So I recently got a receptionist job at a dental clinic which was cool because usually places like these require previous experience.
Interview process was fine, took maybe less than a week. Management seemed friendly. Training was alright, could’ve been better.
So during the interview process, they had me go in for a paid working interview for an hour at the clinic I would be working at (they have multiple clinics under one company). No biggie, the manager that I got to meet and work with at my clinic, let’s call her “Mary” was eccentric but nonetheless nice in that one hour I got to interact with her.
So 4 days of training later I get my schedule for the following month and it looks like I’m closing 12-8pm with Mary, awesome. I’m excited and can’t wait.
Obviously learning dental software, dental lingo, learning how to bill insurance etc, is obviously information overload for someone like me with only retail heavy experience but the first 2-3 days is cool, I’m learning and testing things out. I like Mary for the time being. But this is where I begin to notice and feel weird about things. It’s almost like something is bothering you but you can’t put your finger on it. So Mary is very eccentric, in a good way I guess. Has lots of energy. Good work ethic. Imagine the greatest customer experience you ever had, but ON CRACK. Like literally explosive. That’s her with customers (again not a bad thing because they like it).
Maybe it’s me, I’m on the spectrum + diagnosed w cptsd; so I assume it must be me. But her voice, the way she carried herself, interacts w people was almost theatric and loud. As if she was on a stage, felt very performative.
As she’s training me, she talks with a lot of authority, over explains, gets irritated if I don’t understand the little intricate details of dental procedures, dental lingo, having to need things explained multiple times or having them explained in a “dumbed down” way so I can understand. Obviously I’m not going to understand how insurance works, therefore I need you to explain it to me in simple words first and then in dental language. For example, she was explaining to me that for some insurances they have a “maximum limit” for an insurance holders whole year plan or something from what I recall. So I basically tried regurgitating it back to her in my own words (because that’s what we’d been doing+ it helps me learn) so I say something along the lines of “Oh so the insurance will provide a maximum limit for that whole year and it can go towards whatever procedures the patient gets” she goes in drill Sargeant mode and goes “well no that’s not what I said …. And no we don’t know what the patient is getting because we are not the patient we would have to check their chart notes”. And in my head I was like “lady, I wasn’t being specific, ofc I know it doesn’t matter what procedure the patient is getting nor does it matter, I’m just trying to understand whether or not a maximum limit can cover whatever procedure”. Because she was trying to explain the maximum amount ur insurance will pay out for a claim. Yeah she flipped on me for that.
Another thing I noticed is that, she will ask me to do a thing, then start talking to me non stop about things that aren’t related to work, and because I don’t want to be rude, I’ll stop looking at my screen so I can engage with her. But after she’s done her “yapping” (smthing she admitted herself that she does) she’ll snap back and tell me to finish what I was doing. Okay? Or sometimes if I stop taking my notes because I’m listening to her and really digesting what she’s saying, she’ll say in very rude tone “you might want to write that down”. Or if she wants me to explain my thinking process she doesn’t go “can you explain your thinking process on that” she’ll go “why” in a way that makes you doubt yourself even though I’m confident in my answer.
She asked me to check out this patient and she embarrassed me in front of him. Because I said he wasnt covered for scaling (which was true) 3 of his procedures were covered at 80% and scaling wasn’t covered at all. I guess I did say it incorrectly. I ended up crying because I just couldn’t take it anymore. She said as much as the “company interviews people we interview them” and basically saying it’s better to prevent the potential situation where I wake up and hate going into work. Nah I just don’t want to wake up hate my job cause I have to work with you. I didn’t want to be there anymore and she started saying I should probably work at a hair salon. Am I tweaking or is just a shitty manager? Btw, she constantly talked about how she got this job because her sister is a manager at another clinic. Mentioned how this job made her cry after work as well.