Hire Your Dream Team
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[00:00:00] If you're starting your business, you're not going to want to hire anyone. I know, because when I first started my business, I didn't want to hire anybody. But once you start getting going, maybe you're a year or two years into it, and you're thinking, Oh, shit, I need to hire somebody to help me because I'm wearing so many different hats.
There's no way I can do anything. Anything that well, but I'm having to do so many different tasks. Well, my name is Wong. I'm an occupational therapist and certified hand therapist. And 10 years ago, I started my therapy clinic. And then five years ago, I started hand therapy secrets, which, um, is what you see me doing right here.
And hand therapy secret is all about helping therapists build their clinical skills and business skills. And so I just share a little bit about what I did to do that. To hire my dream team and, um, you know, hopefully that can help you as well inside my OT business corner. Um, course I talk extensively about hiring your dream team, but here is essentially what I did in this order.[00:01:00]
I hired my admin first, then my therapist, then my marketing assistant, then my manager. So here is, um, What I first did when I hired my admin. Now, um, you might think, and I thought this and I was very wrong. So I'm trying to save you the heartache of making these decisions that, you know, they don't really serve you because you're thinking so small because you're so scared.
And maybe that's not you, but that certainly was me. I was scared to hire someone first. Full time because I was like, Oh my God, I'm gonna have to pay them all this money, which means if I didn't, if I had to pay them that I wasn't getting paid. Right? Um, so I started someone part time, but I can guarantee you that there's so much that this one admin person can do.
It's really incredible. If you know what you want and if you know how to best utilize them, right? And I, You're going to make mistakes, like be [00:02:00] prepared to make some mistakes and don't think of someone's salary as like, Oh my God, this is how much I'm going to lose. So, so sometimes it can be really scary because you're like, Oh my God, this therapist wants like 70 to 120, 000.
Right. You know, and I'm going to lose all that money if, um, if I hire them and they don't do well, no, you're actually just going to lose a month. You're gonna, uh, lose two months. You're gonna, you know, and hopefully they're doing something within those two months or one month for you that you're not fully losing it.
They're actually doing something right. Um, so I want to encourage you to kind of like break your thinking down so that it makes it less overwhelming. It makes hiring somebody a little bit easier. So you don't have to go through the shit that I went through. So I hired part time, but I totally could have had that person full time, and it was just a matter of like, what, um, having that list of things for them to do.
Now sometimes you might think, oh, that there's not enough for them, or, um, there, there is enough. There, I promise, there is [00:03:00] enough. Uh, the other thing that might be stopping you from hiring someone full time, because you think that you're going to do everything better, and technically speaking, you are going to do something.
Think better. But if they can do 80 percent of it as good as you, is it worth hiring them so that you don't have to do it? And believe it or not, over a period of time, they might do better than you because they have the capacity to do it all the time. And by that, I mean admin and even the marketing. So when I first started and I didn't have a marketing assistant and I didn't have a manager, I was the manager.
I, Wong, I was a marketing assistant. I was the therapist. I was the manager, right? And the thing is, is all I wanted to do, this admin could have done so much, right? This admin could have [00:04:00] Schedules could have been doing the calls. This man, this admin could have done some cleaning for me, could have done the towels for me.
Just there's like a zillion little things that they could do. Like, honestly, there's so much they can even help you with your billing. If you want it to, I personally didn't want my mark, my admin to do billing for me because I needed that shit. I needs to be fricking paid. Okay. So I made sure I was hired.
I always outsource my billing. Um, I still to this day, I'll source my billing. Um, just a personal choice because I don't want to deal with it. But if you, uh, want to have your own billing person, it's quote, unquote, a little cheaper to have a billing person versus having a billing company. But sometimes you've got to pick and choose, right?
You got to pick and choose. So with my admin, um, one thing I always knew is I didn't want to do by billing and collections in house. I was willing to pay someone else. And so my admin had other things to do. Now. The marketing assistant stuff the admin could [00:05:00] do now. I didn't do that at the beginning because I was so afraid to let go of the marketing assistant stuff.
