A doctor writes in asking how The Dental Practice Fixers feel about hiring team members with large visible tattoos. He has been doing a lot of interviewing and says that this is extremely common these days. His concern is that they do not look good and he is worried that his patients, especially the elderly ones, will go elsewhere. Tune in to find out what Dr. David Madow and Dr. Richard Madow have to say about tattoos. Then of course we do the call of the week. We call an office asking a fairly simple question – Are you accepting new patients? It’s the call that every dental office would LOVE. How do you think they did? You need to listen to this one. If you have a question that you would like answered on our podcast, please send it in to podcast@madow.com. We will do our best to get yours answered!

Large Tattoos on Team Members – Do You Hire Them?

Dr. Richard Madow: Hiring new team members has always been a bit of a tricky proposition, but it seems like these days there’s a new complication that’s been thrown into the mix. We’re going to hear about that on our question in this week’s episode of the Dental Practice Fixers Podcast. Welcome, welcome, welcome everyone. I am Dr. Richard Madow, along here with my cohort and co-host.
Dr. David Madow: Dr. David Madow. How are you all doing? Welcome back, we really appreciate you and let’s get right into the question today.
Dr. Richard Madow: Let’s do it.
Dr. David Madow: It’s a great one. I’m surprised we haven’t got this question earlier.
Dr. Richard Madow: I know. I think we’ve got it in our live seminars before. Yeah, I think so.
Dr. David Madow: Have we got it? Oh okay. Anyway, this is something that is probably going to affect if it hasn’t yet, every single dental practice out there. It starts out with Rich and Dave, hey guys, love the podcast. Thank you so much, we appreciate that. I’ve been a practicing dentist for over 35 years and still love every single day in the office. There are no plans to retire. Well I’m not sure that’s great because you should have some kind of exit strategy at some point.
Dr. Richard Madow: Well it doesn’t mean he can’t afford to retire. It’s just means he has no plans to retire. That’s great.
Dr. David Madow: Like most dentists, we have staff members who leave for various reasons. So, every now and then we need to hire someone new. The last few times I’ve interviewed people, they all had very large visible tattoos which I found to be unattractive. I know these things are commonplace these days, but many of my patients are older and I don’t think they would appreciate team members with tattoos, piercings, etc. What do I do? Dr. Abner Smith from Georgia. That explains the whole thing. But actually, it doesn’t because tattoos are ubiquitous. No matter what state…
Dr. Richard Madow: State, city, urban, rural. I mean they’re just – they’re everywhere. Tattoos are extremely…
Dr. David Madow: Hey have you ever seen mine?
Dr. Richard Madow: I don’t want to. Hold on…
Dr. David Madow: It says Marshall.
Dr. Richard Madow: Is this Marshall? What?
Dr. David Madow: This is Marshall. I had one that said Barb but I took – I covered it with Marshall.
Dr. Richard Madow: As you remember many years ago, I think it was Marshall – Marshall’s our middle brother. It was he’s 50th birthday so he’s 61 now.
Dr. David Madow: Wait a minute…
Dr. Richard Madow: So it’s 11 years ago.
Dr. David Madow: It was 11 years ago. Are you sure it’s that long ago?
Dr. Richard Madow: The three cool brothers were in Atlantic City. Well it’s not the three cool brothers,