Healthcare burnout is a nationwide problem that can take a drastic toll on the physical and mental health of workers. However, as a dentist or practice leader, it’s important that strategies are in place to avoid burnout. After all, your employee’s well-being and job performance can directly affect your practice’s success. Therefore, our dental practice coaches at Bryant Consultants share on the blog three best practices to prevent your team from burnout so that you can create a workplace environment where employees feel empowered, valued, and appreciated.
How do I gauge employee burnout?
The most common indicator of employee burnout is when they become indifferent about their position, and it reflects in their performance. Although many factors contribute to employee burnout, some may feel off in their work-life balance, their workload is unmanageable, they aren’t fairly compensated, or there’s an underlying problem you need to identify. Unfortunately, when your practice has excess claims to track, rework, and resubmit because of denials, it can cause financial stress to the whole team.
Our dental office coaches recommend checking your practice’s pulse to determine if employees feel they have the necessary support to succeed. For example, have a meeting with each employee every quarter to conduct a performance review. Not only are you evaluating their job performance, but you can ask questions about their fellow employees, workload, and role, and discuss other details about how they feel regarding their work. Having honest conversations with employees can generate feelings of value and provide ideas to fine-tune your practice.
How do I prevent employee burnout?
One of the most important steps to prevent employee burnout is to illustrate that you care about them and their personal life. An emerging way to do so is to offer flexible schedules for team members. That way, employees feel more trust and want to work harder for you. Our dental practice coaches share the three best practices below to help you prevent dental practice employee burnout.
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Give employees autonomy and purpose.
One factor that leads to employee burnout is uncertainty about their role and responsibilities. Micromanaging and criticizing employees can make them feel unvalued and that they may not be the best fit for the position. Therefore, allow your employees to define their purpose. For example, allow team members to handle patients and scheduling through their desired process. However, it’s important to guide them to include necessary office practices.
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Ensure employee workloads are reasonable.
Dentists who are not involved in the daily details of billing, scheduling, or running the office may not realize the current workload for each employee. For example, a team member that works in billing and another area may quickly become overwhelmed. Therefore, outsourcing billing services may help your employees do their best work while reducing work-related stress, especially when insurance billing feels like a constant battle.
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Cultivate a sense of community in a healthy work environment.
Your practices work environment can dictate success or demise. Creating a sense of community can be an excellent way for your team to bond. For example, sharing a positive quote during the morning meeting or activity over the weekend can build relationships over time.
Below are some ideas to help cultivate a healthy work environment within your dental office
- Remain Professional and Kind – Bad attitudes can spread through a practice very quickly and create negative energy that your patients can pick up on. Although you don’t have to be best friends with your employees, it’s important not to allow personal issues to enter into work relationships.
- Appreciate Each Other – Each role in a dental practice depends on another. Therefore, encourage an environment where team members say “please” and “thank you” when appropriate.
- Constructively and Kindly Communicate Problems – Practice problems will come up, but how you communicate or constructively criticize your team members can make a difference. Then, work together as a team to find an effective solution.
Dental Practice Consultants
Your dental team depends on a leader to create a work environment that promotes a comfortable workload and work-life balance and makes them feel valued. If your office feels burnt out and you’re not sure where to get started, feel free to contact our dental office consultants at Bryant consultants to discuss your next step. We are pleased to offer complimentary consultations. Please call us at (877) 768-4799 or contact us online to schedule an appointment today.
