The Importance of a Job Analysis When Hiring

If you have ever had to hire someone, you can relate to the frustration of not getting great candidates. As the economy improves, the war for talent will only heat up. If you are reading this article, chances are you have already taken steps to improve your own skills and grow your practice – but without the right people around you it will be hard to sustain the momentum you started by seeking advanced education. In this next series of articles, we will explore tactics to help you increase both the quantity and the quality of candidates.

When making a hiring decision the first step is to ensure you know what you really want this person to do for you. Do you want an assistant to simply suck spit and hand instruments or do you want them to be an integral part of getting a patient to ask the right questions about treatment? Should your assistant have 15 years of experience so they can step right in or would you prefer to train in someone greener so you don't have to break bad habits? Are you really looking for an office manager or a front desk person with a better title who will handle escalated customer service calls?

A great place to start with this is a task based job analysis. Doing this helps you to take a step back and really assess the tasks you want your employee to perform by assessing the frequency and how crucial it is that they do it perfectly. For instance, if one were to look at the tasks of a police officer, one task would be paperwork; the frequency of this would be high but how crucial it is would be medium. In contrast drawing their weapon in the line of duty might never happen, so frequency would be low but if they do it is crucial that they do everything right.

When thinking about your practice, you need to be able to determine what attributes are most important. Is it clinical skills or attitude? What can you train? Do you have the time to do so?

When you have a clear picture of what you want finding the right person will be that much easier. Here is a form that will walk you through the steps of a job analysis so you can begin to fine-tune your requirements and source with a laser focus.

Adam McWethy is the Human Resources Manager for Spear Education.