Relationships

Relationships with organizations, people and colleagues help build your practice or it can destroy what you have worked so hard to build.  Individuals have their own baggage that they bring to the table. However, in order to keep those problems to a minimum and to have a team of people that can work through problems they have to be balanced in all five realms of emotional intelligence.

Stein and Book in their book in 2000, name five realms of emotional intelligence, intrapersonal, interpersonal, adaptability, stress management and general mood.

Intrapersonal intelligence is your ability to be self-aware. Reflect on how aware you are of your own emotions, relationships and feelings.

Interpersonal intelligence refers to how you see or view your social responsibility and your ability to emphasize with others.

Adaptability is your ability to change and solve problems when they arise. For example, are you able to see a problem from all angles? Can you evaluate outcomes of choices in the moment?

Stress management is the fourth emotional intelligence. As a human being you deal with a variety of different stresses. If you are the owner of a dental office, you have to balance not only office needs, but staffing and patient needs. This is a delicate balance and one that takes a great deal of skill in.

The fifth and final one is overall mood. Stein and Book are referring to whether you are overall optimistic and your general wellbeing.

All of these areas together are required in order to have strong relationship skills. If you are really strong in one area but weak in another you may find that your relationships are out of balance.  Take the time before the New Year to reflect on where you are in each area and determine where you need to improve. The more balanced you are the more strength you will find in your overall business.  

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Happy Holidays

Insanity

As we head into the New Year this is a perfect time to look back and decide to try something new.  Insanity is defined as doing the same thing over and over but expecting different results. It is time for you to try something new.

Change a policy that isn’t working for the office or switch around the morning huddle.  Stop, close your eyes and picture the office you want to have. What is everyone doing? How many patients are there? What does the office look like? What do interactions between patients and staff sound like?

You have to picture it to believe.  You can have the office you want but you may also need to reframe the situation. If something is going on that has happened often it has become a habit. It takes time and practice to break out of bad habits. But now is a good time, to stop, reframe and change whatever isn’t working.

Don’t spend this year doing things that don’t work for your business.

G                          Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality 

                       communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please                                                  visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Solution steps

In the heat of the moment when there is a fire burning at your doorstep it is easy to make a solution that is incongruent with the facts or a decision you would have made not in the heat of the moment. In order to make the best possible decision when facing a tough problem the book, "Leading Every Day," suggests that you complete these four steps:

1. Examine the facts

           Do you have all the information?

           Is there something else going on? 

           Are you missing a piece of information?

2. Consider the possiblities

          Sometimes we jump into a solution before we really consider all of the possible solutions. It is important when facing a problem that you think about all of the possible solutions including ones that may seem crazy or out of the box. It might just be what you in need in order to solve the problem.

3. Evaluate the situation logically

         It is easy in the heat of the moment to lose your head. It is important to stop, calm down and think about the problem. You may need to make a pro-con list or analyze the consequences of the action you are going to take. 

4. Look at the impact of your proposed solution on people, including yourself and your own value set

         Before you make a decision consider the impact it will have on you, your organization and your establishment. Again we can jump right into a solution without thinking about the large impact it will have on everyone around us including ourselves. 

Trust in this process every time to help make situations better when your faced with your next fire.



Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Layers of Leadership

Is it just you on the top?

Or do you have people in the middle layers that can help make decisions?

It is important in order to build strong leaders throughout the organization that you are not always the one in charge. Sharing responsibility of certain areas or letting someone else be in charge can help boost morale as well as empower individuals to step up. 

For example, if your front office is not very good at social media but your hygienist is, then you will want her to be the lead in this particular area. And if your back office is really good at ordering your supplies then they should be the person who is in charge. 

You do not have to always be the one in the lead role. When you allow other members to help make decisions it will help them step up and take responsibility because they are now in charge of something specific and they were able to give input into the process.

Everyone in your office has areas that they excel in, you want to capitalize on these areas in order for your office to be great in all areas.

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

A new start

Your culture defines what you do

Culture is the beliefs and systems that drive your organization. It is what makes up your business and supports patients. Your culture is made up of two different things. The policies you have written down, for example, no drinking coffee in front of patients and the underlined values and beliefs your staff hold dear to them.

What happens when the two collide?

Well it depends. You need to ask yourself does the employee’s culture go against the general culture you are trying to instill in your office? Or do they enhance what you are already trying to create? 

You have a choice? 

If your culture is tense, distracting and unfocused you can change. You can hire new staff if you need to bring people on board that have the same cultural beliefs in patient care, office procedures and the general well-being of the business. 

