How to Recruit and Maintain a Lead Associate Dentist with Venture Practices

Alec Goldman:
Ben and Brittany. Welcome to the show. How are you both doing today?
Ben Shaver:
Doing great, Alex. Thanks for having us.
Alec Goldman:
Ben and Brittany, if you guys don't mind, for the folks in the audience who do not know each of you, would you guys quickly just give a quick intro of who you are, how you got to Venture Practices and tell us a little bit about what's going on over there in your neck of the woods.
Ben Shaver:
Ben Shaver, I've been in the dental industry for probably about 15 years. Like a lot of us on the business side kind of fell into it. Uh, a lot of that time was spent marketing and had a marketing company, but over time realized that the internal team was really what drove success as far as getting referral patients and bringing people in. Uh, we do a lot with team communications, and team building a lot on the development side, but that led to recruitment. And having that marketing background has been really helpful in helping to source and recruit and honestly, our big focus is retention as well. So that's kind of what I specialize in.
Brittney:
I've been in the dental space originally more in community relations and also with a marketing background for about 10 years now. Met Ben really just completely aligned with just his philosophy on the way, you know, operations and people and marketing and recruitment should go. And that's how we ended up here.
Alec Goldman:
That's awesome, guys. So if you don't mind, just quickly, for folks who don't know a little bit about Venture Practices, just elaborating a little on the mission and what makes Venture Practices so different. I know that you guys are really focused on, as you mentioned, both retention and finding dentists and placing them in certain practices, specifically at DSOs. But what is it about Venture Practices that makes you guys so different?
Ben Shaver:
Uh, yeah. And it's, I think a lot of it was kind of the accidental way we got into recruiting through marketing. I think when we started looking at a typical recruiting company, here's your placement fee and we're going to go place ads under our name. And then as we get candidates in, we'll kind of send them out to the highest bidder and it was just very transactional. So we wanted to kind of make things very different. So we do recruiting as a service.
So basically what that means is we're going to go source those candidates. that isn't necessarily going to LinkedIn or Indeed, or maybe you're posting things to better teams or through your ATS or whatever that might be, we're going out there and actually trying to find high-quality elite talent. And then kind of from there, what we realized was, okay, we gotta be able to keep this talent. So I think a lot of people are like, we don't care if you keep it because we'd love to come back and re-recruit. That's not our mission. Our mission is for you to have great teams. And also how do we get them to culturally fit? We use a lot with a DiSC and value assessments. So I got certified in that years ago just completely because great communication and practice means there's great leadership. Everybody knows where they're going, and have their own agreements. So you can retain those really great doctors that you spend a lot of money for.
Alec Goldman:
Brittany, did you want to add anything there?
Brittney:
Yeah, exactly like Ben mentioned that there, we're really focused on getting the right fit for your practice and just making sure that it's more of that long term, instead of just getting a warm body, making sure that everything just aligns. And that there's just a huge market out there for those that are not actively seeking, that are willing to, you know, explore the right opportunity.
Ben Shaver:
Yeah, I'll add real quick to that Alec, if it's okay. It's kind of, kind of like in marketing, you can go out and advertise for patients, you know, do your SEO, do everything through Google, a paper click, all that. But that is only going to be for patients that are actively looking for a dentist, which is generally, you know, a pretty small percentage. But when you go and you do direct mail and you brand yourself really well, you're going to get those people that may not know you that eventually, they'll come to you. So a lot of what we do on the recruiting side is duplicate that by creating brand assets. So people become very attracted to the practice and they may not be ready to jump now, but somewhere down the road, they may want to. So bringing a lot of branding and marketing into it has helped.
Alec Goldman:
That's really cool. I mean, and as a marketer, that's what we would call it like creating demand. Right. And that's selling a problem to somebody they didn't know that they had and getting your brand out there to say, Hey, this is something that maybe you should consider. So when you're advertising to an associate or lead dentist, what are kind of the key messages that you're putting out there to, peak their interests so that they're aware of Venture Practices?
Ben Shaver:
Yeah, and usually we're going to work for the actual practice.
Ben Shaver:
But a lot of what it is is figuring out what they're currently doing and maybe even unwinding some of that. Sometimes just rewriting their ads can, I mean, Brittany, you did that a couple of weeks ago with a hygiene ad. They hadn't had a candidate in what, three or four months or something ridiculous.
