As a pharmacy owner, you can’t afford to lose employees or tolerate ones who are quiet quitting. Be willing to make changes that can help prevent quiet quitting while improving your business practices.
As a pharmacy owner, you have your hands full with all the tasks that make a profitable and successful business. Effective pharmacy management entails keeping track of inventory, documenting finances, managing stock, budgeting, hiring, and retaining good staff.
Staffing is a particular concern in the pharmacy business, with the turnover of employees affecting your financial bottom line and customer service. Pharmacy Staffing reports: “Employee turnover costs can be estimated to be, at a minimum, almost 100% of the employee’s base salary.” They continue to estimate that for a highly educated employee like a pharmacist, the cost can rise by up to 300%.
The reasons are clear—the cost of advertising, hiring, training, onboarding, and the residual impact of losing other employees, or a reduction in productivity for those remaining.
Your pharmacy technicians are also important, and staffing shortages of pharmacy techs are occurring across the country. Quiet quitting is another negative phenomenon that may affect your pharmacy business. By attending to quiet quitting, you can improve your management practices.
What is Quiet Quitting?
The idea behind quiet quitting is that employees are unhappy or otherwise dissatisfied with their job, so they do the bare minimum to get by without actually quitting or getting fired. So how do you know if an employee fits this description? The pharmacy business is a people business, and your employee’s behavior and attitude toward customers can give you the first clues. Here are some quiet quitting behaviors to look for:
- Lack of Effort. Employees are people with lives and stressors you may not know about. A lack of drive or work engagement could be temporary due to a family or health problem. If you notice a consistent lack of effort on the job, this is a problem.
- Negativity. Negative statements about work to other employees or a bad attitude are unhealthy and damaging to the work milieu.
- Poor Customer Service. Some evidence suggests that quiet quitting is more of an issue for Gen Z and Millennial employees, but it is not confined to any particular age group. Pharmacy customer service is at the heart of what you do and how you retain customers.
- Lack of Engagement. Lack of involvement can mean less interaction with other staff and company initiatives.
How Does Quiet Quitting Affect Your Pharmacy Business?
Simply put, quiet quitting affects your bottom line and the financial health and stability of your business. Consumers have more options for their prescription drugs than ever before—primarily online pharmacies such as Divvy Dose, Amazon Pharmacy, and costplusdrugs.com.
The advantage you have as a community or independent pharmacy competing with online companies or other retail pharmacies in your area is the face-to-face interaction your customers have with you and pharmacy techs. Even one negative interaction can drive a customer to another business. You can’t afford disgruntled and uninvolved employees.