Dental Peers

OCTOBER 4, 2023

Welcome to the last category of management tasks that we will consider for delegation. Over the last 4 months, we have looked at how to delegate tasks in a way that ensures there is ongoing accountability. This is critical to your role as CEO as without that accountability you can never feel confident that you are receiving the information you require to effectively guide your practice.

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Dental Peers

SEPTEMBER 7, 2023

Good news! We are coming close to the end of our series of blogs on creating accountability through delegation. Today, we will discuss the second last category I have for you. And after that, I will close it out with a few final comments. Last month, we took our CEO minds to those tasks where you would work closely with your manager to complete. Accountability is built in because you will have regular consultation on how to best proceed with those tasks.

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Dental Peers

JULY 8, 2023

We are on a roll with the delegation train and there is no reason to let that engine cool down just yet! In moving that train forward, I would like to address one of the biggest challenges I see dentists face on the issue of delegation. That issue is the sense of a loss of control. It can manifest itself in the form of dentists feeling they cannot delegate because “nobody will do it right.

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Dental Peers

JULY 4, 2023

Let’s keep the idea of delegation going this month! Great CEOs recognize the importance of developing their leadership team and that means more than simply giving them a title. It means truly assigning those team members responsibility for some of the most important tasks in your office! Last month, we created a category for those tasks that, while incredibly important for the success of your business, simply should not fall into your lap as the CEO.

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Dental Peers

JUNE 6, 2023

Congratulations! You have stepped into the world of the great CEOs and committed to delegating some tasks to your manager ( see last months blog )! Now you have to consider: WHAT tasks you will delegate HOW you will ensure you still have the information you need to make your big, CEO decisions Delegation is not about surrendering control of your business.

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Dental Peers

MAY 8, 2023

In last month’s journey to developing your inner-CEO , we referenced the importance of working with a leadership team. Working more efficiently will mean delegating some managerial tasks to members of that team. Before considering which tasks you should delegate, I want to address one of the greatest obstacles I see to the effective operation of potentially great leadership teams.

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Dental Peers

APRIL 6, 2023

In March, my blog took a bit of a trip down memory lane! I recounted my own mindset of fear that acted as my motivation to study hard while in university. Fail to study…fail the class! And as much as that fear proved successful in my academic life, building a business motivated by fear is not the way to succeed. Fear will limit your options. Fear will cloud your judgement.

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Dental Peers

MARCH 6, 2023

Last month , we discussed how the perfectionist mindset many dentists have can be a barrier to their willingness to delegate certain tasks to team members. These dentists either wind up doing too much work themselves or micromanaging team members to the point of frustration. Neither approach is helpful to build long term success. Today, I would like to continue with the issue of mindset because, no matter how much I coach on the skills needed to become a successful dental CEO, you will never dev

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Dental Peers

FEBRUARY 6, 2023

One of the greatest challenges ALL small business owners face is recognizing what tasks they should do themselves and what tasks they can delegate to team members. Letting go of responsibility is hard – but it is also essential! CEOs recognize that even the smallest of businesses have so many moving parts, all crying out for attention, that it is impossible for any one person to be responsible for all of them.

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Dental Peers

JANUARY 3, 2023

Happy New Year! I hope the Holiday Season was enjoyable for all of you and that you managed to find ways to spoil your team members – as well as your family. All the better if they spoiled you too! For many, this is the time of year we envision the “new and improved” versions of ourselves. We will start exercising regularly, eating better and looking after ourselves.

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Dental Peers

OCTOBER 3, 2022

In last month’s blog, I asked the crucial question whether you can still be happy in private practice. I believe you can and how you achieve it is something I will explore in upcoming blogs. However, before we move into that realm, there is an even more fundamental question that dentists should consider. Namely, are you truly happy in dentistry? Many of you may consider this a silly question.

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Dental Peers

NOVEMBER 7, 2022

In October, we discussed how some people simply are not happy practising dentistry. Making a few tweaks at the fringes will not change things. They just do not find dentistry fulfilling and may even consider it exceedingly stressful. They need to find an alternative career. Others love being in the clinic! It gives them an incredible sense of accomplishment.

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Dental Peers

DECEMBER 5, 2022

In November, we focused on delegating tasks to team members and holding them accountable. As a dental CEO, you simply cannot do it all. You need to entrust some vital tasks to your team. And as we head into the holiday season, a time of year intended to spoil our family members, it seems appropriate to ask if we should also spoil our team. I will be up front and say go for it!