I was afraid to let go while creating the captions. I was afraid of letting go of Like taking the pictures and posting it a certain way. I just, I could not let that go. Um, but let me tell you if I could let that go earlier, I would have, and I would have gone faster sharing that with you. So maybe you go a little faster than I did, but it was a painful process.
Cause I was like, Oh, I have To do it all and you're just martyring yourself for no fucking reason. 'cause it just drags you down. You're slower. So once I sort of like, you know, what happens, uh, why you make the decisions, 'cause you get freaking tired, something happens. You get freaking tired of shit and you're just like, I can't do it.
Um, somebody needs to step up and do it. And so, um, sometimes it. something breaking you to make the change. Sometimes it's because you hire someone really well, [00:06:00] right? And so, um, I think sometimes it takes a few, uh, takes a little bit of practice. One of my friends says that the magic number is three and she's not lying.
She's not lying. I, I probably hired, um, let me see one, two. Yep. By my third one. By my third one and the, the magic was because I was willing to hire full time, right? So by the third person, she was great. Um, Dulce was great. She was exactly who I needed. She was in my corner. I would change shit on her and she'd be like, yeah, let's go.
Let's do it. Um, I didn't have someone who's like pushing back on me all the time. Like one of the times, no, actually, oh my God, this was my fourth person. Yeah, oh, yeah, just it was my fourth person because I, I did the whole like, let me hire someone I know. And then I hired a couple people part time. And then that was like a shit show.
And when I hired full time, um, she didn't give me pushback. Right. And what [00:07:00] does it mean by pushback? I don't mind people challenging, like me like If I, if I want to do something and they're like, Oh, you know, they want to play devil's advocate. Let's, Oh, let's, you know, what about this? What about that? I don't have a problem with that at all.
Pushback meeting is like, if I have a goal and we're we're trying to achieve this goal for the betterment of like, The company and us, right? The company meaning if I make if the company makes money, I have money to pay you. Like, let's, let's think about this people. Um, if the company doesn't make money, I won't have the money to pay you.
It's literally that simple. But people give you pushback. It's like every time you're trying Like something important, even though it might be hard or strange or new to them, they're, they're like ready to go. They're like, they're ready to support you. The people will give you pushbackers like, well, I don't want to do that because this and this and this, like, they're constantly, you know, draining your energy because they don't want to do some shit because it's uncomfortable for them.
Or they're like, I just didn't sign up for this. Okay. You know, um, [00:08:00] maybe this is not the best job for you. So, uh, hiring the right person really helped. And here's what I did to hire the right person. Um, I have a series of questions that are really good that I use to ask them. Outside of my really good questions, I have a process that I implement.
So, my process is, uh, really simple and it has saved me a of hours. I kid you not thousands of hours. And my friends that, um, that are in business, I tell them like, you guys have to use this. This is so good. Um, but basically I, they opt into, um, to, to the position and then I send them an email. I say, Hey, Um, if you're interested in this position, do this, this and this, right?
It's literally one email and it gives them three things that they have to do. They're very simple things. There's a, they're very simple things. [00:09:00] But for the pandemic, I had an extra step. Okay, great. Thank you for. It's for sending that email to me. I want you to make a seven minute. Um, um, I want you to make a seven minute video of why you want this job.
I've had two people, um, do that. And let me tell you, they were the best. They were the best. One of them, she is an occupation. Like she ended up, she wants to be an occupational therapist. She was volunteering in my clinic when my admin was leaving and she wanted a job. And I was like, well, you have to, uh, I was like, I don't necessarily want to hire someone who's going to, you know, go into OT right now.
Cause she was only going to give me a year. Right. Um, but she was like, well, I'm going to apply for this job anyway. And she applied for the job. And I was like, you know, like she did. It's like that is someone who wants a freaking job. You know, it's not easy to make a seven minute video and she didn't make a seven minute video cause she was like, okay, that's all I got to say.
It was [00:10:00] like at five minutes she was literally in her car, parked in the parking garage, parked in the parking of my office. She was on her way up to do the volunteering. Um, let me tell you those candidates, those people who worked for me or amazing. And so I think if you do something where you put an extra step in that says like, Hey, someone is showing you that they're interested.
