Don't Pre-Judge

The most important thing I learned was to not pre-judge patients and to present the very best care option to every patient. I know a lot of dental offices that pre-judge what they think a patient will be able to afford or desire and then present treatment options to fit that perception. I know that I would be angry if I had a bad knee and I went to an orthopedic surgeon and he pre-judged what treatment option I might pick and only presented that option. I would want to hear the option with the most opportunity to make me well.

I often say, “if you were my mother, this is what I would be doing” – and then I proceed to present the very best option to the patient (the one that I would do for my mom). It is okay for patients to ask about less costly or less invasive treatment options – I am happy to give my patients all their options. The most important thing is that they have been told by me what the best treatment option is and why it offers them the best long-term outcome.

I understand that dentistry can be expensive but that is no excuse for us not offering the very best treatment plan to each of our patients. Present the dental plan that you would want presented to you – then let our patients decide if they want to move forward with the ideal treatment plan or to ask for alternative plans. Don’t pre-judge your patients. Let them decide for themselves.

Dr. Corey Gold
President – Advanced Continuing Education Systems
www.aces4ce.com

Volunteering in the Local Schools

I am a huge believer in having all the members of the dental team volunteer to teach dental education at the local elementary schools and pre-schools. In my office we actively book times for myself or staff members to go to every local school and pre-school each year. We do not wait for a call from the school – rather we call the schools and set up the visits.

At the visits, we give away tooth brushes, tooth pastes, coloring books and a sheet for each child to bring home to their parents on hygiene basics for elementary school children. We also give them a one-page sheet to give to their parents on what to do in case of a dental emergency. This last piece has practical information for the parents as well as our office phone number – we tell the parents that they are free to call and ask questions to our office – even if they are patients at another office.

Over the years our office has done a lot of good work in educating the children in our community and we have also built a much bigger business. We are regularly getting new patients who say they learned about our practice from an education visit to the schools. Some parents say that they called us after having the emergency dental sheet on their refrigerator for years.

Dr. Corey Gold
President – Advanced Continuing Education Systems
www.aces4ce.com

Spark Plug Employees

Every once in a while I interview a person for a dental job and that person has a BIG personality. They are happy, smile, make jokes and generally are vibrating at a higher rate than the typical person. I almost always hire this kind of person on the spot.

I love to have employees that are simply fired up and give off positive energy – that smile and laugh and make the entire office more fun – more fun for the staff and more fun for the patients. I can teach an RDA to become better at some of the technical aspects of their job but rarely can I teach a highly skilled person to have a bigger personality.

I look back upon my many decade career and can point to the years where I had spark plug employees as some of the most fun and highly productive segments of my career. I know some offices that try to shy away from hiring employees with big personalities and tend to hire more vanilla/quite types. I say – GO BIG! Hire people that have personalities and like to chat with the patients. Yes – the person has to be mature and know the bounds of professional conversation – just set ground rules

I have been blessed with having a good number of spark plug employees over the years. I want to surround myself with employees that are fired up, alive and happy. I want that energy permeating my practice.

Dr. Corey Gold
President – Advanced Continuing Education Systems
www.aces4ce.com

Are You Negative?

I have been asked to observe many offices and make recommendations on ways that the office could be more productive and to increase the flow of new patients into the office. I would assume that the dentist inviting me into their practice would be on their best behavior when I was observing. Maybe they were?
What I have observed all too often are dentists who are very negative. They are unhappy and seem to be on edge. As the leader of the practice, the dentist sets the tone for the entire office, if the dentist is negative and down – the staff will follow. No one wants to go to a dental office that is down and no one wants to recommend that office as well.

Sometimes the number one recommendation I make for dentist in the coaching session is simply to smile, laugh and chat with people more. Just have a good time – enjoy the staff – enjoy the patients – enjoy the work! Be an attractive force within the office. Catch people doing things right and compliment people more. Compliment your staff in front of patients and compliment your patients as well.

I have seen dentist office increase sales by over 30% in a few months by doing nothing more than actively focusing on being happy, giving compliments and taking a sincere interest in their staff and patients. Sometimes we have just been doing dentistry for so long that we just forget to enjoy each day and the people we spend our day with. Just actively working on being a positive person and giving off happy energy will improve your practice.

You patients rarely know the quality of your work but they do know the experience of being in your practice. Patients will return to your office and refer you to others when they feel that they are in a positive office and the dentist takes an active interest in them as a person. Sometimes simply being nice pays off.

Dr. Corey Gold
President – Advanced Continuing Education Systems
www.aces4ce.com

Set Your Own Goals – Don’t Let Your Goals Set You

I get a lot of questions around New Years from doctors wanting to set goals for their offices. The first things I tell them is that they cannot set their goals for their offices in a vacuum – that their office is a part of their overall life. They can only set their office goals in conjunction with setting their personal goals (family/travel/community service/religious/physical/office/etc…).

If someone tells me that they want to spend more time at home with family, more time in the gym, more time taking vacations but they also want to double their office sales – they are probably setting off on an incompatible course of goals. You can’t simply double your time allocation everywhere – you have a finite amount of time. We can make improvements to your office with the time you have – but to double sales takes a major effort that includes more time

When planning your goals for your office – figure out what you want your life to look like for 2014. Do you have high school tennis matches you want to watch for your kids? Soccer? Orchestra? Mommy & me? What things are important to you that supersede your office goals? Is it eating dinner at home with your kids? Is it Thursday night date night? Is it Wednesday bible study? Is it one hour in the gym with a trainer? Block all these important times out of your schedule!

Now look at your calendar – that is the time you have to open your office and make the practice magic happen. You might find that your available calendar does not provide the best opportunities to produce the income you desire – simply not enough hours to work. When you find your work calendar and your ideal calendar don’t mesh – look hard at what you will be giving up to gain more dental office hours. Is it worth it to make more income but miss dinner with the kids? Is it worth it to miss your kids tennis matches at high school? Only you can decide the answer to those questions. The one this that I do know is that you can always make more money – but you can never make more time.

Be wise in choosing where to invest your time in 2104.

Dr. Corey Gold
President
www.aces4ce.com