327: It’s Time to Rework Your Core Values

Do you often think of your practice’s or company’s core value? We sure hope you do! They’re an important part of setting the culture at your place of work, and guideposts on the roadmap to success. The Dental A-Team is currently reworking its core values to attract better hires. Listen to this episode for a core value exercise to see where you stand with your current values, and then learn if they might need to be re-shifted.

Also included are the eight attributes of teams and companies that succeeded over the past year! Check ‘em out:

1. Candor

2. Collaboration

3. Teaming out

4. Accountability

5. Development

6. Energy

7. Relationship

8. Outcomes

This rework should be a team effort, so make sure you’re including the gang! If you want to hear more about core values, listen to episode 244, Workshop Wednesday: The Hardest Part.

Podcast Transcript:

Kiera Dent:

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the Dental A Team podcast. I'm your host Kiera Dent. And I had this crazy idea that maybe I could combine a doctor and a team member's perspective because let's face it dentistry can be a challenging profession with those two perspectives. I've been a dental assistant, treatment coordinator, scheduler, office manager, regional manager, practice owner and I have a team of traveling consultants where we have traveled to over 165 different offices coaching teams. Yep. We don't just understand you we are you. Our mission is to positively impact the world of dental and I believe that this podcast is the greatest way I can help elevate teams, grow VIP experiences, reduce stress and create A teams. Welcome to the Dental A Team podcast.

Kiera Dent:

Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and you guys, let's go through a fun topic today. Who's ready for that? I hope you are because I'm ready for that. All right. Today we're going to dive into core values. I know I've talked about them on webinars, talked about them on the podcast but hey, it's new time. Let's talk about our core values. Before we get started you guys, please, please, please stop go write a review if you have not already done so. Subscribe to the podcast. Share this with someone. I can't thank you enough you guys. I don't think you realize how much this helps the podcast grow. Just like your practices we're trying to grow the podcast as well and you guys are the only way that this podcast grows is by sharing with other people. There's no way for us to help get Google reviews or to get more reviews for it. It's literally just asking you guys and having you guys give back for the things we put out for you. This is literally how you keep the podcast going and we appreciate you guys doing that. Please go like, give us a review, five star review and also share this and subscribe. That would be amazing. All right. You guys. Core values. Talking about core values today. Let's go through this. Before I've taught you guys different ways and the reason core values are coming up...

Kiera Dent:

I mentioned this briefly on another podcast where I started looking at our core values. I have loved our core values. Loved our core values. But the bottom line is I started realizing we were having problems in our team and that was people weren't committed to the company. They were coming in and if I ever even talked to them at all about something that we weren't doing they would all of a sudden tell me that they didn't like their job. And I thought, "What am I doing?" I asked the question of what am I doing to create this culture? It wasn't like, "I don't like them." I started noticing a pattern and I think often it's important for us to look for patterns in our companies. I started seeing patterns that these people were telling me if I ever gave feedback to them that they weren't liking their job. I thought my approach is wrong. Something like, "What are we doing?" I talked to some close friends. I talked to some people in the business that I really trust and respect and they gave me some good feedback. And one of the pieces we realized are as much as I like our core values we are the fire VIP's you guys have heard me talk about that. That's fun, integrity, results and ease all done with VIP customer service.

Kiera Dent:

We realized that we might be attracting the wrong crowd because of the words we're using. Donald Miller, if you guys don't know Donald Miller he's StoryBrand Marketing. I love a lot of his stuff. I attend a lot of his webinars. I read his books. I really like a lot of his philosophies when it comes to marketing. And you guys know I'm a huge marketing... You know how I feel on marketing. Don Miller says, "Words are free so use them." And I love that thought because we do get an opportunity to use words and we get to create our own reality. Words create worlds. What world are we creating with the words we're using? And I started noticing maybe the word fun even though I love to have fun guys. I live to have fun. That's how life should be in my opinion. I realized that fun might be attracting a culture of people that aren't necessarily committed to the workforce.

Kiera Dent:

And maybe that's why... And I don't know. Maybe, maybe not. Maybe we're setting the wrong expectation for a lot of our team members. Yes. Don't get me wrong. We're not going to get rid of fun per se but changing that word might help us get different results. What we did is we started thinking about what were the problems in our company and that was the first step. When you guys are building your core values maybe you would like to see some of the things you're always dealing with. For example, always dealing with accountability. We're always dealing with the fact that our rooms are never set up consistently. We're dealing with a problem that people don't take ownership. We're dealing with... whatever your problems are. That's a great way to find some of your core values that maybe are lacking. Then you can also list out what are we doing really, really well that we don't want to lose.