Um, it makes a big impact cause you're going to weed out, you know, uh, people who are really not that interested in your job. Uh, as small business, as small businesses, we, Need very particular types of people in our business, right? I'm gonna give you an example. I just like someone just quit My admin just quit like literally from one day to the next she was like I quit and she didn't even fucking give me notice Right.
I had my shit ready to go. Literally. She was You know, texted, Oh, I don't have, you know, the next morning, first top thing in the morning ads went up, [00:11:00] um, paid for it on indeed. And within not even a, not even a week, we had 200 applicants. So from the 200 applicants, we were able to narrow it down to, to like, let's say 30 people who filled out the form.
And then from the 30 people, 10 people actually did that one step thing. From the one step thing, we called them because it narrows our time, like it narrows our candidates down so we can save so much time. So much time. Do you want to know how I fucking did this at the beginning? People would apply on Indeed.
I'd be like, oh, let me look at their resume. Oh, and then I would call them And then you know what they would say to me Okay, where where are you calling from? Oh, you're in Doral. I'm all the way down in Homestead. I'm not taking this shot Like, why did you apply? You know why? Because indeed in those [00:12:00] companies, they, uh, put stuff in front of people.
So it's becomes automatic. So they just sign up for something where automatically applies on their behalf. So they're not even necessarily interested in your job and they're applying for your job. So you think you have candidates and you're wasting your time going through them. So, uh, now I just Wean it down.
Wean it down. So then we have so many in-person, um, I mean, sorry, so many Zoom interviews. So it's like 15 minutes. You know, uh, every 15 minutes I block out, you know, I don't block it out anymore. My manager does, but when I used to do it, I used to get on zoom interviews with them and then I would say, um, you know, ask them some questions.
And if they showed up, it's that simple, they showed up and they showed up half decent. Um, You know, and they sounded like they were interested in the job and they answered the questions in a way that sounded halfway decent. [00:13:00] Then I would invite them for an in person interview. So imagine all like 200 people, you will down to like five, you know, to six people.
That's the only six people you need to, you know, invite into your office to have an in person interview. Right. And then you repeat and recycle that every week or two. Right. So imagine that's, that's a lot of time. Um, so if you had 200, Applicants every two weeks. I'm like, that's just a lot. Um, so that's how I was able to do it by myself to whittle it down to, um, being able to hire a really good admin.
And then after I hired the admin, I was like, oh, I need to hire a therapist right now. I know a lot of people love hiring that like. Therapist, you know, part time, per diem. I don't know about you, but I need a little bit of commitment, right? Hand therapy is not easy. It's not easy for people to find jobs.
It's not easy to find people with skills. [00:14:00] I'm willing to train for it, right? But training for it takes a lot of time and it takes a lot of energy, right? Not everyone is willing to Train for it. They don't, some people don't have the energy for it. Some people don't have the time for it. Imagine if I had to, I have to pay you, right?
I have to pay you. See, this is where people don't understand sometimes. I have to freaking pay your ass money and my ass costs twice as much. Now I have lost Plus two amounts of money, right? Cause we're not working. We just sit and talking and training and blah, blah, blah. Now you can train on the job too, but you know, if you're making 50 an hour and you've got to go back to watch my other videos on like, you know, what kind of business and how much you're charging for.
But, but that's a lot of money lost. When you are hiring somebody who, [00:15:00] um, has a poor piss attitude, right skills, you can train for all day and everything, right? Skills you can train for. Someone comes in, they don't know how you do things, they don't know how certain things are done. You can train for that.
Attitude 100 percent you can't train for so, um, therapists can be assets, but they also can be liabilities, right? Assets are people who, you know, you build into, they're gonna, they're gonna bring money back, right? You're investing in them, they're gonna have a money return. Liabilities is like using a credit card and spending it, you never get shit back.
They tell you you're making money back. But you're not making money back because you're spending so much money that you'll never have a chance to make money back. That's a liability. And so when you hire your therapist, Right, and this is where therapists who want to work for someone else don't understand is you can either create yourself to be an asset Or you're creating yourself to be a liability and you have to decide which one you're going to be.
