At Arm’s Length
A retail pharmacy finds people skills are just as important as technical
expertise
by anne bokma
Some call it employer’s remorse—that sickening feeling
you get when you realize you might have hired the wrong person for
the job. Marion, manager of a chain pharmacy, currently has the feeling
about Bill, whom she hired as a staff pharmacist five months ago. In
addition to the usual patient counselling responsibilities, Bill’s
duties include supervising several technicians and doing medication
reviews once a week at a local nursing home. Marion has discovered
Bill’s strengths are in drug expertise and dispensing, but not
in patient communication and staff management. He often seems uncomfortable
talking to patients, and doesn’t delegate as much work as he
could to the techs. Several residents at the seniors’ home have
complained that Bill isn’t as personable as the previous pharmacist
who visited them. Marion would like to try and improve the situation
before taking the drastic step of firing Bill, but she’s not
sure how to help him.
“Marion is in a position many of us have been in at one time
or another—with an employee who cannot or chooses not to demonstrate
the required skills or knowledge,” says Joan A. Pajunen, president
of TrendSeek International, a retail consulting firm in Collingwood,
Ont., and co-author of The Butterfly Customer: How to Capture
Today’s Elusive Customer (John Wiley & Sons, 1997).
She suggests Marion closely observe Bill’s behaviour and have a conversation with him as soon as
possible after witnessing a poor interaction with a patient or staff member. “She
needs to recount what she saw and get Bill to put himself in the shoes of the
patient or staff member to help him understand what he’s doing wrong.” Marion
should then discuss her concerns about Bill’s communication skills, outlining
specific steps that might remedy the situation. She might ask him to take a
communications or staff-management training course, help him learn from others
by putting him on the same shift as another store pharmacist who has superior
communications skills, or have him shadow a pharmacist at another store in
the chain. She might even arrange to do some one-on-one role-playing with him.
Marion then needs to stay on top of the situation by following up
a number of times over the next couple of weeks to ensure progress
is being made. She should offer positive feedback to Bill whenever
possible to encourage any improvement. Most importantly, she needs
to convince Bill that a change in his behaviour is required, not only
for the future health of her pharmacy, but also for the sake of his
future career in it.
It’s not surprising that Bill doesn’t like to delegate
dispensary work to technicians, since this is the part of the job he’s
most comfortable with. But if he hopes to have value as a pharmacist
in Marion’s store, he must move beyond the technical aspects
of his job, finding a way to connect with patients and earn the confidence
of the staff. “Communicating with a wide variety of people may
not come naturally to Bill, who is likely an introvert, but it’s
something he simply has to work at,” says Pajunen, who suggests
that a Toastmasters course could help bring him out of his shell.
Bill needs to heed Marion’s advice. “Interacting with
patients well is an absolute necessity as a pharmacist today,” says
Pajunen. “If Bill won’t or can’t improve his communication
skills, it’s a tough call. He may have to realize that working
with patients in a pharmacy is simply not the best environment for
him.”
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