The EntreMD Podcast

4 Steps to Rebuilding Your Confidence After a Bad Hire for Your Medical Practice

• Dr. Una • Episode 420

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You made a bad hire, now what?

A bad hire can seriously dent your confidence and make you question whether you're even capable of building an A-team. 

But trust me, these are just tricks your mind is playing on you! 

I’ve worked with hundreds of very successful entrepreneurs, and I have yet to meet a single one who has not had a bad hire!

Most of the time, the pathway to a great team involves a few bad calls. That's why today, I want to share the four steps you need to take to rebuild your confidence and build the team of your dreams!

Tune in!


Key Takeaways: 

  • 00:00 Intro 
  • 02:17 Forgive yourself
  • 04:45 Run an audit 
  • 10:04 Revamp the teambuilding process 
  • 11:21 Get back into the trenches
  • 13:24 Outro 

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Speaker 1:

I'm not saying that this bad hire didn't work, because everything was perfect with the hire and everything was wrong with you, but the thing is you have no control over the hire, right Like when you look at auditing this situation. You really need to audit yourself and your actions and go like, okay, well, oh, that person was so crazy, but I hired them right. So what do I need to do? What do I need to adjust? So I'm not this person who hires crazy people, hi docs.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the EntreMD podcast, where it's all about helping amazing physicians, just like you, embrace entrepreneurship so you can have the freedom to live life and medicine on your terms. I'm your host, dr Imna. There are very few things that will make you wonder if you're the kind of person who can build an A-team, like a bad hire or somebody walking away and telling you you're a terrible boss. And so today, on this episode of the Entremet podcast, I'm going to show you how to rebuild trusting yourself, rebuild your confidence after a bad hire. Okay, now I'm going to start off by saying this I am yet to meet an entrepreneur who has not had a bad hire, at least an entrepreneur who is an established entrepreneur. I have spoken to people from startups to serial entrepreneurs to people who are building businesses valued at $500 million, and every last one of them has had a very fascinating bad hire. They have amazing stories they can tell you. So I want to start off by just letting you know if you had a bad hire, if you brought somebody who was a toxic employee on board, or you brought somebody who you thought was a great fit and they just could not deliver, they could not do the job, or you even, you know, you took the initiative and got somebody at the management level or the executive level and after they came on your team, they even made a whole mess of the work you had done over the years. If you've done any of those, that's okay. You're an excellent company, okay. This is something that happens to almost everybody, okay.

Speaker 1:

So the question then becomes how do I rebuild my trust in myself? How do I rebuild my confidence and my ability to attract hire and lead a great team? Okay? So the first thing is, oh my goodness, forgive yourself, like. Forgive yourself, extend yourself, grace. Don't make this mean a lot of things about you, even if there are things you need to correct, even if there are things, even if you're like, yeah, I had a, I had a lot to do with all these things that happened. These are things that happen, okay, because we're physicians, so I can use this analogy without feeling weird. But you know, building a team is kind of like getting competent at it. It's kind of like getting competent at nursing a baby. In the beginning, the baby doesn't know how to suck, the mom doesn't really understand how to breastfeed, and so, as they work on it, they both become better.

Speaker 1:

When you start hiring, chances are that you really suck at identifying the right people. You're not really good at seeing red flags. When they're there, you convince yourself that it's not really there, because you want a warm body to take a position in your office. Or you don't even really know what the true outcomes for this role are, and the truth of the matter is there's no number of books or podcast episodes you listen to that will help you get everything in 24 hours. This is something you're going to become better and better at, and the better you get, the better quality people you bring on board, the better team members you hire, and so give yourself grace. This is not something you start off with perfection. This is something you grow into becoming better and better and better. So, and it happens to everyone. So just relax, forgive yourself, don't make it be a thing. Just forgive yourself, and now we can talk about how do we rebuild this trust, how do we get better at it, and all of that.

