Park Dental is not the place you want to work. The executive management team is terribly dysfunctional and lacks even the slightest idea of what leadership means. The CEO, Pete Swenson, is only the CEO because his father started the organization in 1972. He genuinely lacks a comprehensive understanding of the workings of the business, yet regularly tells others that they don't understand dentistry. This defense mechanism is part of his extreme narcissism that has so far allowed him to maintain a death grip of control over the organization through intimidation and bullying. No one would follow him as a leader, and so ultimately he rules by force at the extreme detriment to the organization and its ability to succeed and grow.
Since taking over, he has created a culture that can only be described as toxic, hostile, condescending, and demoralizing. He does not tolerate free thinking, and anyone who disagrees with him is swiftly punished or removed from the organization. He has no idea what it means to mentor, grow, or encourage, and he is generally disliked across the entire organization for exactly that reason. It is clear that he doesn't care about anyone except himself and increasing his excessively large paycheck.
It is unfortunate that Pete is regularly shocked to discover things that aren’t functioning as he expected, while not recognizing he and a very small group of people who, in his view, can do no wrong, are the ones responsible for having decided to run things that way in the first place. This is a common occurrence observed and discussed by many. They are clueless to their mismanagement and aren’t open to the possibility that they may have ever made a mistake. In most of these situations they cast a wide and deep net of blame towards anyone not in the "protected" group to make sure disagreement doesn't spread and risk jeopardizing their unilateral decision. Any objection to the blame results in one-on-one meetings or public shaming to help "clarify" or "calibrate on" the misunderstanding. Finally, anyone who doesn't see things Pete's way afterwards is swiftly removed from the organization and becomes the de facto scapegoat for any problems Pete creates but can't admit to.
Nearly every manager (except those in the "protected group") at the Resource Group (headquarters), as well as nearly every manager at the practices talk badly about Pete and his close circle of incompetent moronic managers who he safeguards, yet no one confronts them about it because they have a history of getting rid of anyone who questions anything they say.
In short, creativity is punished, absolute loyalty (especially in the face of contradictory information) is the only thing that is rewarded, and there is no room for growth because senior leaders are terrified of losing the death grip on the organization. Park Dental is not the place you want to work as long as Pete Swenson is the CEO, and Dr. Steele is the President.