Ben Shaver:
And then you rewrite the ad and add two candidates and they ended up hiring somebody.
Ben Shaver:
But it's really more looking at the overall picture. Like I said before, does the website really say to them that this is a practice I want to be in? Does their social media look like a culture that they want to be in? So we, uh, we do a lot of that. Also, we look at what are you doing when they come into the interview. And do you send out a lot of people now send out boxes after somebody's interview that they like that might have local coffee or just local thing, just these little kind of just? triggers at the end of We really want you, we're really thinking about you, we don't need a warm body, and then of course just making sure we've put together the right culture fit.
Alec Goldman:
Brittany, you wanna add anything there?
Brittney:
Yeah, no, I think Ben is spot on with all of that. Just making sure that, you know, they're able to envision themselves in that practice, going back to, you know, what sort of messaging that really just depends on what is that practice looking for? What is their ideal associate? What's going to be the best fit? But it can be messaging towards. just questions that they would typically have during their first interview. You know, how many operatories, how many hygienists, what are the Google reviews, the area, just some information on the demographics, you know, operationally, and then also just, you know, who are the key leaders there, who are the other doctors that they're going to be working with, what are their personalities, so we try to encompass all of it in one.
Alec Goldman:
I mean, it really sounds like a very, I mean, you're putting together an extremely elaborate content strategy to ensure that it sounds like you're answering all of the hard questions that dentists inevitably have to have answered before making the decision to sign on and join a team.
Ben Shaver:
Yeah, and we're trying to do that upfront, right? So that we don't get this back and forth. As we've worked more and more with DSOs over the years, those leadership teams, we always think there's just these huge admin people there and it's not. It's a very lean leadership team that does need support and just being able to help them get that and go a step further, that's brought a lot of success.
Alec Goldman:
I have to ask, you know, as a, we, as a, you know, someone who works at NexHealth, we're constantly thinking about how technology improves, enables the team to move with a little bit more speed, agility, makes the lives at practices easier. I would love to hear your guys' perspective as people who are speaking with dentists all the time, I'm guessing hundreds, if not thousands of folks in the industry, how does technology fit into their thinking about joining a practice.
Ben Shaver:
And Brittany, I'll let you take this one here in a minute, but I was just going to say a lot of that too is they want the technology for sure, but they actually want the mentorship so that they know they're utilizing everything and being as effective as they can be and being efficient. So lots of times it's you've got the people element with the technology. But I don't know, Brittany, do you get a lot of questions about what type of technologies are in the practice?
Brittney:
Absolutely. If their focus is more implants, you know, they want to know that there is that high technology or that you're willing to explore, you know, getting additional technology there. So that's definitely something that they're looking for.
Alec Goldman:
So it sounds like leveraging technology is part of a brand that says, we're thinking about your future, something that's modern, something that they can grow into as well.
Ben Shaver:
Oh yeah, technology is definitely a big thing, but it's, it depends. It's so different for each person. I think
Alec Goldman:
And totally dependent on the practice and where it's located and which type of patients are coming in, I'm sure it's a total, you know, affects how they think about technology in so many different ways.
Ben Shaver:
Yeah, I mean that they're going to be paid on production. So for them, they want it to be as efficient as possible. So I can say this, it will work against you if you don't have the right type of technology.
Alec Goldman:
So you're thinking about from a recruitment perspective, it's having a strong content strategy, leveraging platforms that dentists are spending time on, trying to get the right message in front of them at the right time, whether that means joining the second or just letting something linger and have them think about in the back of their head over time. Ultimately, that then leads to them signing and onboarding, which kind of leads into the back half of the conversation on retention.
Alec Goldman:
How does venture practice think about a healthy onboarding process for dentists to join practices?
Ben Shaver:
I think the biggest thing there, Brittany and I both, this is kind of where we start to merge together here is you just have to be organized. You have to be completely clear roles and responsibilities have to be defined. I'm not saying you have to have a pecking order and an org chart, but one of the greatest things I ever heard about associate dentists is you can't outsource leadership. So if you're a DSO and you're sitting there thinking, okay, we're going to put this person in there, but we're going to take care of all the employees and all the important stuff, they still have to have some sort of leadership capabilities. So during that onboarding process, it's important to kind of test that and see what they have. If they don't have that, who else in the practice can step up and fill that role? Is it an office manager?