Speaker 1:

So the first thing I really, I literally want you to stop, like you may need to pause this and stop and say, okay, I've been beating myself up about this, I've been saying that I suck, which is not true. You're working on getting better. You know, like, I've even decided that I'm no longer hiring, I'm not doing that anymore, because this stuff just doesn't work. And it works, and a great team will absolutely, absolutely change your life. A great team has changed my life. A great team has a hundred X what I am able to do with this one life that I have, right, and so you're. It's, it's a magical thing, okay, but we got to learn to get better at it and all of those things. So we can't, we don't stop, okay, all right. So forgive yourself, forgive yourself, pause the episode, deal with it, come back, okay, but come back though, okay, all right.

Speaker 1:

So the second thing is really to run an audit. And I want to challenge you. You can choose observation over judgment. So this is not about you sucked at this, you did this wrong. Oh, it's not about that. It's about observing what went wrong here, what went right here, what could I have done differently here? Right, like it's observing with no judgment. Okay, the way I tell it to the doctors in the entrepreneurial business school, I'm like, hey, let's do this math. What is five plus five plus two? And they're like, and I'm sure they're like, oh my goodness, what is Dr Una up to? And I'm like, and they're like, 12. I say good, I said good, I said what emotion did you feel as you did the math? And they're like no emotion, it's just math. And I'm like I want you to treat this process the same way. Okay, I want you to just observe the facts and there's no story with it, right? So I want to invite you to do that, okay. So we want to run an audit now. So these are the kind of questions you know, like where did I miss it in the hiring process? Okay, so this is your audit Now, these are the questions you're asking when did, where did I miss it in the hiring process?

Speaker 1:

And it could be. You know we talk a lot about doing three interviews with three different people. Maybe you did one interview and at that interview, before the person sat down, you decided you liked them and you were going to hire them, no matter what they said. And you know we we can be truthful with ourselves and you were going to hire them, no matter what they said. And you know we can be truthful with ourselves, we know when we do this right. So maybe that was the thing right. Maybe we didn't really ask questions to get the answers that let us know if this person can actually do the job. Maybe we didn't even take the time to say what are the outcomes this role would create, right? Maybe we didn't do that. And if you haven't listened to the episode on seven interview questions, I always ask oh my goodness, you want to go listen to it? Right, because it will give you a feel for how we engage with that interview process. So maybe it was there. Maybe those were the things that were missed out. So that's something to look at.

Speaker 1:

Another thing to look at is where did I miss it in the onboarding process? Because when I started hiring people, I was like you guys I hope you read minds because I want you to come in and it's a plug and play you just do what you're supposed to do and everything's happily ever after. I resisted the time and effort of onboarding. I resisted creating an onboarding system. I resisted taking the time to train, taking the time to coach, taking the time to hold them accountable and all of those things. And maybe you did that and maybe you're looking. You're like I didn't sit down and do vision casting with them. I didn't show them the outcomes I want them to own. So they show up every week like this is what I came to own. I didn't take the time to show them how these tasks are linked to the outcome. I didn't take the time to create an evaluation system where, every week, I can say okay, these are your outcomes, these are the actual numbers. This is the gap. Where are you having challenges? How do we work on this so you can deliver on the outcomes this role delivers right, like it's supposed to deliver on. Because if we didn't do that, maybe we didn't actually set them up to succeed right. Where did I miss it with the ongoing hiring? So after their onboarding, did I say you know, the force be with you or did I have a system so, week to week, they're getting some aspects of training, some aspect of looking at the outcomes, all of those kinds of things? I'm meeting with them, especially your high capacity hires. Did I do that?

Speaker 1:

Another question to ask is is my system set up to help them thrive? Are they set up in such a way that they can get the results that they need to get? So, for instance, maybe part of this person's responsibility is to make sure your schedule is always full. Let's say it's a private practice administrator and the question then becomes you know, if that's the person's role, do they have a way of pulling up the recaller? Do they have people who can do the recaller, who they're holding accountable for that? Is there spots in this person's calendar for them to go meet referral sources? Is there a database of referral sources? Or can we inform them on how they can create that and things like that? It doesn't mean you do every single thing for them, but is there stuff in place? You know what I mean. Is there stuff in place that people who are your friends, who are doctors, who would refer to you? Did we do warm handoffs, did we set them up to succeed.

