Cassie Kellner [00:00:01]:
Welcome to The Bloom Effect. I'm your host, Cassie Kellner, former chairside assistant turned team coach and founder of Everbloom. This podcast is all about the real stuff, honest convos, leadership lessons, and the heart behind thriving orthodontic teams. If you're ready to grow, lead, and bloom, let's dive in. Hi everyone, welcome back to The Bloom Effect podcast. I'm so glad you're here because we're just getting into something that I am genuinely fired up about, and I mean fired up in the best way, because this is a topic that I've been sitting with for 22 years. 22 years of me watching practices struggle with the same problem, and it's finally time that we talk about it out loud. Okay, so you just get me today. We're solo. I love doing these. Today we're talking about— are you guys ready? Team turnover. So specifically, I want to talk about why your best people keep leaving and why the answer has nothing to do with the people themselves. Now, plenty of times if people are leaving, it does have to do with them, right? But I'm talking about when people leave and you go, oh my gosh, I wasn't expecting that. This is really wild. How do we get them to stay? What do we do? Right? So if you're a practice owner in an office, you're an office manager, you're a team lead, or honestly, you're anyone who has watched a great team member/employee walk out the door and you're wondering what the hell went wrong, this episode is for you. So let's get into it. Okay. I want to start with a story. A few years ago, I was working with a practice, beautiful office, incredibly talented doctor, genuinely good humans on the team, and they were hemorrhaging staff like constantly in the span of about 18 months. So a year and a half, they had gone through I think it was between 5 and 6 clinical assistants. You guys, that's a lot. And every single time someone left, the same conversations were happening. The doctor would go, why? I just don't understand. We pay well. We have a really good culture because let's get real, culture could have been a part of it, but they had a good culture. So I don't understand why no one wants to stay. And let's say that this this, uh, well, in this scenario, this person left to just go into an entirely different industry, right? And that happens often. And most times practice leaders are like, listen, I want my people to grow. And if they want to leave to go into something different, then I'm happy that they were here with us and that they were able to grow with our team and they accomplished so much and they learned so much and we were a part of their day-to-day for X amount of years. I want to spend some time here. Okay. So I was in this practice and I sat in on just an observation, right? And they were training a new hire. And I really watched what happened when a patient came in and a new assistant didn't know the protocol. Right? This is very common in our industry. I watched a senior team member sigh and take over without explaining how to do anything from the new hire's chair. I watched the new person smile and nod and look completely lost. Take that in, you guys. If this has happened or is happening in your practice, I really need you to take this in because then I looked around and I did some digging as I do, as I did on that observation day. And I went into the training materials and I went into the SOPs and I went into the onboarding checklists and I was looking for the, this is how we do it here document. You guys, there was nothing. There was, oh gosh, there was a sticky note on the computer monitor that told them how to do something. There were laminated sheets of paper. By the way, if you have laminated sheets of paper, you're one step ahead. Let's make those digital, but we'll talk about that at another time. There were laminated prep sheets, right? But the problem was is that they were so faded and they had leaked through from wiping them down that you could barely read them. Also, I have to be honest, I don't think that they had updated this laminated sheet in several years. So to give that to a new hire, you're not setting them up for success. And that was it. That was their system. And you know what really broke my heart about all of it and continues to really, really get me in all of my feels is that doctor is not a bad leader. That team was not a bad team. They still aren't. They're just stuck in a cycle that nobody ever helped them get out of. Right. Here's, here's a scenario. And I want you guys to really take this in. This is typically how the roadmap goes. You train from scratch, you lose someone, and then you train from scratch again. Let me repeat that. If this is you, you hire, you train from scratch, you lose someone, and then you train from scratch again. And they didn't have a people problem. Sometimes people have a people problem. Those are two very different things. They had a systems problem. Their people were wonderful and they were happy and there was no mean girl mentality, which we're going to get to. There was such cohesiveness. Their lunchroom was roaring with laughter. It was a systems problem, right? So I see this everywhere, every time I work with a practice and teams, team members are quitting not because they hated the job, but because no one ever set them up to succeed. So this is