So as a business owner You, I am an [00:16:00] asset, right? I make money. The decisions that I make make me money. You as a business owner You're an asset. The decisions you make make you money. When you hire a therapist that makes you money, you can pay them and you can make money. If you hire a therapist that has a piss poor attitude and they become more of a liability than they are an asset, you will drain out your money.
So it took me several, therapist as well before I got to, um, a really good one. And I would say that most of my therapists, um, like my first full time therapist, it wasn't her fault that she was considered like she lost me money. I lost money hiring her. It wasn't her fault. She did a great job with what she had.
It was just like my focus. When I hired her got deterred because of, I was so busy learning business skills that I didn't do [00:17:00] real fundamental things because my, you know, I didn't have, I didn't have a marketing assistant.
Now go watch my other videos, right? Go watch my other videos on marketing. Cause there is no way in this day and age, you can grow your business solely on The word of mouth of a doctor, the minute that doctor turns on you, you're fricking screwed. The minute that doctor closes his business, you know, uh, you're fricking screwed.
If the, if that doctor decides to, you know, go cahoots with another therapist, your business is screwed. So I never put all my eggs into one basket of one surgeon. I don't put my eggs in one basket. Of an insurance company because the minute they change, you have no control over it. The only control you have is over how you decide to run your [00:18:00] business.
And marketing nowadays is really big. It's such an important, um, aspect of running a business that whether you like it or not, you need to, you know, hone in on. Whether you are marketing to other companies to send you people or you're marketing directly to the consumer, like I tend to mark directly to people, um, if you're not playing that game, you're going to lose out because there's a lot of noise nowadays.
And most. majority of people are on some form or fashion of a social media platform. They are being influenced somehow or another by the brand of a company, the message of a company. Um, and when the sooner you start marketing, the sooner you start marketing, the sooner you start developing your brand. Now I was talking to a business owner and she was like, well, I don't know, like, she's like, Brands making new she's like I'm developing my brand.
Okay Brand is a reputation that people understand and know your company [00:19:00] about so if your brand's making new you have absolutely no brand And brand isn't about your colors and it isn't about your logo Uh, it's about your reputation over a period of time Um that people get to know you to see you Stand for.
That's a brand, and it takes time to develop a brand. I mean, you think about, um, companies like iPhone, you think about, um, shoe companies like Nike. You think about, you know, purses like Louis Vuitton. You think about, uh, hotels like, um, the Ritz Carlton, these people, these big, huge companies. develop a brand over, you know, decades and, um, multiple renditions.
I actually was listening to a story on, on the luxury brand, uh, Hermes, Hermes, Hermes, Hermes. I can't fucking say it. Uh, but you know, it took them three generations before they got as big as they got. Now you see this luxury brand as like this brand that you can't even go in and buy a, a purse, you know, [00:20:00] uh, you can't even go and buy a Birkin bag or a Kelly bag or whatever.
You have to like be in the club. Uh, they make it so exclusive, but before they were like that, they were gone through three generations where they were just like, you know, weren't making much of anything and almost like, Died out as a company. So, uh, brands take a long time and it takes a lot of work, a lot of marketing over a period of time to create it.
So, um, so yeah, the more you can hire and the more you can get someone to, you know, to, to help you to do these things, because you can manage your ego saying like, Oh, I am the best. I can do everything. Like if you can let that go, you'll be able to hire your dream team. And that's what I did. And then after a while, I was able to hire a manager, right?
So, you don't really have to hire a manager unless you have multiple locations, maybe you have multiple staff therapists, you know. Once you start having more than [00:21:00] like seven people, um, this manager can help you do a lot more. But, um, I don't, I have a small team. I want to work with a small team, but I have two companies.
So my therapy clinic and then I have hand therapy secrets, my educational company. And so my manager helps me to manage, um, a lot of stuff in between. Um, so that's what I did to hire my dream team. And I hope that helps you to, uh, hire your dream team or even just your dream team could look like. Um, these videos are created to help you save time and heartache and hopefully save some money because I lost it so you can save it.
Um, if you have any comments and you have further questions, leave me a comment below and there's going to be some links there for you if you want to grab my free guide to, um, to your business. Let me do that again. I'm going to have, I have some links below. If you want to grab my free guide, so you can start and grow your business, make it part
