Is Everyone On Your Team Working Together?

Is everyone on your team working together?

This is a question that needs to be regularly asked, and answered in any organisation with more than one employee.

All team members need to be working together towards a common goal for the organisation.

All team members need to be on the same page and need to be COMMUNICATING with each other.

We can’t have teams, and team members, operating in silos without cross communication. The efforts, and exertions, and results of one sub-team or team member MUST BE SHARED with other team members and sub-teams in the organisation so that collaborative discussion can occur and build upon positive results and also amend efforts that are resulting in outcomes that are less than desirable.

Team members in a department need to share and educate each other as to what’s working for them in their roles as well as helping those team members struggling with mastering certain duties and roles.

Remember, the word TEAM stands for Together Each Adds Meaning.

A football team works to outscore their opposition.

One football team member may be struggling to get past his opposing player, but some helpful advice given from one of his team members may be the GOLD NUGGET that is needed to create the needed competitive advantage.

Similarly, in the dental office, on the phone answering team, one team member may be booking a significant number of new patient appointments compared to another team member.

This information about what is working well needs to be shared between co-workers. Comparing what one employee is saying compared to another, will help the team member with the weaker appointment booking numbers to improve.

After all, in dentistry, we owe it to our callers to make sure that we solve their problems. And that usually means scheduling them an appointment with our dentists or hygienists to attend to their issues.

Remember, as Jayne Bandy says:

“They haven’t phoned your office to order a pizza.”

The caller has not phoned your office for the fun of it or because they have ten minutes of time to kill. The caller has a dental problem or concern and they are looking to your dental office to HELP THEM.

If collaborative training of your team is not your forte, then the best thing to do is to outsource the training, and employ someone who can come in specifically to help engage your team members to work together as a TEAM, and not work as a group of individuals.

Economically, the investment in a coach is far less than the lost dental production time wasted by a dentist trying to do something they are not trained to do or are not good at doing.

And then the dentist can do what they are meant to be doing…. some dentistry.

The ROI on external training is always a 5X or 10X or more multiple, unless the team members do not want to be trained.

A football team would never tolerate or endure a team member who did not want to be trained.

Yet some dental offices do?

Why is that even logical or rational?

A dental practice is a business with owners who have invested money in that business.

And that skin in the game should mean that the owners have the right to choose who is on the bus, and who needs to get off the bus.

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Dr. David Moffet BDS FPFA CSP is a certified coach who helps businesses improve their Customer Service Systems to create memorable World Class experiences for their valued clients. Click here to find out how David can help your business