Are there team leads? One of the things that we're encouraging now, and I think this is a differentiator of what we do on the retention side. Do we get creative and we just say, what does it need to look like? So for example, we had a client the other day and one of the things we came up with for them was having an associate advocate. So a senior doctor that comes in and spends that first couple of weeks with them, maybe even a month, checks back in with them once a week and really helps guide them and make them understand what they're looking for. Because everybody says you have this clinical autonomy, which in a lot of cases might be true. but you've still got the services you provide and there are limits on that. But they, like I said before, want mentorship, they wanna learn, and that has to be part of the onboarding process.
Alec Goldman:
We're going to do anything there on onboarding.
Brittney:
Yeah, just with the onboarding, you know, if somebody is relocating to the area, that associate advocate is very vital to, you know, helping them understand the area, showcasing that, you know, you do care about them personally, professionally, they're making a move to maybe a new location. So introducing them to different apartment complexes or introducing them to a realtor in the area, but just allowing them to settle personally as well.
Alec Goldman:
That makes a lot of sense. So I guess even now going past onboarding and assuming that they had a healthy onboarding, I love this idea of pairing them with somebody who is already at the organization and kind of being able like quickly to answer questions, and give feedback, right? Having that, I think even NexHealth was extremely helpful in my onboarding. But as we go to retention, obviously your goal is to get dentists to leave where they are. to come and join the practices you represent, and then not let that happen again, right? So like trying to keep the back door from closing. So what are your retention strategies to keep both lead and associate dentists happy over an extended period of time?
Ben Shaver:
Yeah, the biggest one we deploy is the team communications training. So lots of times when new associates come in, we'll do a team communications workshop or at least kind of go through with that particular person. Here's the staff, here's their behavioral styles. Here's what they value. We will look at practice ahead of time and get an idea of what that looks like. So for example, you might have a very, um, assertive, fast-paced practice that does a lot of production, a lot of turn and burn. There are certain behavioral styles that are just not going to work. And so we don't want to put an associate in there that's, I mean, I think there's the idea of, well, they'll catch up, they'll learn, they'll get faster, and maybe so. But that may just not be the speed of what they're looking for.
Patients are the same way, right? Patients don't want to go into a practice that's turn and burn if they are looking for a more boutique experience. So that's a lot of it is upfront. And then we recommend regular check-ins. Annual reviews are great, but beyond just the associate advocate, I think ownership needs to check in with them and make sure they've got everything they need. Don't be too stingy on certain things. Like if they need certain handpieces, let's get them to them, right? Have your own agreements with each employee so employees don't get into each other's business.
So somebody needs to leave at three o'clock because they have kids they want to get. That's their agreement. If somebody wants more money. That's their agreement, but the teams really work better when they know they're being looked at individually, that they're significant, that they belong. And so we try to get everybody ramped up in that role really quick.
Brittney:
Yeah, that just reminded me, I know Ben discussed rewriting that hygienist ad and one of the things that we added to that was the hygienist wanted involvement in the quarterly budget. So not necessarily have a full say, but just want to take a part in that. So we did incorporate that into that job ad and I believe that's what supported that. So just knowing what, you know. dentists and hygienists, what they want to be a part of, and that they have a voice.
Alec Goldman:
Yeah, I mean, I think anybody can relate to that, right? Just feeling a part of an organization and being in the know and understanding where, not just where you want to grow your own personal trajectory, but that you're part of a large organization on a mission that has its own trajectory in itself, and a lot of that just goes into how do you communicate with your boss, how do you communicate with the executive team and kind of feeling like you have your own little place, you know, at the table.
Alec Goldman:
Ben, what did you want to add there?
Ben Shaver:
Well, I was just going to say back to an ad we had one time, just to kind of show a client how we could help. I asked her, you know, what are your hobbies? What are your interests? You know, you're trying to hire these associates into your practices. She said, I don't know, I'm a big dog person. You know, if they want to bring in a support animal, I'm not one of these people that thinks that's weird. So I'm okay with that. But in the ad, we kind of did it more tongue-in-cheek because that's who she was. And then at the end, it just said, hey, you know, I'm a dog lover. If you're a dog lover too, send me your resume. picture of your dog and so it was kind of one of these cool qualifiers that she was like Oh look at this you know so it's just kind of those creative fun little things you can do to see if somebody's gonna be a good fit for you.