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Dental Peers

SEPTEMBER 6, 2022

It is always interesting to observe how perspectives change from one generation to the next. While consulting with a dentist in Ottawa approximately 10 years ago, a 4 th -year dental student dropped by. An ambitious person, she was already exploring the path for potential associate opportunities when she graduated the following year. We chatted and she shared with me some of her thoughts on her future in dentistry.

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Dental Peers

AUGUST 1, 2022

Last month, we discussed the importance of cross-training, particularly at a time when so many offices are struggling with shortages of team members. The question is how to do this effectively. The first thing I would suggest is make sure your team is involved in the process. Employees today do not respond well if they feel you are arbitrarily dictating new terms to their job description.

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Dental Peers

JULY 4, 2022

Just to be clear, the link between cross-training and summer has nothing to do with peak fitness so we look great in our summer wardrobe! Well…it could be about that. But not in an article for a dental publication. Instead, this is the time of the year when we try to slow down at work so we can enjoy more of what summer has to offer. Everyone needs a vacation, and summer is the time more team members tend to be away from the practice.

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Dental Peers

JUNE 6, 2022

It seems like it has been forever since we could turn on the news and see anything remotely positive. All we have heard about for the last couple of years has been the pandemic, supply shortages, skyrocketing home prices, Russia invading Ukraine, more supply shortages and now…inflation like we have not seen in decades! And this level of inflation is not fun!

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Dental Peers

MAY 2, 2022

It is an interesting contradiction to talk to dental students about the importance of learning about the business side of dentistry. The response I receive to offering training on management, human resources, marketing and financial planning is that they are so stressed focusing on the clinical components they need to earn their degrees, they don’t have time to worry about these topics.

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Dental Peers

APRIL 4, 2022

I was recently asked by a dentist to look into my crystal ball and tell them what I see for the future of dentistry. We know that when one is trying to predict the future, one must be prepared to be wrong more often than they are right! Still, it is always fun to play a bit of a guessing game, so I gave it my best shot. Regardless of which of my predictions may come to pass or not, the one aspect I am quite confident in is that dentistry will reward those who are creative.

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Dental Peers

MARCH 7, 2022

We know the world is showing signs of re-opening and that is a time for cautious optimism. Cautious because it seems we have been down this path before only to have a new variant push us back. But optimism may feel strong as maybe…just maybe…this time we will be in a better position to avoid any setbacks. With more and more dental events taking place live and in-person, now just may be the time for dentistry to truly come back!

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Dental Peers

FEBRUARY 7, 2022

We know the pandemic has had a profound impact on the dental profession. Hygiene, in particular, has been hit hard, with a number of hygienists seeing it as a sign to change careers. The resulting labour market has seen dentists jumping over each other, pushing salaries ever higher to make sure they had someone — anyone — available to treat their patients.

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Marketing 246

Dental Peers

JANUARY 4, 2022

Here we are starting off a new year. Sadly, it feels like more of the same. The pandemic is still raging as a new variant has taken off. That means all the talk is on boosters, restrictions on public gatherings and shut downs! Hopefully, we will not see the same increase in hospitalizations as early reports suggest Omicron is less severe than the Delta variant was.

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Best practices 246

Dental Peers

DECEMBER 5, 2021

Welcome to December and my final blog for 2021! It has been a great honour to share some of my thoughts with you again this year and I look forward to continuing to do so in 2022! My most recent blogs have focused on the importance of proper onboarding to increase your rate of employee retention. People want to feel satisfied that the work they are doing is making a difference in the lives of others.

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Dental Peers

NOVEMBER 1, 2021

In my last blog , I touched upon the idea that proper onboarding of a new team member was vital to avoid playing the current, far too popular game of employee roulette. Many of my colleagues agree that most dental offices have historically struggled with onboarding and training. Rather than develop a training program, many offices simply hired the candidate with the most “experience.”.

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Dental Peers

OCTOBER 6, 2021

You have dramatically increased salaries…you offered thousands of dollars as a signing bonus…and now, you are spinning the wheel yet again…waiting to see if you will still have all your employees at work today. Welcome to the world of employee roulette! If you get through this round, you can choose to do it all over again when the next team member tells you they are leaving for a $10 an hour raise and a $10,000 signing bonus.

