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Are you wearing too many different hats in your practice? Having admin help can really help you take things off your plate. Also, hiring an associate could do that too by bringing. Being able to have you be able to see more patients within the practice without you having to see them yourself. And they could also be making money for you in your practice, even when you’re not there.
But how do you find the right admin or associate? So that’s what we’re gonna be talking about today. This is Chen Yen, your 6 and 7 figure Practice Makeover Mentor at introvertedvisionary.com, your host for the ChiroSecure Show today. So how do you attract and then. Find and decide to hire the right admin or associate.
So let me share with you three steps that I help our clients with many times through this. Like looking at how best to do this. So the first step is to find and. , when you are in this place of finding, there are a couple of considerations. For example, deciding on who best to hire and when. Sometimes the biggest mistakes in when hiring have to do with hiring someone either too early in advance and then not being able to cover the their pay in a way that feels good for you.
and then can create some pressure or stress, or it could be hiring too late and then or feeling like you need to hire someone yesterday because you are already stretched too thin. So the best thing is to find somewhere in between that, where you’re not in, in both ends of the extreme. And so how do you decide?
What order and when to hire someone so that, that’s one, one key to get figured out. And also what, in terms of, I would say the overall advice I would give for that is ideally if you are already starting to. For c that you are getting busier and that could be happening this year based on trends of what’s been happening in your practice.
Then already start, look, be looking because there’s nothing that it, it’s great to, to be looking and even if you don’t hire anyone, you still have potential candidates for when you’re ready to pull the trigger. Whereas if you wait too long to start looking, then you might get to the point where you either, maybe it is.
For example, maybe you do have somebody who is a great admin or great associate right now, but then they decide to leave and then you weren’t expecting they weren’t going to leave, and so all of a sudden you don’t have anyone. That can create, this sense of just hiring anybody you, you find as soon as possible because you really want somebody to fill in the gaps so that you don’t have to do the work.
And then that’s when hiring decisions could be made in such a way that it’s, it doesn’t really help you in the long run. And maybe there’s a higher chance of turn. So it’s always good to be looking even if you aren’t ready to hire and pull the trigger yet. Now what the other. Piece of this is, what do you do if you, that I get asked a lot by chiropractors and other holistic practitioners is what do you do if you can’t, you don’t feel like you can’t afford someone yet.
So I will say there are a couple of things, and one is from the practical side of things, and then the other is a more of a mindset side of things. So let’s talk a little bit first about the mindset side of things actually, because many times if we’re used to doing things ourselves, . And then we also just look at the numbers.
We, we can often think if I hire someone, then it’s an expense, and then I’m not able to keep as much of that money in my pocket. So it’s very easy to feel that way, especially if you haven’t really hired before or if you’re just making your next big decision and, and your next decision about hiring.
And it could feel like a really big leap. And so the. , but one very powerful shift that I’ve seen of chiropractors who are making multi six and seven figures. The one biggest distinction in shifting from earlier growth to later, later stages of growth is to hire a little bit ahead of when you absolutely meet them.
Them and it could, it could feel either scary or it could feel like it’s a, it’s added pressure at. , it might feel that way, but in the long run, you are going to it’s the only way to go beyond doing more, know, doing all these things yourself. So it’s something that sometimes we may think we can’t afford it, but sometimes it’s we can’t afford not to hire someone.
Also, even if in the short-term it might feel like we might be making less money in that timeframe. So how do you deal with that one? One possibility is to
like in terms of if you feel like you can’t afford something, there are a couple of things you could do. One is you could start saving up for a hire. So putting away a set amount of money every month towards this investment of a new hire. And then the second possibility is you could hire someone perhaps less experienced, whether it’s someone who is more of an do someone who’s in school, if this is for admin.
And then train them up, or maybe they just graduated and train them up. So then you may not be paying them as much as somebody more experienced. But the drawback of that too is you would need to be putting more time into that. So it may or may not be worth it, but that is a possibility as well. If you feel like you, you can’t quite afford it yet.
And then the other thing is to start, how do you deal with it if you feel like you can’t afford it yet? It’s to. Looking at how you can put systems in place that support attracting new patients. into the practice or bring in more revenue into the practice because when you have more revenue to work with then you’ll less likely feel like you, you can’t afford it.
Seeking that’s, for example, many of our clients come to us for that reason where they feel like they’re not really sure what to do outside of what they’re already doing to be bringing patients and without having to spend more, money on marketing and that kind. So getting that figured out before you end up hiring someone can also help with cash flow.
Now in this step of deciding who and when, like under the fi step one find, right? It’s also helpful to create a, an attractive job ad , there’s a job ad and then there’s a job description. And many times people mix the two together. What is the difference between the two? So one biggest mistake a lot of chiropractors make is to when they’re looking for someone, they tend to post an ad.