Alec Goldman:
That's a really cool story. So how do you guys, I guess from the retention perspective, continue on Ben what you were just mentioning? I love this idea that you guys are kind of looking not as everybody is. I want to say as a canvas, everybody has their own unique personality traits, and given those personality traits, you're putting them in what you think would be the right environment. So I think that's extremely unique and really special given that you're spending time with them upfront early in the process, helping them on board and placing them. But then a lot of what you said is about kind of like ensuring the right communication with their office, with their boss, with their other colleagues. How are you guys at Venture Practices helping there and how are you ensuring and following up that the right practices are in place?
Ben Shaver:
Yeah. So that comes back to the coaching. So generally after we do a team communication workshop, we'll do these. And I don't know what, what they're called now, but they were more like workshops, is that what they are? Brittany, where we get five of the five of them together on a call once a month, just so they can kind of talk through common problems. And lots of times if there's that associate advocate, that person, that's helpful and you know, usually it doesn't come down to team things at that point because we've onboarded them correctly. They sort of know. you know, they're not complaining about team members. They're ready to go, right? Like they took this job.
They want to get in there and they want to do a good job. They want to serve patients and they want to make money. And so they're, they're talking to their colleagues on these calls about how better to do that. And usually, it's, you know, we don't have to do a lot of support there. They support each other. So I think that group kind of helps that sort of having that colleague support that sometimes can be your best asset. I tell DSOs, you don't even have to have us moderate that. but make sure you have that available to you.
Ben Shaver:
Yeah. And to add to that, Brittany will even follow up with them 90 days in, and get that feedback that they're more comfortable giving to her, right? Cause she's that third party versus they're going to talk to the operations manager and say, Oh no, everything's great. Love it here. But then they're secretly like, I'm not loving it. So Brittany can then in a really nice way and successful way, broker some communication there.
Brittney:
Absolutely. Another tool with retention is, I know Ben mentioned The DiSC and values. Just knowing what they value helps with retention. You wanna talk about that a little bit more, Ben?
Ben Shaver:
Yeah, you know everybody's heard of The DiSC but we actually had that value section to it because if somebody's a big altruist. Let's just say that they're all about people then these are the people that might go to those farmers markets on Saturday morning That's an itch. They like to scratch they want to grow the practice that way They'll be in the environment some may not some may be more economically driven and more about practical results But knowing what they value you can kind of cater to that even in those value assessments work-life balance We can see if somebody values that. And what's going on kinda of makes them hesitant as well. So we've had numerous times where people are like, I don't need more money, I just need a pat on the back. That's important to know, right? And they'll take the money, don't get me wrong. But they were like, am I doing a good job? I don't.
Alec Goldman:
Then just for, I've done a DiSC before, but just for folks, if you don't mind, I'm just explaining a little bit more in detail of The DiSC and why I think it's actually such a really strong tool and how it correlates back to retention. You could just connect those dots for folks. That'd be really awesome.
Ben Shaver:
Yeah, absolutely. We do this with every client that we start with just to get an idea of their communication style, but you always hear about personality tests. You know, we've looked at Kolbe and Strength Finders and then there's 50 others, right? The DiSC is more of a behavioral assessment. So it's not really a personality test. Something like a Kolbe is going to say, Hey, this is how somebody's going to act the day they show up and this is how they're going to treat their job. The DiSC can be a little bit more subjective.
So The DiSC kind of runs through. D, if you're a high D, you're going to be a little bit assertive, that type of thing. But D is more about how you solve problems. It is more about people. You know, you're going to be very interactive and be more about people. High S is more about pace. So high S's are kind of that duck on water, right? They look very calm and cool and collected, but underneath they're just battling away. And then the C is more your detail people, more about procedures.
But. Why that's important and especially in dentistry is, you know, in those admin jobs, you know, people tend to go either task-related jobs or people-related jobs. So when you've got somebody that's supposed to answer the phone and convert a new patient and then turn around and also file insurance and take care of some of these tasks-oriented jobs, that stresses them out. And if they're stressed out, they stress out the other people in the office. Knowing that a dentist is a low economic and a high S they're going to be very loyal and not demand a lot of money. So we kind of call that a little bit more of a passive associate.