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Marketing 246

Dental Peers

SEPTEMBER 6, 2021

After an early summer that seemed so promising, signs of a 4th wave are leaving all of us wondering what is next. How will we end 2021 and how will we begin 2022? Let’s face it…business planning has likely never been more challenging than it is right now! The impact on dentistry has been a bit of a mixed bag. On the one hand, we fared better than many businesses which had to remain in complete lockdown well beyond the first wave of Covid.

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Dental Peers

AUGUST 5, 2021

Many of you are likely familiar with the work of Brené Brown. She has become a renowned coach and thought leader on the topic of, well, leadership. Her books, such as Dare to Lead, have taught us that leadership is not merely about who delivers the best “rah rah…rally the troops” speech. Nor is it about who is the stoic “tough guy” who calls all the shots and rules with an iron fist.

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Dental Peers

JULY 5, 2021

“ Train people well enough so they can leave. Treat them well enough so they don’t want to!” – Sir Richard Branson. At a time of incredible labour shortages for so many dental positions, the ability to attract and keep top level talent is proving to be as challenging as it is critical. I know of a number of offices whose productivity has declined in 2021, not because of a lack of patients.

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Dental Peers

JUNE 6, 2021

By now, everyone probably knows about the DentalCorp IPO. It is the first Canadian corporate dental group to go public since TriDont tried it, unsuccessfully, approximately 35 years ago. The response to this news on social media has been interesting to watch. Some dentists in private practice have responded with an “if you can’t beat’em, join’em” attitude, seemingly feeling this is a sign of the apocalypse for private practice.

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Dental Peers

MAY 3, 2021

Congratulations! This is incredible news. Your passion and pride in what you do in the healthcare field is truly being rewarded. Perhaps you were an excellent hygienist…a phenomenal dental assistant…a top-notch admin team member providing your clinicians with first rate support. And today…your journey as a new office manager begins! This is your chance to put your stamp on the standard of oral healthcare offered to all patients throughout your office.

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Dental Peers

APRIL 5, 2021

It was right around this time in 2018, I presented before a group of dentists and office managers in Ottawa. Most of them were 45 years of age and older. The topic: technology that many experts predicted would become commonplace in dental offices by 2020. I was not presenting on cutting edge, futuristic technology that day! This was not technology that was still just part of the imagination or the dental version of Steve Jobs.

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Dental Peers

MARCH 1, 2021

Have you sat down with your accountant yet to review your 2020 financial statements? Now is the time of year many of you are doing just that! And let’s face it…looking at those numbers after a year of Covid is not likely to help chase away the February Blues…even as we move into March! Some of you may be thinking, why bother looking? Why waste time comparing our numbers in 2020 to what we achieved in 2019?

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Dental Peers

FEBRUARY 1, 2021

Let’s admit it…as dental professionals, we love to nerd out! Nothing excites us more than new technologies that can really enhance the level of dental care we can provide to our patients! . Even office and communication technologies are beginning to excite us more.

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Dental Peers

JANUARY 4, 2021

Welcome to 2021! I hope that you and your loved ones have managed to remain healthy and safe throughout the Holiday Season! Every year at this time, we have likely just finished reflecting on the year that was and are still thinking about the year ahead. . Sadly, no matter which direction we are looking toward, one word dominates the landscape… COVID!

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Dental Peers

DECEMBER 7, 2020

As we find ourselves in the final month of 2020, I am sure many of us would rather just turn the page to 2021 rather than look back on this crazy year. However, looking back can provide an incredible perspective. We learn what we did well so we can duplicate it. More importantly, we learn what areas we may need to focus on to improve going forward. .

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Dental Peers

NOVEMBER 1, 2020

We see it in our daily news coverage…particularly now! We see it in many of our regular, commercial advertisements to purchase this product or that service or something bad will happen. We see it in our daily news coverage…particularly now! . We see it in many of our regular, commercial advertisements to purchase this product or that service or something bad will happen.

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Dental Peers

MARCH 4, 2019

Life is full of big plans… big announcements… big changes! Perhaps your review of your 2018 business performance has left you feeling the need to make some big changes to make 2019 that much more successful. Unfortunately, many of us become paralyzed by the thought of change. We know we need it. We know we would be better off if we achieved it. But the process of sweeping, dramatic change in our dental world can become overwhelming.

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