Speaker 1:

Bad hire didn't work because everything was perfect with the hire and everything was wrong with you. But the thing is you have no control over the hire, right, like when you look at auditing this situation, you really need to audit yourself and your actions and go like, okay, well, I'm like, oh, that person was so crazy, but I hired them right. So what do I need to do? What do I need to adjust? So I'm not this person who hires crazy people, right, and so it's this radical ownership. And just looking at you know where do we miss it right, where do we miss it? Okay. So the first thing is the forgiveness, the second thing is the audit and then the third thing is really revamping the team building process based on the audit. Okay, so I want you to think about it this way If I notice that I have the warm body syndrome, meaning when I go for an interview, if there's a warm body and they have potential, I just hire them.

Speaker 1:

Then the system becomes we always have three interviews, and we always have three interviews with three different people, so that we can all come together and say, okay, this is why this person's excellent job, this is the evidence that this person can pull off this job. These are the red flags that I saw. These are like, everybody's not going to have the warm body syndrome and everybody's not going to fall in love with the client the way the potential hire, the way you do Right, and so you can say, okay, that's what we're putting into our process to make sure that, when people with a lot of red flags come up, that we're able to identify those right. Maybe it's time to build an onboarding system, maybe, like whatever that is, revamp your team building process by the information you got from the audit. Now you may not be able to change everything, and that's okay, but pick your top three and tweak those right. The top three will make a huge difference. Okay, so that's the third thing. Then the fourth thing is oh, my goodness, I mean, this is a hire that you need. I had a bad hire, you lost the hire or whatever.

Speaker 1:

It is time to get back into the trenches. It is time to say, okay, let me go update. You know, like, based on my audit, I was like I just Googled job description for XYZ and I copied it and I edited some things and put it out there. I did not even take the time to sit down and say what is it that I really want? Who is the kind of person I really want to work with, who is the kind of person I don't want to work with? I didn't even do any of that work, I just put it out there and got whoever I got, and so this is the time to say let me go, let me rewrite this job ad based on what I truly want. Let me put it everywhere. Let me talk to people about the fact that I'm hiring and go hire. Don't let the bad hire stop you from getting a great hire right. So get back into the trenches, get back interviewing, get back having conversations with people, get back to asking for referrals and set yourself up to then have the best hire you've ever had, and that can totally, totally be your reality.

Speaker 1:

I will tell you I have hired. I have had so many bad hires oh, my goodness, so many. I've hired a lot of people, so I've had so many bad, bad hires. But I will tell you that the team I have now whether that's in my private practice or in EntreeMD, or in the physician's marketing team, which is our marketing agency they are phenomenal and I'm so grateful for them. And they I mean they are the reason why I can do so many things and I can live a life that has such a profound impact. Because I'm not the only one doing it. I have a team of rock stars who are doing it, getting the work done, who believe in the vision, who love our clients, who love our community, and they're fighting to help them get results and see what is possible for them. It's mind-blowing, mind-blowing what is possible for them. It's mind blowing mind blowing.

Speaker 1:

So when you think about the bad hire that you had, just think about it. As you know, you've got antibiotics, you got a diarrhea, but it fixed your ear infection, right Like. So the lessons learned are going to help you get to a great team. This is just a little side effect, right Like? Just think about it that way. Well, not don't think too much about the diarrhea, but just the concept.

Speaker 1:

But yeah, but you deserve, you deserve a great team, and sometimes the pathway to that is a few bad hires or maybe many bad hires, but you want to get better and better at hiring and leading an A team. Okay, so don't let this stop you in any kind of way. Forgive yourself, run the audit, edit your team building process and get back in the trenches. Back in the trenches, and I cannot wait to celebrate your next amazing hire, your next rockstar hire, and I know that you have exactly what it takes to build a rock solid team that will help you multiply exponentially your impact and will also create time freedom. Okay, all right. So this episode is a must share. I want you to take a screenshot of it, post it in your stories, post it on social media, tell it, oh, my goodness, go listen to this episode and I will see you, my friend, on the next episode of the Entrepreneur.