The Importance of Staff Meetings

Regularly scheduled staff meetings are essential to maintaining the effective day to day operations of a dental practice as well provide for the ongoing development of a dental practice. 

Staff meetings provide an important forum for problem solving and correcting day to day operational problems which are impossible to get in the middle of your day.  The ongoing correction of problem areas is essential to:

• Maintaining high standards of patient treatment, service and care.
• Maintaining high standards of teamwork and communication.

Staff meetings also provide the opportunity to work on the development of practice systems free from day to day operating pressures which is key to developing effective systems.   Developing effective systems also requires that teams follow planning, decision making and change management processes in order to effectively incorporate change.

Common Causes of Workplace Problems and Job Stress

Quality research estimates that 25% to 35% of work that people typically do in a day is rework - time spent dealing with problems that result from things not working properly in the first place.  This type of work is costly for  dental practices and stressful and frustrating for team members.

The majority of these problems can be directly traced to various types of systems problems:

• The lack of properly defined systems.
• Poorly defined or designed systems.
• Inconsistency in following systems that are defined.

System problems directly effect the quality of treatment, service and care provided to patients as well as represent a major source of stress, conflict and miscommunication that occurs among staff members on a day to day basis.

The only way to consistently provide patients with high standards of treatment, service and care and break free from a stressful dental work environment is to ensure your systems are properly defined and followed.

Rethinking Your Working Relationships

Achieving excellence in the treatment, service and care of patients requires that practices organize their view of work and working relationships around systems and processes versus job descriptions limited to a certain position or area.

Ones’ position in a practice is secondary to the role that one plays in the overall system of consistently delivering high standards of treatment, service and care to patients.  From a systems perspective, everyone plays an equal and important role in the process of providing treatment, service and care to patients and everyone is equally dependent upon everyone else in order to get the job done.

 “For organizations to excel, people have to understand it is in their collective best interests to cooperate; they must be more concerned with how the system as a whole operates versus just optimizing their own little piece.”
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      Brian L. Joiner

Defining a System

A system does not describe a thing – like a noun.  A system is more like a verb - a system describes a method or way of doing things that you and your team have sorted out in advance will solve a problem area in your practcie or make your practice function in a specific area in a hihgly effective way.  Systems take time to get properly defined and implemented and require input from everyone involved in order to function well - but the payoff's are huge. 

Without systems, it is impossible to consistently provide patients with high standards of treatment, service and care or maintain a stress free and productive work environment.  Systems are the foundation upon which clinical, operational and productivity goals are realized.  This includes:

• Developing systems that result in the effective delivery of treatment, service and care to patients.
• Developing systems that enable staff members to work together effectively, grow and develop as a team.
• Developing systems that maximize the productivity and profitability of practices.

Once defined, it is essential that systems are rigorously followed and improved upon when necessary.

 “Without a system, people have no objective understanding of their work and what is expected of them.  As a result, people are forced to do the best they can, which of course varies vastly from individual to individual.  Without a system, you are playing Russian roulette with the results you deliver to your customers.”

“Conscious organizations are those that possess a clear Vision and manifest that Vision through highly integrated systems.  They hold their people accountable for the effective utilization of those systems.  They collectively modify, improve and reinvent their systems when needed.  They seek and acquire learning, growth and intelligence through the process." 

"Unconscious organizations are those that are unclear about their Vision and possess few systems.  They generally experience chaos, confusion, disruption and disorder.  These organizations seek solutions to problems and rarely come up with anything better than quick fixes."

Michael Gerber, The E Myth Manager