That’s pretty much like a job description. And what that often means is it’s boring and it’s I’m looking for someone who can do this. Because what it is it’s like roles and responsibilities and then your expectations of the role and what you want. But when a person is looking for a job they’re looking at will this be a great opportunity for me?
and so because that’s how they’re looking at things. If you would love to attract people who are great talent, like people you can count on, people who you enjoy working with, people who are really aligned with who you are, then it’s helpful to have something that attracts them in that way. And so what you actually need is more of a job ad, which is written in such a way that is first and foremost written.
in a way that attracts them. So it’s a different type of style of writing in terms of what you put in it. And that’s one hot tip. And so the other, the second step is the is so once step one is fine, and then step two is to screen. So once you have actually found the right person, and by the way, there are different ways of attract.
that person. So there you could either be putting a job ad up or you could be connecting with people and talking about it, and sharing about it. One of, one of my CLI clients she said that one of her admin hires was hired because of this, being able to she shared about it and someone said, oh, I actually feel like I know someone for that role.
Right? Another avenue of attracting a good candidate, whether it’s for an admin role or an associate role, is by doing active recruiting. So what is active recruiting? Active recruiting is more of, if someone isn’t actively posting on a job board and then saying, I would or responding to a job board.
Like they’re actually people who are thinking about making a change but haven’t pulled the trigger yet. Or maybe they’re not thinking about making a change, but they would actually make a change if it were a really good opportu. For example, there’s a practitioner I know who, who called me once and she said, This other practitioner scooped up my admin person and she was all upset about it, right?
And I thought, actually, that person’s pretty smart . She knew that this admin person was really good and then scooped her up. And that’s one example of active recruiting. But I, in terms of active recruiting, how could you reach out to those people without feeling like you’re like being pushy or salesy or just like random saying, help, hey, come work for me.
There are, you could either reach out, there are ways to reach out in LinkedIn, for example, when our clients work with us, we actually give them a copy and paste LinkedIn script that they can send over and to as outreach to potential candidates on LinkedIn or potential people they see and they’re like, oh, I like this person’s background.
Perhaps there’s possibility for to see if this person might be interested or know someone. So that’s one avenue. Another avenue is that you could reach out. To either clinics in the area and then talk to their, for example, if it’s admin hire, talk to their front desk and mention that you are looking for someone like that.
And in case they come across anyone who may be interested to, to be in touch with you. That’s one possibility. And you don’t have to be making those calls by the way. You could have someone on your team or hire somebody to do that. So that’s an ex, those are some examples of active recruiting.
It’s optional, but it’s a possibility. . Now, the oh, and actually before we get into the screening step I do wanna share one quick thing about the two other things. So under the find, step one, find it’s decide who and when. Also evaluate the pay and and type of hire you would like.
So should you hire someone brick and mortar, should you hire someone? Virtually, and, it’s pretty awesome the kinds of roles you could hire someone virtually these days that as a chiropractic, as a chiropractor, you may not have even thought about doing. But there are chiropractors who do this and have virtual help, which means you don’t have to be paying for overhead costs for that person being in your office.
And many times they will also be they will use their own equipment at home and that kind of thing too. , what kind of roles could you look at virtual hire hires for? You could look at hi hiring admin help, who can help you with admin things virtually or even chart noting virtually yes, they’re even HIPAA compliant virtual assistants that you can find where they are able to do chart noting.
while you’re in the room. And then that way, cuz have you ever felt like you, you hate the chart noting part, right? You love seeing patients, but you hate having to take all those notes. It’s so tedious, so time consuming. And then you end up not doing it in between visits and then later on by the end of the day you have this , like you just feel like, oh, I gotta sit here and do all these chart, this charting before I can go home.
And then, so that can feel draining. But if you had somebody chart noting in the room while you’re seeing your patients and then afterwards you just update it a bit and then it’s done. So that’s an example of a role you could even hire a virtual assistant for, you could hire virtual receptionist, help.
You could also hire. Virtual help to help you relate it to marketing types of things. Some do copywriting and or some are more in the tech side of things. So there’s a whole range of what you can hire for on, on this. And I actually did a free webinar on this. And so if you have an interest in learning more about that or understanding that more, cause it’s a, I feel like it.
It’s something that a lot of chiropractors don’t even think about, but it’s, it’s, there’s some good opportunity for you to be able to hire people without huge overhead costs and that kind of thing. Feel free to message me or you can go to our website@introvertedvisionary.com and request it and happy to share that with you.
So as far as the evaluating pay and the type of hire you could consider, Does that make sense for them to be an independent contractor or an employee? So there’s some different considerations with that as well. There’s some pros and cons to each and also a legalities to each that you’ll need to be kosher with the laws of your state and profession and country for now, independent contractor.
One drawback of independent contractor is that. . Just think about the mindset of somebody who is an independent contractor. Many times they’ll feel like this is my own business and so I can of do what I’d like. And so that, that is one potential drawback of an independent contractor.
