Often, dentists complain that their team members are not engaged in the practice and do not understand what it takes to run the business. However, when asked if they discuss numbers, current overhead, KPIs, and the budget they are working within, the dentist’s answer is no!
There is this stigma in many dental practices that if there is any mention of money or number, then the office is “all about money” or “turning into a corporation.” Let’s be real here. It’s a business, and it’s no different than any other business in this world. If the team is left in the dark, then they will operate in the dark and use their own belief system instead of adapting to the company’s belief system.
Here are ten steps that will help you introduce practice numbers to your team in a way that they will best understand and own.
Step 1: Understand your Overhead: As a dentist and business owner, you must know your practice numbers and the industry-standard that you are working towards.
An example would be staff costs. What are your staff costs? What all is figured into it, and does it fall into the benchmarks of the dental industry? If it doesn’t, why?
If the owner doesn’t understand the overhead percentages and where the money goes, it will be extremely difficult for a team member to understand.
Step 2: Get a Budget: Nearly 85% of dental practices do not operate on an annual fixed budget. Instead, they monitor their bank account and overhead and make reactive decisions based on what they see. A set budget would allocate money for future needs, wants, and expenses (continuing education, employee raises, marketing, office updates, team lunches, etc.). How is it that our families can operate on fixed budgets, but the business that feeds our families doesn’t?
Step 3: Understand Practice KPIs- The CEO of the company (that’s you, doctor!) should know what he or she wants out of their business. Dig in deep to find the pulse of your practice and understand the KPIs you should be tracking daily, weekly, and monthly. There are various adjunct software programs available that can do this automatically. However, digging into your own practice management software to find this information has cost-savings benefits and feels satisfying.
Step 4: Get a Plan Together- All owners want a plan on what is important to share and how best to share it. When sharing overhead, you share in percentages and groups. Your dental team will not engage in accounting information but rather an overview and what part they play. You could approach this topic by saying, “Here is our overhead for our company, here is where we want it to be, and here are ways to keep it under control.” Give them a budget for dental supplies, office supplies, marketing, etc. Create a document that shows them what you want them to see, fair enough? So now, you have an overhead document, and you want to have a KPI document that shows where you are and where you want to be. Lastly, create a document with your expectations for discussing and tracking KPIs.
Step 5: Block Meeting Times– It’s pretty natural for a dental office to implement overhead and KPIs into monthly meetings. Use language like, “Team, I feel like I have the right people around me each day, and everyone is invested in the company’s growth… it’s time we all take it to another level. I need to involve you all for that to happen.”
Step 6: Delivering the Information- Understand that your team will have questions and many comments about practice numbers. This is normal; you are asking them to learn about and accept foreign information. Be receptive to their inquiries; don’t be defensive. If you do not have the answers, say, ” That’s a great question, I’m going to write that down and look into it. Let’s discuss my findings at the end of the week.” DON’T BE DEFENSIVE.
Step 7: Ask for feedback- After the meeting, and as the upcoming days arrive, solicit feedback, and see what follow-up questions or ideas that your team presents.
Step 8: Repeat and Repeat– It’s important for you to do this each month, so don’t stop!
Step 9: Work on your budget for 2020- Figure out your 2020 budget for next year. How much you will allocate for continuing education, marketing, updates, uniforms, etc. Place this on paper and get it ready to deliver to your team!
Step 10: Plan for a Yearly Meeting- It’s the perfect time to implement numbers and budgets because we are in the final quarter of the year. Yearly meetings are best done out of the office and with an agenda. It’s great to give team members a worksheet for them to complete and bring to the meeting. This keeps them involved and actually makes them participate more.
This is how it starts; this is not how it ends! We want to engage the team and start adding layers to this foundation each quarter that will eventually get your entire practice reporting numbers and taking actions to grow the profit of the business each day. For more information about key performance indicators and team discussions with practice overhead, please email us at info@bryantconsultants.com.
