they can show up and be recognized as individuals, contribute according to their own personal and professional strengths, and feel like they are making a real difference in clients' lives. There are no shortcuts, playbooks or quick fixes to make this happen in a workplace. It takes earnest, sincere, sustained effort on the part of leaders to build such a culture, significant aspects of which will be unique to each practice that succeeds in this realm.
Larry Stewart, DDS. Texas Oral Surgery Group (Plano): It all starts with strong leadership! As the "captain of the ship" it's important that our staff know we are open, sincere and available and that we set clearly defined goals. Employees want to know that leadership is committed to growth and personal and professional development in order to have "buy-in" to the company culture. As smart leaders, we need to focus on those employees that are open and receptive to change and growth as these "culture change warriors" are the future of your practice. Once you have staff values aligned with your values, then the workplace environment naturally becomes a pleasant and productive experience with increased job satisfaction and performance, with reduced employee turnover. It's been my experience that a happy staff attracts and motivates other happy and productive staff!