For dental practice owners, running the business is often trickier than the dentistry itself.
From managing employees and patients, to scheduling and insurance, things can sometimes feel a bit chaotic and more than a little out-of-control. You might have a committed and passionate team, and work with a specialist accountant for dentists in Fort Lauderdale to reduce your back office duties, but still your practice doesn’t run smoothly, and you’re always stressed.
However, while you might assume that reducing the chaos is only possible through tighter controls or improved systems, it might actually be your own form of leadership that’s the problem.
Leading an efficient, healthy dental practice doesn’t come naturally to all dental professionals, and if you’re struggling to take control of your practice and reduce the chaos, here are 4 ways to hone your skills as a leader:
- Enhance your huddle
Morning huddles are a great opportunity to review the previous day, but they should also be a preparatory tool for the day ahead.
Thoroughly review patient needs, identify possible gaps in the schedule, and ensure that everyone’s priorities are aligned before the first patient of the day arrives. With a team that knows what to expect, you should feel more in control of things as a practice leader, instead of being forced to react as things happen.
- Spread ownership throughout the team
You might be the leader because it’s your dental practice, but that doesn’t mean that everything should fall on your shoulders.
Give your team clear roles that they’re comfortable with, simple systems to follow that enable each person to understand, and carry out their responsibilities with confidence and pride, and you’ll soon create the kind of setup that’s efficient and robust.
- Use metrics in a positive way
Data can be immensely helpful for dental practices, as it can for many types of business, but if teams don’t know how data is being used, or how to interpret it, they may develop a resistance to its use.
Introduce data to your team as a means of understanding what’s happening within the practice, instead of something that serves only to highlight their mistakes and inefficiencies. Keeping them engaged will help them feel informed and supported, instead of merely monitored.
- Recognize and acknowledge progress
Improvements to the way in which a clinic is run, often take time to appear, but when they do, noticing and acknowledging them can go a long way to making the teams that helped create them, feel valued and motivated. You should also apply the same rule to your dental practice accounting team, who may also feel motivated to work even harder for you.
As research has shown, developing a culture within a practice of highlighting and appreciating improvements, is much more likely to promote continued improvements.
Honing your skills as a dental practice leader is all about setting clear priorities, making small but steady improvements, and creating systems that your team are content to follow and sustain. With everyone onboard and feeling valued, you’ll benefit from a confident team who are ready and willing to share the responsibilities; reducing the need for micromanagement on your part.
