Ever hired someone who looked perfect on paper, but then turned out to be a bad fit to your core values and company culture?
Believe me, we’ve all been there…
The glossy CV arrives in your inbox — qualifications, certifications, and experience neatly chronicled. It promises perfection. Yet weeks later, nothing but headaches.
So, why do many aesthetic clinic owners find themselves in this predicament?
One core reason is pressure…
The aesthetics industry is fast-paced and patient-focused. Clinic Owners face the urgent need to fill a vacancy to prevent a dip in service quality that might send patients looking elsewhere. This frantic rush often catalyses a shallow hiring process prioritising paper qualifications over a candidate’s alignment with company culture and values.
Yet, hiring decisions made in haste are decisions that clinic owners often regret.
In my experience there’s nothing quite so expensive and demoralising for everyone as having a bad employee… or even just the wrong person for the job.
Unfortunately, we tend to hire people for a ‘position’ rather than a role. To make matters worse, we often hire people we ‘like’ regardless of whether or not they’re actually suited for the job we want them to do.
This is purely human nature, and while you might think you’re perfectly able to be objective and unbiased in your choices, the odds are overwhelmingly against this actually being true…
And the world being what it is with the Draconian employment laws in countries like the UK, hiring the wrong person can be expensive; and getting rid of them catastrophic if they take you to a tribunal and you lose.
So, here are my top ten tips to avoid these problems and ensure you hire the right people who aren’t just perfect on paper but are also a perfect fit for your aesthetic clinic’s culture:
1. **Slow Down**: Resist the urge to fill a position immediately. Taking extra time in the hiring process can save time and resources that would otherwise be spent on re-hiring.
2. **Identify Core Values**: Clearly articulate your core values and the culture you have cultivated, and seek candidates whose personal values resonate with them.
3. **Behavioural Interview Techniques**: Use questions that prompt candidates to demonstrate how they’ve lived out values similar to your clinic’s in past roles.
4. **Challenging Scenarios**: Ask questions to evaluate how a potential hire might handle real-life challenges in your clinic. Throw them a few curve-balls based on your own experiences, and see what direction their thinking goes.
5. **Reference Checks**: Go beyond verifying employment history. Ask for examples of how the candidate has embodied their previous company’s values.
6. **Consider Team Dynamics**: Evaluate how the candidate would blend with the existing team. A team assessment can be as crucial as the individual’s skills.
7. **Involve the Team in Hiring**: Introduce top candidates to the team. A group perspective can be invaluable in assessing cultural fit.
8. **Look for Adaptability**: The aesthetics field is ever-evolving. Candidates should be adaptable, eager to learn and able to demonstrate that they continually invest in their own development.
9. **Probe Motivation**: Understanding why candidates want to work with you can reveal much about their fit. In fact, the very first interview question you should be asking is:
‘How much do you know about our clinic, and what’s your strongest reason for wanting to work here as opposed to anywhere else?’
10. **Trust Your Instincts**: Beyond all checks and methods, sometimes a gut feeling can guide you to the right candidate. Don’t ignore your intuition.
While a CV might display a perfect set of skills and experiences, it’s the alignment with company culture and core values, identified and evaluated through a thoughtful hiring process, that ultimately crowns the dream employee.
When pressure mounts to fill a vacancy, remembering that the right hire will not only flourish but also elevate your clinic’s standards and reputation, can help turn the hiring process into one of strategic importance, rather than a race against time.
Put simply – Hire Slow, Fire Fast.
