3 Tips to Hire the Best Pharmacy Staff
The employees behind your pharmacy counter have a huge impact on whether or not your customers will keep coming back. Here, we’ll talk through hiring strategies and 3 tips to hire the best pharmacy staff and keep the best possible talent.
Seek Advice from Your Team
One of the most common reasons employees stay with a company is because they enjoy their coworkers. There’s always a risk when you hire a new employee that the dynamic of your business will change in a negative way. To mitigate that risk, be sure to loop your existing pharmacy staff into the hiring process. You should always have additional people participate in interviewing candidates with you, in order to get different viewpoints and have someone else ask questions you may not have thought of.
Another way to engage your team in the hiring process is to ask if they know anyone looking for a pharmacy job. Of course you can source external candidates through various job sites and social media, but referrals from your top employees are always a great place to start. If your best talent has your business’s best interests in mind, they’ll recommend quality candidates that will fit into your pharmacy organization seamlessly.
Come Up with Your Questions
As a hiring manager, it’s often tempting to “wing it” when it comes to interviewing candidates for your independent pharmacy. This is understandable and is a great method. You definitely want to see where the interview goes, as candidate responses can lead to different questions you may not have prepared in advance.
However, it’s critical to have a list of questions prepared that are specific to the role you’re hiring for—and that you ask them all. Candidates are nervous, and pauses in interview questioning can heighten that feeling—resulting in the candidate perhaps not presenting themselves at their most confident. Your questions should run the gamut, touching on everything from on-the-job experience to customer service background to the ability to work in a team environment.
Never Stop Searching
This tip, which applies to all industries, is one of the best ways to take the work out of hiring new staffers. Often, small business owners are forced to seek out new candidates in a matter of days or weeks, based on when the need arises. Current employees can quit unexpectedly, or business can pick up out of nowhere. If you’re prepared as a business owner with a nice bank of potential employees from which to choose, you’re in a great spot. Therefore, don’t evert take a break from searching for top talent. Definitely don’t be shy about approaching folks who are already employed, either—you never know when someone will be in the market for a new job.