Keep your patients coming back!

What is the key element to keeping your patients coming back to your dental practice? Your team! They are the backbone of your practice and they are the “face” of your practice. They manage every phase of the patient experience, from answering the phone, answering questions, delivering care, and saying goodbye at the end of the visit. Your team keeps your practice running smoothly, your systems working, your patients happy, and the dentist happy. This will not happen without a team that is working together with no drama. Here are 5 tips to ensure you have your dream team.

1. Don’t hire the first warm body with an impressive resume.
Your hectic schedule and the time you devote to patient care are not an excuse. Invest in finding the “right” person for your practice. Without the right people on your team, you will constantly hire and rehire. This makes your team unable to focus on delivering the level of care you expect. We recommend holding a “Job Orientation”. This 2 hour meeting will allow the cream to rise to the top, and the superior candidates to standout. It takes the pile of received resumes and allows you to see who they are as compared to all the others. This will determine who is given your valuable time in a formal interview.

2. Use behavioral based interviewing questions and check references
There are two terrible places to sit during an interview. In front of the desk as the interviewee wondering what is going to happen next, and behind the desk as the interviewer wondering the same thing. The best applicants will be interviewing you as well, don’t show up unprepared, unkempt, or disorganized. Plan the questions you will ask to help you understand their willingness, emotional maturity, manageability, ability to prioritize, and personality. Really listen to their response, don’t focus on your next question. Check references and their previous salary. Realize that some people interview well and become someone else on the job. Let the “Jekyll and Hyde” hire go sooner rather than later.

3. Hold Performance Reviews regularly
High performing team members want feedback. What holds you back from helping them analyze how they are doing on the job? Have performance reviews at least annually and in a way that makes sense for you. Everyone in one week, or on one day, spaced out throughout the year, or on each team members’ anniversary date. Make the team accountable for scheduling the reviews. Set a deadline for their portion of the review to be turned in to you a week prior to your review with them. Start now to define your system for a formal annual performance review. Know some team members will need more than annual review. Coaching the team to improved performance and ensuring everyone is working toward practice goals, is the priority for the leader of the practice.

4. The “Team Integrity Agreement”
This commitment between all members of the team consists of appropriate and acceptable behavior standards for the practice. It includes statements such as: I will treat all patient information in a confidential manner, I will turn off or silence my cell phone during business hours, I will arrive at work on time and be a dependable employee, I will clock out when I am no longer working, I will use the internet for business purposes only. This creates a standard set of expectations for everyone. The Doctor included. When behavior is outside of the agreement, it is easy to discuss because everyone agreed to the standards. Ignoring unacceptable behavior only generates confusion amongst the team and passive aggressive behavior from the dentist or other team members.

5. Develop teamwork
Schedule team events outside of the practice. Do a murder mystery with your team, decorate Valentine’s as a group and have your patients vote on the “best”, go to a sporting event, amusement park, or dental meeting. Be involved in your community by sponsoring or participating in a local event. Go bowling or play softball. Do something together. This allows people to get to know one another on a personal level and have fun!

The interest you take in your team member’s lives outside of the practice is given back. Take each individual team member out to lunch twice a year. Talk about them as part of the practice and about their lives, what’s going well, what they want to see different, how their job impacts their life outside. With genuine curiosity and devoted time, you will get a return on your investment in the form of a committed and dedicated team.

To build a tight knit team takes time, energy, and effort. Once you have a strong team, everyone reaps the rewards. Better interactions with patients, feeling like the team is helping to achieve the practice vision rather than you pulling the team along, and less stress. Follow these 5 tips and create your dream team. If you have questions or need more information, contact us!

Trust is essential to all healthy relationships. Without trust, you, your team, your patients and your family will suffer.  The author and speaker, Jon Gordon has shared his thoughts on the 11 ways to build trust:

1. Say what you are going to do and then do what you say!
2. Communicate, communicate, communicate. Frequent, honest communication builds trust. Poor communication is one of the key reasons marriages and work relationships fall apart.
3. Trust is built one day, one interaction at a time, and yet it can be lost in a moment because of one poor decision. Make the right decision.
4. Value long term relationships more than short term success.
5. Sell without selling out. Focus more on your core principles and customer loyalty than short term commissions and profits.
6. Trust generates commitment, commitment fosters teamwork; and teamwork delivers results. When people trust their team members they not only work harder, but they work harder for the good of the team.
7. Be honest! My mother always told me to tell the truth. She would say, “If you lie to me then we can’t be a strong family. So don’t ever lie to me even if the news isn’t good.”
8. Become a coach. Coach your customers (patients). Coach your team at work. Guide people, help them be better and you will earn their trust.
9. Show people you care about them. When people know you care about their interest as much as your own they will trust you. If they know you are out for yourself, their internal alarm sounds and they will say to themselves “watch out for that person.”
10. Always do the right thing. We trust those who live, walk and work with integrity.
11. When you don’t do the right thing, admit it. Be transparent, authentic and willing to share your mistakes and faults. When you are vulnerable and have nothing to hide you radiate trust.

March 6-12, 2011 has been designated Dental Assistant Recognition Week by the American Dental Assistants Association, the American Dental Association, the Canadian Dental Association, and the Canadian Dental Assistants Association. This is the perfect time to recognize and acknowledge the contribution this valuable team member makes to your practice. In every practice we work with there are versatile, willing, customer service oriented team members. Many times it is the assistant that goes the extra distance to make the day work out or the patient feel special. During this week plan a celebration for and about your great assisting team members. Let them know what they do for you, the practice and your patients. Remember; what gets rewarded, gets done.