Supercharge your staff meetings

By Jay M. Geier

Staff meetings can turn into a complete waste of time and a distraction from production if they’re not structured and well-thought-out. Here are a few ideas to make staff meetings more productive and profitable.

1. How much time do you spend thinking from your patient’s perspective? This means thinking about how changes affect your patients and not you. Be aware of how the changes you make affect your patients’ experiences. Your practice is not all about you. It’s about your patients and the impressions they take with them when they leave.

2. How much time do you spend discussing and identifying what was effective? Think about everything from marketing to scheduling to treatment techniques. If something you’re doing in those areas works, don’t change it just to do something different. Repeat what works until the results decline.

3. Discuss goals. Set monthly goals and then make daily goals. At the beginning of the week, determine what needs to be done to make sure your staff hits the weekly goal. Every day talk about where you are compared to where you should be to reach the goal. Every member of your team should have some sort of goal related to his or her specialty area. It holds them accountable for their part in the growth of the practice.

4. Discuss the big ideas of the practice. Spend time each week talking about the big goals. When there are big, exciting goals to reach for, it makes the small problems seem less daunting.

5. Ask for feedback and discuss roles related to reaching goals. Sometimes, as the leader, you must reset tasks and assignments for people. If a task is just not getting done, you should be able to delegate it to someone else. Likewise, if a team member proves he or she can handle a more challenging task, give that person more opportunity to excel.

6. Give compliments and praise. This goes for the leader and the team members. It’s as important that the boss thank the staff as it is for the staff to thank the boss.

7. Make sure everyone is engaged with a current incentive. People connect behavior to reward, and you want your team to work together to achieve their goals.

Author bio
Jay M. Geier is the founder and president of the Scheduling Institute. He is a well-known dental speaker and has helped more than 10,000 doctors nationwide grow their practices. Mr. Geier offers a free practice analysis on his Web site. If you’d like him to do this for your practice, go to www.SchedulingInstitute.com and click on “Take the 5 Star Challenge” at the top. You may also contact Mr. Geier at [email protected].