what I'm unpacking with you today. Okay. So I feel like this is something I have to get off my chest because I feel like I do talk about it, but I really want to dive into it on this pod today. We have a very serious problem within this industry, and the problem is this: we are treating hiring like a fire drill. Someone quits, panic sets in, job posts go up, a few interviews happen, or you get ghosted. Let's get real. Someone seems nice enough, they get hired, and then 6 months later they're gone. And we act surprised every single time. And I hear it constantly. We just can't find good people. Nobody wants to work anymore. You guys, I did an entire AAO lecture about this last year. We have got to flip this mindset. No one wants to work anymore. No, I'm here to tell you, no, that is not it, right? I hear things like, this generation doesn't have the same work ethic. I don't believe it. I don't believe it. I believe that in every generation there are individuals who do not have good work ethic. However, that doesn't matter. Like, it doesn't matter how old you are depending on your work ethic. I have a 25-year-old brother who works his buns off. I have a 25-year-old niece who hustles. I have nieces in high school, in college, nephews in college that are hustling, right? So I am going to sit here and ask you to stop Can we just collectively agree that we are going to stop saying this generation does not have a work ethic? Okay, because here's the truth, and I say this with so much love, like so much love, right? But also zero apology here. If you are constantly losing people, The problem is not the people, it is what you are putting into them. I want you to take that in. If you are constantly losing people, the problem is not the people, it is what you are putting into your people. Uh, a bad system will break every great person in your practice Every single time. You cannot hire your way out of a culture problem. You cannot find the perfect candidate and then drop them into chaos and expect them to thrive. It doesn't work that way. And to be honest with you, I don't really care how old they are. You can't find any candidate, whether they're an elder millennial like me, they're a Gen Xer, they're a Gen Zer, There is a new gen alpha that's coming in soon. Let's get real. It just doesn't work that way. We can't drop them into a bucket of chaos and expect them to thrive in our practices. Here's the part that really gets me. We spend so much time and energy in this industry on the clinical side, on technology and techniques and continuing education, which we should, right? I think it's incredible. I think it's incredibly necessary. But then what happens is we spend so much energy on techniques and the clinical side, and then we completely neglect the operational side, the people side, the how do we actually run this practice in the way that we're not burning everyone out side. So we would never say, I'm just going to wing this treatment plan and see how it goes. But we do that with our team and our systems every single day. Every single day. And then we wonder why people leave. You guys, we wonder why people leave when we haven't poured an ounce of anything into them. The hiring, the onboarding, the training, the growth, the compensation conversations, all of it requires attention and intention. It requires systems. It requires most practices to really take a step back and look at operations and people. And a lot of practices are doing zero of those things. Zero. And I want you to hear me when I say that has to stop today. You are in 2026 and you have got to start focusing on your people. So let's get into the practical stuff because I want you to walk away with this episode, in this episode, with something that you can actually do. Not someday, like this week. Okay? Something that you can do this week. I'm going to walk you through 4 different areas where most practices are leaking great people without even realizing it. And for each one, I'm going to give you one thing that you can do right now to start fixing it. Okay. Are you ready? Here we go. Number 1, hiring. Most practices do not have an actual hiring process, right? They have a panic response, which, by the way, the panic response is not going to go away. You're always going to hit the panic button for most things. If it was not a planned leave, right? There's a huge difference between a panic response and a process. The process is repeatable, intentional, and designed to find the right fit before you make an offer. A panic response is posting on Indeed at 9 PM because someone just gave their 2 weeks notice And here's the thing. Here's the thing I want you to do. Rewrite your job post. Rewrite it. Not— I don't want the list of duties that people should be responsible for. Anyone can find that, right? I want the part that answers the question every single candidate is actually asking, which is, why would I want to work here? What does growth look like for me? What kind of team am I walking into? Because talented people are interviewing just as much as— are interviewing just as much as you're interviewing them. So they are out there in different areas, and it may not just be orthodontics. So give them something worth choosing. Okay. Number 2, onboarding. This one is really personal to me because it is where I