Hiring vs. Receptionist Training – Which is Better?

Hiring vs. Receptionist Training – Which is Better?

In a recent Harris Poll conducted for Glassdoor, 48% of the HR and hiring managers surveyed said they are unable to locate enough qualified candidates to fill all of their open positions.

Furthermore, 26% believe this will become an even bigger problem moving forward. But a shortage of talent isn’t the only challenge that comes with hiring. There are many other factors also at play. So, is hiring a new front desk team really your best option? Or could receptionist training be the better choice? Let’s take a look at a few of the most important things to consider.

Cost According to a study by U.C. Berkeley, hiring a new employee costs businesses an average of $4,000. These costs tend to be even greater for smaller businesses, due to an even higher proportion of non-wage related expenses, such as administrative costs. This number also doesn’t take into account benefits, which can total 1.25 to 1.4 times an employee’s base salary.

Furthermore, according to the Society for Human Resource Management, replacing an employee can cost as much as 50-60% of their annual salary.

In stark comparison, the annual cost of developing existing talent, such as through receptionist training, costs an average of about $1,200 per employee. Looking at the numbers, it’s pretty clear that receptionist training has a much higher ROI than sourcing new talent. This is particularly attractive for smaller businesses that have tighter budgets. For instance, a small dental clinic would fare far better by investing in a dental office receptionist course for existing staff than hiring someone new.

Time In addition to monetary costs, hiring a new employee also costs an employer’s time. The SHRM study mentioned above identifies the cost of time associated with replacing employees as including any or all of the following:      

Time spent by HR personnel handling exit interviews, administrative tasks, payroll and benefits activities, etc.

Time spent by managers on retention efforts and exit interviews Vacation and sick time taken by departing employees Time spent finding temporary coverage during the replacement process Time spent by other existing employees to get work done during the replacement period Production delays and other disruptions caused by the employee’s departure

On top of this, there is also the time spent on searching for qualified candidates, which includes drafting up and managing job postings, reviewing applicants and interviewing, as well as hiring, on-boarding and training. Conversely, the time spent on training is a fraction of what is lost during the turnover process. None of this extra time would be lost by simply investing in receptionist training to develop existing employee skills instead.

Flexibility and Opportunity Developing your existing talent also provides much more flexibility in terms of encouraging employees to take on more roles and responsibilities. When you train from within, you will have the advantage of recognizing certain existing skills and strengths that are difficult to ascertain during the hiring process. This will enable you to handpick those who are best suited for the job and will therefore be more likely to excel in that role. Essentially, receptionist training lets you optimize staffing decisions to a degree that hiring externally simply cannot.

Training and promoting from within also lets you develop future management and invest in those with the potential to one day become trainers themselves. Rather than looking outside the company for front desk talent, you could work with internal employees to not only compile a high-performance team, but also develop and hone your own receptionist training program.

This can have a multiplier effect that could eventually help you train additional employees without having to worry about added costs.

So, what’s better? Hiring from scratch or developing your existing staff? As you can see above, investing in receptionist training will not only save you money and time, but it could potentially pay dividends for many years to come. Looking at it that way, the answer should be abundantly clear. Receptionist training is the way to go.