, although sometimes with the pros of it is that, it’s, it could be easier to let them go if you don’t feel like it, it works out, or and and then usually they’re responsible for their own taxes and things like that. So they’re different things to weigh their, and pros and cons of that.
And then depending on the role itself as well. Now let’s look at the oh, and then the. So the third step, it w sorry, third step. This is still under step one. Find, so I brought up under find the step one about finding the right hire is deciding who and when. And then evaluate, pay, and type of hire virtual or brick and mortar.
What kind of type. And then the, and then then it’s getting the word out, which I talked a little bit about as far as please get the word out. Now, step two then is to screen. For the right hire. So do you have an effective screening process in place? What is your screening process? Should it I often get asked, this is should it, how many interviews would it be?
Would it be best? And at what point do I bring them in for an interview? Instead of doing it more by phone or. or via Zoom? I personally recommend having a short phone interview, like more of a initial screening interview because have you ever felt like it, it’s so time consuming to, to be screening candidates and then it’s, you have to go through piles of resumes and then when you, it comes down to interviewing, it takes time so you can cut down your interviewing time and this whole process.
By doing a quick phone screen first, and then through that phone screen, then you could decide, okay, do I want to interview this person at greater length? And it could be done via phone or Zoom or if you really wanted to already bring them in your office, you can for that next interview. But many times our clients end up doing a quick initial phone interview and then they do something more by Zoom and then if things are good there, then moving on to the process of bringing them in the office and.
Having a good process for when you do reference checks as well as do you actually have it’s funny because I was just talking to a practitioner the other day and she said, I forgot, I totally forgot to check references. And she was trying to decide between a couple of candidates and she totally forgot to check references, even though, it was something that was under her radar.
But it wasn’t in that moment. And so then do you have powerful interview questions? So are the questions ones that pretty much, cuz most people prepare for interviews and many will tell you what they think you wanna hear. So do you have interview questions that helps us suss out the right kind of a hire without you feeling like you are yeah without feeling like it is just, you just hear some canned answers and you can’t.
Do too much with that. I’m gonna share with you one hot interview question. A lot of our clients love our interview questions template cuz they, they haven’t really heard the ones that I’ve shared before with them, and this comes from many years of experience. I didn’t mention this, but I actually ha I have a recruiting business and a separate business that’s our recruiting business.
We help chiropractors. Growing their practices and two multi six and seven figures and the introverted way. But we also have a recruiting business of separate it. It’s not in the chiropractic field, but. But from that experience of helping pharmacists get into jobs that they enjoy.
So over many years many years, of trial and error and learning and making mistakes and and then learning from those lessons. Also investing a lot to to figure out and learn what works best in screening. So we’ve pretty much dialed in some really a great screening process, including great interview questions to ask.
So many of our clients end up commenting on that. They’re like, oh never thought of that one before. That one’s really good. I’m gonna share with you one, one interview question that I really like that comes from the book through, and it’s it’s this what who are your last three bosses or your last three supervisors and then, find out the names of them and then say, what do you feel they would rate you on a scale of one through 10 in performance?
When we talk to them, not if we talk to them, but when? Because if you say that, then they’re gonna be more. about what they actually say, because you’re gonna talk to them and we’ll see if it matches up. And then the other thing is then you can ask, what did they what do you feel they will say about your strengths?
What do you feel they will say about your areas for improvement? So if you can ask it in this way, then , people tend to be more vigilant about what they say, and I, instead of just telling you what they, the, instead of just telling you the blanket kind of, oh, my strengths are this and this, and you can say whatever you want.
So that’s a great question. I love to ask. One thing I also noticed from that question sometimes is where people end up saying some not so positive things about their supervisor. When that question is asked sometimes, and so that, that might be a red flag, so yeah. So do you have powerful interview questions, not only in the initial phone screen, but also in, as you google further along in the interview process to help you suss out a candidate and then also be able to help you work well with this person too.
And then do you have good evaluating fit tools, or is it just that’s it, like you just do. an inter some interviews and reference checks. Is that all you do or do you have other aspects of the screening process as far as tools that, that you use that support you with making a good decision? When you have these things in place, it can literally help you half your hiring time and reduce turnover and the cost of turnover.
And the heartache of turnover. And it could help you truly have somebody you enjoy working with. And who else who is more likely to stay too? . If you are at a place where you are thinking about hiring, then already start thinking about some of the things that I brought up to you today in terms of who would be the best hire and and what is it that I would love to are some of their qualities and even be putting the feelers out there.
Be advertising for it already, and then if you would like to have access to that free masterclass I shared about the how to hi. Find a, what, how to hire a virtual assistant to take things off your plate. That’s also something you can ask me for you can message me about.
And then if you would like six and seven figure practice makeover tips or would like help with where your practice, you’re welcome to go to introverted visionary.com. So next time.
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