see the most unnecessary damage done. Okay, real quick, whether you're driving, listening to this while you're doing laundry or taking your walk or you're at the gym, I want you to raise your hand if onboarding is basically a 2-day orientation and not a whole lot of figuring it out on the fly? If you raised your hand, I thought that might be the case. If you didn't, good for you. Here's the truth about onboarding. It is not a 2-day event. It is not even a 90-day event. It is a 3 to 6 month process. And I think a lot of people do this 30, 60, 90-day check-in. I, I recommend it to my clients. I have an entire framework for it. I think it's incredibly important, but then a lot of the times it stops there. If someone is coming in with zero, zero experience, it can be a year or more before they start operating at full capacity. And that is not a flaw, right? That is just the reality of this industry, whether they have experience or they don't. Right. And here's the part that no one talks about. Your practice culture can make or break a new hire before you ever really had a chance with them. If your team is cliquey, if the new people get the cold shoulder, if there's eye rolling when someone has a question, or you're losing people before they even get started because they're so incredibly overwhelmed, which by the way, I've heard So many of these stories, you cannot have mean girls in scrubs. I cannot stress this enough. It's something I've really focused on in the last year is that we need in— we need inclusivity on our teams for true onboarding. So this is your one thing. Assign every new hire a peer mentor. Create a buddy program. In your practice, not a supervisor, a colleague, someone who remembers what it felt like to be new and genuinely wants to help. That one shift can exponentially change the entire onboarding experience for someone who's brand new in your practice. Number 3, Retention and culture. Okay. People do not leave jobs, they leave stagnation. When someone stops growing, when no one asks what they want, when their job feels like they've hit the ceiling instead of we're able to launch you, they start quiet quitting. Everyone knows what quiet quitting is these days, I hope. If it's not, basically they've stopped engaging. They have stopped eating lunch with team members. They have really pulled themselves away from the team and the practice. They come in, they clock in, they do their job, they leave, and they're super secretly looking for an exit. And by the time they tell you that they're leaving, they've already been gone in their heads for months. So here is what the practices winning at retention are doing that most are not. They're asking their people one question on a regular basis. Are you ready for this question? What does growth look like for you here? This is not a performance review. If you know me, you know I don't believe in performance reviews. I believe in growth and development plans. Not this once-a-year conversation. I'm talking regular, real conversations. And then we're actually doing something with the answer because this is also really important, right? We're cross-training people into new areas. We're giving team members ownership over super real outcomes, new titles, new, new tasks, roles, duties, workloads. We're creating paths for the people to grow inside of the practice instead of watching them build a future somewhere else. Now, I want you to remember, we, and we'll talk about this, this is a podcast I really, really want to talk about, but this also can't be role creep where I'm giving them all these things because I want them to grow into this position, but I never compensate them for it. I'm just kind of throwing more on their plate and not having growth and development conversations with them. I'm just like, oh, so-and-so left. I'm going to need you to take this over. However, they are still making the same with more responsibility, more workload, and we've never had a true conversation about it. So here's where your one thing— put a quarterly growth conversation on your calendar. For every single person on your team. Not a review, a conversation. There's a difference here. Ask them what they want. Ask them what is hard. Ask them what would make their job better, and then listen. Also, I want you— and when I said every single person in your practice on your team. I also meant your associate doctor. Number 4, compensation growth frameworks. Okay, so this is a really, really, really big one and something I've been working on with practices probably for the last 4 to 5 months. It's something I've always had a roadmap for, but now I'm actually putting this into play. I'm going to tell you, this might make you a little bit uncomfortable. Okay, so are you ready? Your team— you're going to be uncomfortable, guys, so get ready. Your team is already talking about money. They're talking about compensation. They're talking about it in the break room. They're talking about it in the parking lot or in the group chat that you're definitely not in. And pretending that that is not happening does not protect you. It means the conversation is happening without you. And guess what happens? Resentment. And when you have resentment, you lose trust. And it is so hard, like any relationship, to gain trust again. So Practices are getting ahead