Kiera Dent:

We're really good at having integrity and following through. We're really great at giving amazing customer service. Whatever it is write those down. First step is write down... Maybe I should switch these. First step is to write down the things you guys are doing really, really well that we don't want to lose as our culture. Because there are probably a lot of great things that you're already doing well. I think one of the things we do really insanely well is get results in the Dental A Team. We do. We get results. Offices that work with us always get insane results when they work with us. That's just how it works. Dental A Team equals result. I love results.

Kiera Dent:

That's something that I don't want to go away from. At the same time though we started thinking, "Does results clearly define what we actually want?" Or maybe outcomes or massive value is the same thing just worded differently that'll get us a different result within our company. That's how we started with our core values is we looked at the thing for doing really, really well and then we looked at the areas that we were struggling with and then we started to see are the words that we're using words that actually are getting us the results that we truly want to get. And if not how can we change that up? That was super, super helpful for us.

Kiera Dent:

And so we started thinking through all the different words and I listened to a couple of different podcasts and there was this really great one I believe the guy's name is Keith Williams and he's written the book Never Eat Alone and he has a new one coming out, Leading Without Authority which I'm super excited to read. And he was talking about how they did a bunch of research in Harvard and how they came up with attributes of companies that actually survived and flourished through COVID and they did a ton of research. He said they raised $2 million worth of capital. They had Oprah and a bunch of other people supporting this to really look to see what did these companies do? What was at the core? And so I loved this and he talked about how... This is from memory. I listened to it just the other day and I loved this. He said the companies that did really well, they had I believe it was six different pieces to them and that is what really set them apart.

Kiera Dent:

The first one he said that they had... And I literally listened to this and I thought, "Okay. If they spent all this money and all this research and these were the attributes that these winning companies had maybe I should look at some of these core values." This is another way that I changed up our core values with our team. They're not perfect. We're still mulling on them. But just kind of helping you guys get an idea for thinking about it and then also with data and research from Harvard of what these practices or companies did and what their attributes were. The first word he said was candor. These companies had candor with each other and candor... I really love that word. And we actually are probably going to bring that into our company and that saying what needs to be said. Because companies that can come in speak with candor, they're not afraid of hurting each other's feelings and they can talk about real issues.

Kiera Dent:

This comes back to Patrick Lencioni's Five Dysfunctions of Teams. When they can have candor and he said in a way you can get this out in your team meetings is by saying, "What is not being said that needs to be said?" And I really have loved that and I've tried it in a few meetings. I've tried it with some teams and it's worked insanely well. But he said these, "Companies have candor. They come in, they say what needs to be said, they work together and they find the best outcome." And companies that really have that trust with that candor we're able to pivot. That was one of them. Another one was they also had collaboration. There was collaboration amongst team members which was another attribute that these winning thriving companies had. On that collaboration they were working together. They were sharing. They were coming up with the best ideas. The best motives. What's going to happen? Where are they headed with all of it?

Kiera Dent:

And I thought that was such a great word it was candor and then collaboration and then he said teaming out. And so that's another phrase for teamwork, team player. With teaming out how could they help each other in teams? How could they work together? And I'm just paraphrasing from this. You guys and I might be missing a few pieces that I wrote. Frantically all these notes that this is pulling from memory from this conference that I attended where he spoke. And then he also said that teams they also had accountability. The teams that really flourished through COVID also had accountability. And that's following through on what they said. Really taking ownership of that not having to be babysat and followed up on but they had accountability. And that was an attribute of these teams. They also had development. I wrote down innovation, agility, pivot.

Kiera Dent:

With this development... That was the word they used. Development of developing new ideas. Developing different ways to develop one another. Different areas that they could create differently so that development pieces were really the key attribute. Also energy. Bringing that great energy to the company. Having energy. Having areas that they could withstand what's coming up. Having just like a positive vibe was that energy that they brought to the company. Then they also had relationships. Caring about one another. Making sure that they actually had empathy. There was relationships with their customers, relationships as team members, really thinking of one another and growing as a team in those relationships. And then the last one he said was outcomes. They were focused on the outcomes. They were focused on where they were going. That they got outcomes that were positive outcomes. And so those were the eight attributes of high achieving teams.

