Your Future

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.

Moving Foward

 

On Monday, you wrote down what you learned last year and where your future is headed. Now, how do you get there? 

1. Create smart goals

2. Write down your goals

 3. Implement a plan, and hold yourself and your employees accountable

                                  4. Have meetings to evaluate where your plan is at. Are you on track? What needs to change if you're not?

Visualize your future

It is easy to lose sight of what you are working for when you come into work everyday and spend your time putting out fires. Or if you are just trying to get through the work day. 

In order to improve your office, vision or your job in general you should try visualizing your dreams everyday. Spend time thinking about what you want. Create a collage and place it somewhere you look often to remind you of what you are trying to achieve and where your future is headed. 

Visualize yourself achieving the goal. Lee Iacocca said, "The greatest discovery of my generation is that human beings can alter their lives by altering their attitudes of mind,"(Lee Iacocca).  

When you're tired, frustrated or unfocused use your collage to get you back on track. People who write down their goals are more likely to achieve them. Create pictures of what your life will look like when you achieve your goals. How will it feel? What will be different in your life?

Commit to achieving the goal by writing down the goal. Lee Iacocca said, "The discipline of writing something down is the first step toward making it happen."

Writing your goals down helps you become committed to the goal. It holds you accountable and helps remind you of what it is that you are working towards. When you first create the goal you are attempting to achieve you need to create a plan. Your step number one should be you writing down your goal on paper. 

Keeping the Horizon in Sight

By: Debra Quarles
Salt Dental Consultant
Part 2 of 2

The vision should be one that all team members agree to. The easiest way for that to happen is for you all to work together to create it. Write down all the great ideas everyone has for the future. Compose a story that utilizes each idea. When writing a vision statement use descriptive details, and use all of your senses. What do you see, feel, hear, and smell when you visualize the practice of your future? How is the office positioned in the market place? What tools and equipment does it contain? What educational opportunities are you preparing for? What does your team accomplish daily, weekly and monthly? Have each member review the story and underline anything that they personally can not agree to for any reason. Rewrite the vision and then get a verbal commitment from your team to pursue it. If team members are not interested in heading the direction you want to travel – it may be time to find other team members.

This step is about direction – not motion. But once you’ve verbally committed, (why verbally? Because people generally keep the commitments they make verbally) the next step must be about focus.

Are the things you are doing today taking you closer to your vision? If your vision is to have a practice of people who love and appreciate you, are you asking today all such patients currently in your practice to refer you their friends and family? If your vision is to create a practice where patients are accountable for their appointments – what are you doing to establish that accountability today? If you want to be known for something, what are you doing to create that recognition? While the vision is about direction – start taking the necessary steps now to implement it. Remind yourself and your team frequently to take a breath, refocus and review what they’ve accomplished each morning, each afternoon and each day that is moving them toward the vision. Your actions today are what will enable you to realize your vision.

Your brain when you start writing down your vision may tell you this is silly, you can’t have that. You will fail. Our brain wants us to minimize stress, avoid pain and pressure, and consequently resist change. Play safe so we don’t have to worry about failure.

Do not listen to that part of your brain. It was designed to protect you from lions and tigers and bears, oh my, but now it may prevent you from enjoying the idea of accomplishing impossibilities.

Think about all the impossibilities: Man will never fly. Man will never go to the moon. There is a need for no more than 5 computers in the world. No one will buy a computer for their desk. Who would want to carry a phone with them all day? Who would pay for overnight delivery of a package? These were all ideas that were thought to be impossible.

Impossible is not a fact or truth. It really is only an opinion.

What are the impossibilities that you see for your practice? How far is your horizon? Five years? Ten years. Twenty or 100?

One team I work with as a coach developed their ten year vision, but the team members were so excited about the vision that they asked their doctor if they could change it to a five year vision. How’s that for team commitment?

Remember, like the pilot flying the helicopter, always keep the horizon in sight.

If you would like more information, please contact us at info.saltdpm.com

Join us on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/SaltDentalPracticeManagement.

This article was originally published by Tri-County Dental Society Bulletin

Envision The Future

By: Debra Quarles
Salt Dental Consultant
Part 1 of 1

I’ve started a new exercise program and I’m really excited about it. I do twenty five sit-ups, twenty five pushups, and then I run a mile. After my workout I get out of bed. Whew! Laugh all you want but my pajamas are starting to fit better.

I read an article about a study where people were put in a room and told to concentrate on strengthening their pinkie for twenty minutes over a six week period and guess what – they strengthened their pinkies. It also worked for elbows and biceps. If it can work for them, maybe it can work for me and my abs, too.

The brain is an incredible tool, but you must use it or risk losing it. That is especially true when you are thinking about the forebrain. The part of the brain that lets you look into the future and dream about what could be.

Dentistry is an awesome career, (It has treated me well for twenty five years this month.) but in order to maximize your opportunities you must look to the horizon. What does a career in dentistry hold for you? Unfortunately, if you are not looking into the future you may be missing out.

The future is about:

· What patients we are seeing today and what will they require

· Anticipating what instrument the dentist will need next

· How you answer the next phone call

· How you will handle the next patients

· Scheduling the next appointment and collecting patient portions

· Finishing the day and achieving your production goals

· Finding opportunities today to learn new things

But the future is also about five years, ten years, maybe even 100 years from now. That’s what’s on the horizon. How does it look for you? How does it feel? What type of office are you working in? What kind of people are you working with? How have you contributed to the office and its growth?

It is important to realize that what you do today all has an impact on what you’ll experience in your future. If you haven’t taken the time to think about the horizon how do you decide what actions to take today? Everything you do today is taking you toward your future in dentistry, either good or bad. What are you doing today to insure that your career in dentistry is continuing?

If you would like more information, please contact us at info.saltdpm.com

Join us on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/SaltDentalPracticeManagement.

This article was originally published by Tri-County Dental Society Bulletin