Or you can bring in a coach that helps your business learn to play like a team! 

Build a strong business day and change tomorrow.

SALT

Genuine Action

All of us have mentors or individuals who have been a part of our life and shape the beliefs we have. When you took over the dental office, many people may have offered you advice on how to handle your business. Stop and think, does the actions you take day to day align with your beliefs? Or are you completing tasks, policies and procedures that are out of line with what you believe?

It is easy to take on someone else's belief system when decisions have to be made or when you need to just accomplish a goal. But they may not be the best or most effective. The action may not even be in line with who you are as a business leader.

Take time to analyze some of the events that happen in your office. Do you handle difficult situations in a way that you support and believe in Or do you handle them in a way that your neighbor suggested? Do you utilize social media sites with one post a day because that is what the dentist around the corner does Or because that is what you want your office to be doing?

Step back and figure out which procedures and policies are in place because that is what you want to happen and change the ones that occur because they work for someone else.

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Changing your perspective

Is the glass have empty or half full? 

Philosophers and other like minded people have been asking this question for hundreds of years to determine what type of a thinker you are. Books like the, "Secret" and "The power of positive thinking," have one common theme. The way you think impacts what you do.

That is why reframing how you think about things is critical to your overall success. 

For example, you have very few patients scheduled in the upcoming weeks. 

You can tell yourself, "they don't have money, it's the holidays." Or you can state, patients are too busy this time of year."

Or you can reframe how you think about it and say, "now is the perfect time to schedule because individuals will have time to take care of their dental needs. Then get on the phone and make calls to the patients you haven't seen in awhile. Send out a holiday deal or a special holiday "Thank-you."

How you approach and think about a situation will determine the action you do or do not take towards achieving the goal.  You can sit in the holiday season and barely make it through or you can see patients coming through your door by the dozen and approach your daily practices to accommodate the number of patients pouring through your doors.  Reframing how you think about a situation will also allow your brain to see a situation in a new way.

In order to help you reframe ask yourself these questions: 

1. What are your views on the situation currently and what assumptions are you making?

2. Are you making correct assumptions?

3. How would other people view the situation?

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Your professional organizations

Networking is the organizations that you are a part of. It maybe a dental organization or you may spend time in a community group that supports the hungry. Whichever group you choose to be a part of work to grow your standing in the organization.

Not only does being a part of an organization help build your image in the community it also helps to build your own education and learning in your field. It is easy to become stagnate when you do the same thing day in and day out. However, being a part of a professional network allows you to share new ideas with others, and it allows you to learn from other professionals in the field.

Change is a strong part of organizations and in the Book, “Leadership Every Day,” it states that the relationships within an organization are so complex that it changes the dynamics of the organization. Therefore, choose your organizations carefully.  You want to be a part of an organization that is good for society, or is elite in your field. 

Everyone in the office should be a part of a community organization. No matter whether you are the front office or a registered dental assistant you should still continue your learning process by being a part of a professional group.  Everyone needs support to work through problems, come up with innovative strategies to help support patients or create effective procedures. Networking can help you work through these difficult situations.

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

A simple thank-you goes along way!

Individuals enjoy being recognized for doing a job well done. However, if you did a survey of your office staff and your patients do you think they would tell you they are overly appreciated? Most individuals do not feel that they’re bosses tell them that they appreciate them enough. Bosses go about business, patients come in and they leave. But most people never exchange pleasantries that show genuine appreciation for a job well done.

It is important for individuals to say thank-you to the people around them. It is recommended by some that you say, “Thank you,” at least three times a day. If you are conducting the morning huddle, ask individuals to share something that went well the week before. You may consider instituting a recognition badge for someone who does something exceptional.

Your thank you should be genuine. Just stating a generic appreciative remark does not bread a sense of strong relationships and trust. However, deep genuine appreciation, for the individuals that work with you will help build stronger relationships.  Hundreds of staff leave positions everyday because they feel that they are undervalued for the hard work that they do.

Individuals at your office may feel they are replaceable at a drop of a hat. If you treat them this way however, many of your employees will find another place to work. An attitude of irreplaceable will help your employees feel valued. When employees feel important they will put in the extra effort, they will follow through with your mission and they will continue to help build onto the culture of appreciation by thanking other employees.

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Take your practice to the next level

 Team Strategies,
       The Dental Practice Companion
by Debra Quarles

Based on lessons taught and learned over a quarter-century of dental practice management consulting, Team Strategies, The Dental Practice Companion is a comprehensive and easy-to-follow game plan for staying competitive in today's market. As a brief taste of what it's like to work with SaltDPM, Team Strategies is good reading for any forward thinking dental practice. (revised 2013 edition.)