So you're going to be able to keep them for a while, but that higher D higher economic higher political that, you know, may want to go start their own practice one day, they're going to be a big producer. So there are caveats both ways, but that's how those assessments really do help you determine what you need in that practice and what type of practice it is. Hopefully, that was good.
Alec Goldman:
I love kind of this idea of lots of candidates. Candidates come with pros and cons. Those pros and cons are all based on who they are as individuals, right? So to your point, having dentists who may be a little bit quieter, maybe less economically driven, may have longer attention, but you actually may get more out of somebody who is so hungry, but that may come with personality caveats that may not fit the location that you're placing that dentist in.
Ben Shaver:
Yeah, I'll give you one more example. If you're a high altruist, you're going to give away a lot of dentistry. So if it's and that might not be a bad thing again, depends on the practice, right? Because if you're trying to be community based people are going to love that. And you can put up some guardrails to keep that from happening. But just knowing that that's that person's typical behavioral style helps you kind of lead them versus manage them.
Alec Goldman:
That's so cool. I mean, we could do a whole conversation on how different DiSCs fit different practice types.
Ben Shaver:
26,000 different behavioral styles. So you can't put people in a box, that's for sure.
Alec Goldman:
Well, I think there's, you're describing there might be four boxes.
Ben Shaver:
Everybody's got a little bit of D in them and you're still going to get mad when somebody cuts you off in traffic, right? Even if you're a low D.
Alec Goldman:
That's right. I think it's very cool and it's really unique that you guys are spending so much time getting to understand folks, not just in an interview process, but actually having them take a formal assessment and then having not just a qual, a qualitative lens on who these individuals are, but as you grow and aggregate, you can actually start seeing trends given the different types of DiSC assessments that are being filled out and saying, oh, we understand that this DiSC assessment individual fits really well over here. So I think that's, I think it's extremely cool.
Ben Shaver:
Yeah, I'll say one more thing about that. It helps with predictable conflict too.
Ben Shaver:
A situation where we knew this associate was probably gonna conflict with the office manager. So being able to come in and understand where that was gonna happen and how it was gonna happen and have both of them understand it, kept that from getting bad at some point. So that's another good benefit of it too.
Alec Goldman:
Yeah, I mean, for those listening out there, it's almost, you know, I'm kind of sitting here thinking, well, probably makes a whole lot of sense for most dental practices to be asking their employees to probably fill out. something like a desk. Just given how you think about a dental practice, I mean, I don't want to use the word family because it's a choice. You choose to work at a location, but you spend every day in a very tiny little environment with these individuals, and having empathy and understanding what makes people tick, what makes people excited, I think really goes a long way. Obviously those are things that you get to know with people over time, but having an take the right step in the right direction earlier on as people build relationships over
Ben Shaver:
Yeah, it's a great tool for patient experience as well, right? Because if you know somebody's a high D and assertive and they just want to get out of there, they just need the bullet points, they're going to sign up and do it. Somebody who's a high S needs their high C, they're going to need you to explain a little bit more. And you can observe these behaviors and know that. And that just makes you a lot better communicator. And nobody likes to say sales and dentistry, but helps you get more treatment planning.
Alec Goldman:
That's right. Ben, and Brittany, we've covered a whole lot on what it means to recruit individuals to practices. And I think you guys have a really unique spin on the marketing lens that you guys bring to that. And I think all the things that you're doing from a process perspective for recruitment. are equally as cool and extremely helpful, not just for DSOs, but I think best practices, what small individual practices should be doing as well. We are at the 25-minute mark. Do you guys have anything else that you want to share with our audience today?
Ben Shaver:
Just back to adding that branding to that and making sure if you're struggling to recruit, go and take a look at what your presence looks like online, take a look at your website. Cause that may be what's holding people back. It makes our jobs a lot harder. If you don't have great assets in place, you know, have somebody do some really quality videos for you. Those are evergreen. They can last a long time and find some good marketing partners that can push those things through. So that's the last part of that you really do have to have a great brand if you want to track to lead talent.
Brittney:
Absolutely.
Alec Goldman:
Ben, and Brittany, thank you guys for joining the show. I know that there's a whole lot that we could be diving into again. I mean, we can have a whole conversation on The DiSC or what it means to brand for employees. So I'm sure we'll have you guys back on the show again soon.