Kiera Dent:

And so when I listened to this... You guys I'm constantly... I'm a glutton for punishment over here. I love to learn and to grow and to figure out how to be a better leader. How to be a better team. And I noticed as I was going through this that our core values are probably creating not the culture that we are wanting even though I love them. And so I had to let go of my ego, let go of my pride. That you know what? Maybe there's a better way to do it. And if they spent $2 million on Harvard research I'm sure there's other research you could have. But I thought about it. Those eight attributes are incredible for a company. And no. Not all of them do I love. I don't love all those words. Like I said at the beginning words are free. You get to choose what your core values are. These are your core. Look for the things you're doing really well. Look for the things that you're not doing as well. And then how do we adapt and change?

Kiera Dent:

Hello, Dental A team. I hope you are as excited as I am because guess what? May 14th and 15th this year we are running Dental A Teams full team summit for the first time ever. It's May 14th and 15th. Friday, Saturday and it CE training for you and your whole team in your practice. In the past you've had a fly your whole team to get full team CE and instead we're bringing the CE to you. You guys I've attended so many virtual events and I cannot wait because this is going to be epic of all epics. We're going to teach you guys with your whole team working together how to build your dream practice. How to have accountable teams and run effective meetings. We're going to have breakout sessions with each department specifically. Billing, OM, TCS, schedulers, hygienists assistants and doctors. And we're going to round table style learning from the best. We're going to have lessons on leadership. We're having guest speakers come in. It is going to be epic and I want all of you there. Head on over to our website thedentalateam.com\events and snag your ticket for you and your team to attend Dental A Teams full team summit this year.

Kiera Dent:

Oftentimes offices make core-values and they haven't for years and years and I would suggest and invite that at your annual meeting every January and every quarter you review your core values. Because I believe core values are a roadmap for you, for your practice and what you're going to get. Those are the things we think about all the time. That's who we become. And so if you're able to put into play core values and change it up. If you want you don't have to change. You guys our core values stayed for two years but then I felt like we outgrew them and that we weren't getting the results we were looking for and so we need to change them to become that. I brought that data to the team. We talked about it. We talked about the things we're doing Well, the things that we could improve and now we're revising them. We wrote up a bunch of words. But we want to be really intentional on this and so Kaylan and I decided and Tiffany we're going to mow these over for the next couple of days.

Kiera Dent:

Mow this over to see what do we really want it to be? And yes. I know a lot of teams have core values, they make them on a poster boards. You guys how much did that really cost you? It's not that much especially if you changed your core values and you made them more of what your core actually is. Learning from other teams. Learning from other people. Look to see what you want it to be. That's kind of a core values exercise along with some additional data of what the eight attributes of high achieving teams that they pulled from this last year what they had.

Kiera Dent:

And so that's why we decided to change up our core values. We wanted to have a stronger team. A team that was committed to results. A team that was committed to our company. A team that was going to stay with us. A team that always gets incredible outcomes but maybe that's through delivering insane value to their customers and their clients. Look at your team. What are your core values now? Do you want to add any of those attributes that I listed off? Do you want to change any of yours? Is your culture what you want it to be? Are your outcomes of your company where you want them to be? Or are they kind of, "We could make them better." Get it together. Have a whole team meet together guys.

Kiera Dent:

This is how to just be an owner doctors. This doesn't have to be on OMs. Get your team together. They have great ideas. I think using your team and making them simple can really help. I suggest core values you only have seven. I also suggest you create an acronym or a phrase that people can remember what the core values are. And I also suggest you quiz new hires on your core values so that way we make sure that the core values really are sinking into every team member. You can use them like Summer Caswell does on her one-on-ones. You can use them like we do for our hiring process. You can use core values at all different aspects of your company. That's a little core value creation. I hope you guys enjoy it. I hope you love it. I hope you guys get the culture that you're looking for. And as always guys thank you so much for listening. Please like I said at the beginning, like us, share our podcast with other people, leave us a review. We appreciate you doing so we value your feedback. We value you as listeners. Thank you guys so much for listening and I'll catch you next time on the Dental A Team podcast.

Kiera Dent:

All right. Dental A Team`Listeners. That's a wrap. Thank you so much for listening and if you love today's podcast go leave us a review. It takes you five seconds and your review helps more offices, more practices, more team members just like you find out about the Dental A Team. Thank you guys so much for being part of my Dental A Team family.