Don't miss your opportunity today to own the book that will change your office forever.

Patient Centered Practice

The heart of your business is your customer’s. When they are not happy you can be assured that they will share that with everyone. When they’re happy they will be quick to also let others know.  And when something has happened and they know they are not the center of our practice they will be sharing their unhappiness with the neighbors, friends and strangers at the grocery store. In order to provide the best experience to your customers it is important to know who they are and what they care about.

Your patients might value great care, easy billing practices, or relationships. You may have clients that only care about the overall cleanliness of the office. And what patients find important today may change as they have a family, gat a divorce or switch jobs. It is important to know this because in order to provide superior care to a variety of patients you have to first know what it is that matters to them.

Reflect on what they want and what they value most. After you do that make sure every part of your office meets those same needs of your patients. If you are missing something adjust quickly and implement new strategies that will let your customers know you are thinking of them.

Once you have accessed the primary needs of patients you and your staff should agree upon a method to continue to evaluate how your patients feel about your office. You can utilize different methods such as asking patients when they leave how their experience was or you can utilize social media in order to gather reviews. The method you use doesn’t matter. What matters is that you’re aware and you constantly adjust accordingly. 

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Share new knowledge

The dental field is always changing. It is important to continue to support patients and your office by creating away for yourself and team members to share new information on dental instruments, techniques and technology that is impacting the dental field. 

As a leader of the office you should find and establish a system for your team to bring new information to the office. Maybe a new social media format or an updated software that will save money as just been released. Whatever new idea, there should be an established format where the team can come together and share information and ideas in a safe way. 

In one of your team huddles you may decide to have the team read about a new technique and discuss whether it would benefit the office. Or you might have them try the x-ray machine and report on how well it works for patients. 

Another important way to keep up-to-date on information and share it with your team is conventions and other trainings. In the past you may not have seen a purpose for your teams to attend these events however, new research and new information can become invaluable to your office. The more your team is out and about and has access to new information the better off your patients will be. Find the way to help build your team’s knowledge on new and innovative practices.

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Data allows for action

Data is all around your office and it is constantly changing. In order for you and your team to keep your office moving forward it is important for your team to analyze the data. By taking a look at the numbers it will allow you and your team to know where they are headed and what they need to do in order to make positive financial decisions for the office. It will also help the team determine if they need to complete more re-care calls, or focus on new patients.

For example, you might decide at the beginning of every month you need to work twenty days. While, your hygienist will need to work twenty-three days.  Your front office will need to collect eighty percent or more of the patient portion and you will need to seat at least four crowns, and fifteen root canals. This amount will allow you to pay your bills plus put some aside in case of a bad month. Now, you and your team have a goal to reach. Each of your team members knows what must be done in order to meet the monthly goal. 




You should have your team meet often in order to figure out where your numbers are at and to problem solve when your office is not close to meeting the goal and celebrate when your team is on track. No team should head down a dark path. You cannot hit a goal or a target if you do not know what the goal is. 

Do not wait till the last minute to find out you did not bring in the intended monthly amount. By then it is too late for the team to do anything. You want to give time to course correct if it is needed. The end of the month should be the time in which you and your team celebrate your success not bask in failure.

  

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Be knowledgeable in your field

Monday we spoke about the importance of having procedures in place that improve your office. Today, we are going to take that one step forward and discuss the importance of being knowledgeable in your field. Your procedures will change based on the new x-ray machine or the improved way to accept insurance. However, in order for you to improve on these items you have to constantly improve your own knowledge and your team's knowledge in the field. 


Things change, new technologies improve the way you complete something in your office. The more research you do and the more your staff stays up-to-date the better off your entire office will run. Once individuals are hired in a position it is easy to become complacent. However, you want to make sure your team is given opportunities to improve on their skills and their knowledge.


For example, allow and encourage your staff to attend conferences, events and other opportunities with other dental offices. The more they can reach out in the dental community, the more diversified knowledge your dental office will have.


Take the time to let your team know that continued learning is an important part of your office. Value new information that is shared with you, even if the idea doesn’t fit the direction you are currently going. Learning should never stop because forward progress should never cease.

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

The leaders before you-Maintaining order

Dentist offices are only as strong as the procedures they have in place. In order for your office to thrive in today's society it is important for you and your team to have procedures in place that help your office run more efficiently. 

It isn't necessary to create procedures from scratch on how the front office handles a new patient phone call or how your assistant sets up for a root canal. These are procedures that have been done for years that either you already have a great way that works or you can complete a little research to find out a new way if your way is not working.