of this and building transparent growth frameworks, right? So think of this, define tiers for every single role. You have clear skills and responsibilities and duties on each level. You have compensation ranges that are attached to each tier. That are written down and visible. Okay, so instead of reactive raises, because that's what a lot of people are doing, they're just getting handed out whenever someone finally gains the courage to have a conversation, knock on your door and say, I need to have a conversation with you, right? Everyone now knows what that growth framework and those tiers in that ladder looks like, and they know how to climb it. So you get to have these very candid conversations with, we'd love to see you grow. Here's what that looks like for you, right? So level 1 for your clinical assistant looks like this. Level 2 looks like this. Level 3 looks like this. And these are all the things you have to hit before you can get here and be compensated in all of these tiers. No one Pause. Each one has a compensation range attached to it. So there's no mystery. There's no resentment, right? Does this take time to build? Yes. Is it uncomfortable when you put the numbers on paper? Sometimes, right? But consider the alternative. Good people are leaving because they had no idea that there was a path forward in your practice. Being a dental assistant or scheduling coordinator or treatment coordinator or a hygienist or, you know, whatever, whatever role, financial coordinator, marketing coordinator, is not a stepping stone, right? We want our good people to stay, but if there is no path forward and there is no growth, then they're just quietly getting frustrated because raises felt random or unfair, right? So transparency is not a threat to your authority of being a practice owner. It is probably one of the most powerful retention tools that you have. So your one thing is to pick one role in your practice and map it out. You can have— it depends on the role. When I build these out, you can have between 3 and 5 tiers, right? And I want you to map that out. Just pick one role, write down what does level 1 look like? What does level 2 look like? What does level 3 look like? And what do you, what does each level earn you? What do you have to hit in each one of these levels in order to move up in that practice? So start there. I wanna leave you with something before we wrap up everything that we talked about today, the hiring, the onboarding, the culture, the growth frameworks. None of it is that complicated, right? None of it requires massive HR department, right? Or some fancy software. It just requires intention. And honestly, it requires you to be willing to look at your practice and ask the uncomfortable question, am I building something worth staying for? Because here is what I know after 22 years in this industry: the practices that retain exceptional teams are not always the ones paying the most. They are not the ones that have the nicest offices or the most advanced technology. They're the ones where people feel seen and heard and valued, where expectations are super clear, where there's a path forward in this practice, where someone actually asked them what they needed and actually followed through. That's it. That's the secret. Your team is not the problem. And now you have the tools to start building something that proves it. So here's your challenge for this week, and I want you to actually do this. So really take this in, not add it to a list and forget it later. Don't add it to your Asana. Don't throw it on a sticky note, that's for sure. I want you to actually do this. I want you to pick one person on your team, just one, and have a real 5-minute conversation with them. Not about their performance, not about a problem. This is not a complain fest. Ask them one question. What is one thing that would make your job better or easier? And then I want you to sit and I want you to really listen. And if there is something you can act on, then I want you to act on it. And that's it. That's your homework. Because building a team that stays does not necessarily start with a system. It starts with a conversation. Thank you so much for spending your time with me today. If this episode hit home for you, I'd love for you to share it with another practice owner or a team lead that needs to hear it. That is how we keep this conversation going. And if you're sitting there thinking, I do not know where to start, that is exactly what Everbloom is here for. We help you build the people systems that actually stick. We build it with you, not just for you. Until next time, keep blooming. Thank you for joining me on The Bloom Effect, where we keep it real, keep it growing, and always keep it team first. If today's episode sparks something for you, an idea, a shift, or just a reminder that you're not alone, take a second and share it with your team or a fellow ortho leader. Be sure to subscribe so you never miss a convo. And if you're loving the show, leave a review. It helps more practices find us and join the movement. And if you're ready to bring this kind of energy into your practice, visit DiscoverEverbloom.com to learn more about working together. Until next time, keep leading with heart. Keep building with intention and keep blooming right where you're planted.
