Can Hiring an Associate Revolutionize Your Practice?

Dentists are amazing beings. They work hard to make your smile beautiful, take away your pain, and ease your anxiety. Even though they come off as invincible superheroes, unfortunately, dentists are human and are not immune to the ups and downs of life. Life happens. They catch a cold, become injured, or they want to fly to a tropical island and eat nachos by a pool. When these things happen, when a dentist becomes sick, needs to take care of a family member, or simply needs some well deserved R&R, who takes care of the practice when they are away? 

The secret ingredient to being covered on those days off is hiring a dental associate! With another dentist to help steer the ship, this opens your days up to a world of possibilities. You can focus on business management, add a few vacation days to the calendar, spend time with family and friends, and much more! Your associate will thank you too once they get to enjoy a shared workload and free time to practice without management responsibilities weighing on their shoulders. The perks of adding an associate to your team are immeasurable for both parties. Now it becomes time to ask yourself, am I ready for it? 

Every practice in the country will benefit from hiring an associate, whether you bring in 600k or 3 million yearly, because all practice owners NEED a backup dentist. Here are some benchmarks to tell you that you are ready for an associate:

• You have more than 1500 active patients
• You are booked out more than 6 weeks for straightforward procedures like a single crown
• You have more than 6 operatories
• You cannot currently accept emergencies

The process of hiring an associate will look different for every practice. If you work in a highly saturated area, you can plan to hire in a shorter amount of time, whereas if you live in a less populated area, you should expect the process to take slightly longer. Not every dentist will be willing to relocate, but that’s what your friendly neighborhood Dentist Job Connect team is here for! We make sure that every hiring practice finds their perfect fit no matter the location. 

If you’re still wondering if hiring an associate can revolutionize your practice, the answer is a million times yes! Not only does sharing the workload with an associate open your days up to more friends, family, and FUN, but it also benefits patients as well. Their dental experience is streamlined with two dentists available to take care of them instead of just one. This means that, with an associate, every patient spends less time in pain and less time hiding their smiles!