However, no matter where you are at in the process it is important to make sure that there are procedures that help keep your office organized and moving forward. For example, if your front office does not run efficient this will impact your schedule, insurance, patient interactions. If your back office does not have effective procedures then your patients will wait longer, or items could be lost.

In order to begin working on this analyze each procedure you have in place from the front all the way to the back. Find out where procedures are breaking down or where they are not working well. Ask staff what they want to improve on and start there.

Which ever route you go, make sure that there are strong procedures in place that help make your office run efficiently.  

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Go Big or Go Home: Prioritize your day

So how do you effectively prioritize into a day the treatment follow-up, recall and marketing?

Early each day confirmation should be accomplished so it is clearly understood how much time needs to be filled to achieve goal. A certain number of hours and/or a certain number of calls can reflect the priority of recare or treatment follow-up. Remember, an office is never finished with handling recall. No one should ever hear, “We’ve called everyone. There is no one else to call.” Recall is something that is never completed. There should always be someone who can be called. Calling too much is not the problem when patients report feeling harassed, it is generally because leaving messages is the problem. So if you have team members who report they are being told, or are feeling like they are harassing patients, advise them to not leave a message.

Calling patients for follow-up treatment or recall means calling every number available unless a patient has asked us to do otherwise.  Do not assume because a patient has not been seen for a year or two they are no longer interested in coming to your office. More often than not, patients think they’ve just seen you and are surprised to learn it’s been so long.

Marketing for new patients is another task that too often is considered a project. I have yet to meet anyone from any practice anywhere in the country where they tell me, “We have too many new patients. We don’t want anymore. We can’t see them all.“ That means marketing should be a priority in everyone’s day. Again, every member of the team must do something for marketing before they leave for the day.

There are two types of marketing, internal and external. Internal marketing is marketing to existing patients. This is easy. All those patients coming in to see you can be asked to send in their friends and family. “I smile every time I see your name on my schedule. I wish all of my patients were as wonderful as you. If you have any friends or family who are looking for a dentist, please send them our way. We find that wonderful people tend to have wonderful friends too.”

With social media a source of information and, more importantly, referrals, it can also be beneficial to ask for reviews from those best patients. If you are really interested in increasing your number of new patients, there is no better way than increasing your exposure on-line through the use of great testimonials. Make it easy for your patients to review you. Set your practice up to where patients receive automatic requests for reviews and comments or direct them to the reviewing sites you use: google, yelp, etc. Even though you may have an automated system you still should remind and ask patients to comment on your office.

Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube and Twitter. When considering what to say or do on social networking sites; for Facebook think pictures, for LinkedIn think articles, for Twitter think links and for YouTube think short testimonials and informational pieces. How often should these sites be accessed? Facebook twice a day, LinkedIn twice a week, Twitter more frequently and YouTube whenever you have an interesting video to share.

Remember to also work on your external marketing daily. Whether you are a general dentist or a specialist, it is in your best interest to connect with the offices you refer to and who can refer to you. Build relationships with the other teams. The doctor can do this by choosing one mutual patient a week to discuss with another office via telephone. The front office can do this by providing information on a patient recently seen, or a patient the office has not been able to get back into the office. Referral slips can be mailed. Calls can be made to determine if a general dentist is seeking a relationship with a specialist, specialists can be contacted to provide them with business cards. Visiting business, day cares, schools, medical offices and other places where information can be provided can assist you in getting your name out to those who are seeking your care. 

Staying focused and being consistent in creating priorities that reflect the outcome you desire will allow you to achieve the experience you most want. Go Big!

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Go Big or Go Home: Create your Experience

 If you are still not obtaining your desired goals, perhaps it is because a better understanding of priorities is needed.

I often hear doctors say they would like to be more productive. See more patients each day. Have more new patients visit each month. They inform me that if only they could figure out how to have that, they would be doing well.

Many of us have challenges prioritizing our days. We have so much to do and so little time to do it in. In the end, we accomplish less of what is most important. When discussing the tasks that must be finished in any dental practice it is best to group them into the following categories: People, Priorities and Projects.

People come first because people are most important. No matter what type of business we are talking about, this is true, but it is particularly true of the business of dentistry. People tasks should ALWAYS come first. People based tasks include greeting, checking patients in and out, answering the telephone and providing dental care. With people as our primary focus, we must strive to do all we can to ensure they know we respect and value them.

Priorities are tasks that must be completed before each team member and/or the doctor leaves for the day. Priorities include things such as charting, sterilization, day sheets, and confirmation.

