Taking 100% responsibility for your practice is the only way that you will have control of the outcome of your profitability. This does not mean that you should be micromanaging everyone, but it does mean that you should be providing oversight in the areas that you may have left to your office manager in the past.
You can choose to respond to COVID 19 as the worst thing that has ever happened to your practice or you can choose for it to be the event that will take your practice to the next higher level. You don’t have any control over COVID changing every dental office’s daily existence, but your positive response will help you with your positive outcome. It needs to be positive for your team, your patients and the financial health of the office. You can create your future instead of allowing it to happen to you.
If I were to put together a list of where I think practice owners may not be involved and they should be, it would be in the following systems:
- Team Connection: Connect personally with every team member at least once a week, not just your chair side assistant. Know something about their personal lives as a connection. Share something about your life with them. Keep a list of who you connect with and on which date.
- Patient Connections: Connecting and building trust with patients will take more care and effort now, no longer a handshake or smile will do the trick. Sitting and talking with the patients may mean not leaving while waiting for LA to take effect and connecting with them on a personal basis as well.
- Financial: Taking into account the current financial state of some of your patient’s lives now and looking at your current office payment options to ensure that they are patient friendly. You may need to do some adjusting to your policies if necessary.
- Budget for Sundries: Monthly budget for sundries including PPE should be 6.5% of previous months collection. Have your team know the budget and stay within it.
- All purchases (technology included) need to be necessary, not frivolous while not leaving the practice short of supplies.
- Be Involved: Knowing the systems in the office and not allowing team members to make decisions about the future of your practice. (Example: your receivables, your hygiene recall system, your treatment acceptance program)
Gone are the days when a practice owner can deliver dentistry and have his team take care of everything else. Learning how to be more involved while allowing your team to still have autonomy is a fine balance and ultimately can cost you profitability if not executed properly. You can’t lead a team without understanding how to use the tools of the office. Know your systems, make sure they are achieving the results that you want and if you aren’t hitting your goals then connect with me and I will help you get there.
