What to Do When it’s a Team Member Who Doesn’t Value Care

As if you didn’t have enough to deal with in trying to get patients to value the care you provide. In a comment on a recent post, a dentist recounts the story of how she had to deal with a hygienist who consistently performed an inferior job. The hygienist responded that she had passed her Boards and had worked for another dentist during school. “If it was good enough for them, why isn’t it good enough for you?”

This is a complex situation, and I’d like to take a little more time than usual to address it. The issue here is likely her level of passion — and you can’t legislate passion; you can only try to inspire it. But you certainly can’t let comments like that go unchallenged. You’ve worked hard to set a standard of care in the practice, and you can’t let anyone — whether an associate, a hygienist, or the person who answers the phone — compromise the standards you establish.

So the real question here is, can this hygienist be made into a good performer? The evidence suggests that it’s quite possible. According to a study I have quoted many times, most people — approximately 58% — want to be successful, and with the proper education, motivation, and systems, they can be held accountable for both the process and their results. At the other end of the spectrum, you have the high performers (the naturally hard-working and the naturally gifted) at 34%. Only about 8%of people are genuine low performers who cannot succeed, and I don’t think anyone who can successfully graduate from hygiene school belongs in this category.

We all know that a dentist with 20 years of experience and development can do things a dentist fresh out of school can’t. However, we also know that some dentists resist ongoing development and don’t advance much beyond their graduation-level knowledge unless outside circumstances, such as technological advancements, push them. The same thing applies to hygienists. I think the team member in question needs to be exposed to a good team-based CE program, where she can see the gap between her current standards and what others are doing, and where she can find that tension we all sometimes need to keep us focused on what we can be.

So here’s my suggestion to this dentist: Sit down with the hygienist and have a real heart-to-heart about standards of care, where you explain that her Board certification means only that she has exhibited the minimum standards allowable (just enough to be safe), but the standards in your practice are much higher, and your role is to help her develop into an outstanding care provider. Then, outline and begin implementing a plan for her CE.