Projects are items that need to be done, no doubt, but they are tasks that can be completed at any time and are not necessarily time critical to today. They are things like insurance follow-up, ordering and finding someone to replace a ceiling tile. Important, yes, but maybe not so important that it can’t wait until tomorrow.

In a group setting, I will often go to each team member and have them list the main things they do for the practice, placing each task in the appropriate category based on how they view it. Many times I find the following items in the project category: treatment follow-up, recall and marketing. Remember, projects are things to be completed only after people and priorities if there is additional time at the end of the day. If your true desire is more patients in your schedule, more new patients coming in, then shouldn’t the efforts of your entire team reflect this?

A doctor walked into her office and stated it was time to clean the carpets. Later that day she had a number of bids on her desk to clean the carpet. That is great, except her schedule also had five hours open for the next few days and no one had been working on it. It is a great example of what happens when the line between people, priorities and projects is blurred.

To see more of your existing patients or to have more new patients come into your practice, the tasks that directly lead to that outcome should be a priority and, aside from people activities, take precedence.

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Hiring with diversity

Your office needs a new front desk. You may be tempted to stick to a certain type of person. Bubbly, educated a certain way, bilingual. Or you may only higher from one type of dental school. However, I want you to stop and think about the benefits of making a different choice. The more diverse of an office you have the more types of patients you may find want to visit your office.

But the other benefit is you are able to find individuals who come from such diverse backgrounds that they will be able to benefit the office in a variety of ways outside of the traditional front office or back office responsibilities.

Humans tend to stick close to people that come from the same background or whom they have something in common with. But sometimes it is a bigger benefit to higher individuals that are opposite you.  Then when you need to have a diverse and unique look on how to improve on front office procedures you have a variety of individuals with a variety of opinions.  

Although, relationships don’t always happen naturally you as the leader have a responsibility to support the relationships and opportunities for everyone in the office no matter what background they come from.

Think about the next time you are hiring for a position, which individual is going to challenge the status quo in your office and bring about a stronger team with a variety of expertise and experience.

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.

Diversity

Stop and think about what this word means to you. Depending on your own experiences it could lead to a mixture of emotions however, when building a team, diversity is the key.

However, you can’t just hire a group of diverse individuals plop them in a room together and hope that they make their own connections. Team building with individuals who you do not believe you have a lot in common can be tricky and it may take time. For example, you as the leader of the organization or as a staff member may need to commit to some extra steps to build positive relationships with everyone that works for your office.

Some of the activities you could do to help build your diverse teams are to have an office lunch, commit to a vision and work as a team towards that goal. Or attend conferences together and have monthly meetings to discuss information.

Events for the team do not have to always be formal activities. You can also provide informal opportunities for team members to work together. Have a new member train with all the team members in your office. Or have your front office help in the back office or with the hygienist for a day in order for them to have different learning opportunities. 

Although, you cannot force relationships you can facilitate learning around the office to appreciate the differences among your team members while building a team that trusts each other. 

Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com. 

Let's Talk About Power

 

Last post we discussed three different types of power, utility, legitimate and coercive. Now we are going to look at the characteristics of each type of power.

The first one is coercive power. This power holds something over a person’s head and people do things because they are afraid of you. For example, an employee comes into work early. On the outside this looks really good but while they are at work they are nervous, anxious and are fearful that you will punish them in some way.

Individuals under this type of power do not work well for long periods of time. They will burn out or quit because they are not happy in their position. Your mission maybe compromised and moving your dental practice forward maybe impossible. When you ask for ideas on how to streamline the front desk, instead of innovative and creative thinkers you get silence. This type of power can cripple your business and create an unhappy environment for patient care.

The second type of power is utility power. People who work in this type of power gain some financial or ego boost.  This power is not as bad as the first however, it also misses the mark of a shared vision with a strong team. Your workers may follow and they may step up a little because they can’t wait for that monthly bonus. But they do not go above and beyond if it is needed.

Corporate offices use this type of power to get the job the done. However, in your line of work this is not the type of business where you can just do the minimal.

It is critical in dentistry you don’t abuse the position given to you as boss. You need to build a relationship with shared power or control. When you have this type of relationship with your front office, they will ask patients for a review and their payment up front. Your RDA, will talk to patients as people and not just an extra paycheck.

Not only will your business grow but the relationship you have with your staff and patients will also increase because the word team will not be a word just thrown around, it will be the basis for the future of your business. 

 Great teams take effort. Take time to work on your practice regularly to build quality communication and strengthen your results. For more information and to read other articles, please visit us at www.saltdpm.com.