Episode 504: Avoid These Delegation Pitfalls

Question: Feel burnt out? Try delegating … the right way.

The Dental A-Team is seeing a lot of burnout across practices we visit, so Kiera’s here to offer tips about delegating. Just because you can do a bunch of tasks doesn’t mean you should. Kiera provides DAT insight on the best/easiest way to delegate, how to fill the time you’ve delegated out, and what the delegator and delegatee should absolutely not do.

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0:00:05.6 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, filler, office manager, regional manager, practice owner, and I have a team of traveling consultants, where we have traveled 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.

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0:00:52.2 KD: Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and you guys, I hope today is a great day for you. I am car casting today, I am headed down to see my parents for a little bit today and decided, you guys know me when I drive between that Nevada-California State Line, I love to podcast. If you have not heard about the time I was headed to my little sister's graduation, and I was [chuckle] car casting with a microphone. They have an agriculture checkpoint and go take a listen to that one if you don't know which one that is, email us [email protected]. Guys, I just wanna say a massive, massive, massive thank you to all of you who have been stepping up, taken on our review challenge and honestly, leaving us reviews. I've seen you guys posting on our Google reviews to help Dental A Team get the word out. You've also been posting on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, I have been seeing those, and I just wanna say thank you. Shoutout today, I saw Annie had posted and gave us a massive five-star review and Annie, thank you. There's so many of you that have been listening in. Brooke Birdy, saw your review as well on iTunes, and I just wanna say guys, number one, it feeds my ego, so thank you. I am a words of affirmation girl, so that definitely is the best way to give back to me and make me feel like a million bucks. That's number one.

0:02:09.1 KD: So if you really wanna make my day, please leave us a review and just tell us how great we are, I would love that. And number two, thank you guys for helping us help more practices. We have actually been seeing an upward trend on our podcast downloads, that is kudos to you guys, a massive, massive, massive boost on our downloads. And I just wanna say thank you to all of you for doing that because this is helping us help more practices. You know, when I started working at the dental college, the Dean asked me why I wanted to take on this position, and I said, You know, I wanna find a way to positively impact the world of dentistry in the greatest way possible. That's honestly why we... I did my job at the college, and then that's also why I decided to take on and work with the consulting company, and then that's why we started the podcast, so you guys, the only way for us to reach every dentist in the world is by you guys helping spread this.

0:03:03.7 KD: I think that that's the way we'll be able to positively impact the world of dentistry in the greatest way possible, so guys, keep hitting those downloads, keep leaving us review, keep sharing these. When I see you guys on social media platforms where you're sharing our podcasts with people, it's been so helpful, so thank you guys for taking that on. So thank you guys so much for doing that. So today's topic is, how to delegate. I know I've chatted about this a few other times, but it's just been coming up more and more, and I know a lot of offices are struggling, I'm seeing more and more burnout amongst team members and owners, and so I thought that this would be a very applicable topic for you guys today. So basically, number one, when it comes to delegating, we've gotta look to see what is the reason for delegating. Are we trying to find more time for ourselves so that way we can be more balanced? Are we trying to grow team members into another position? Or are we just trying to ensure that all team members are being utilized throughout the day? Maybe you have another reason you wanna delegate, but oftentimes I find that the number one reason we don't delegate is because we're concerned about losing our place in our job and the value that we're bringing to the practice, when in actuality, I think it's, "Let's get people into their zone of geniuses so we can work more effectively and consistently together."

0:04:23.8 KD: So for me, I think one of the best and easiest ways to delegate is for everybody just to do a brain dump on the tasks that they're doing day in and day out. Now, the reason I like a brain dump rather than a time journaling is because oftentimes those things that we put on a brain dump are going to be the things that we can actually think about that are forefront of our mind. So those things tend to be the ones that are consuming the most of our time, there might be other things on there that we don't think about, so you can always add back to this list, but what I really love to do is I love to brain dump all the information, and then after I brain dump, I go back through, you guys know if you don't know, my favorite color is pink, and I go back through with a pink highlighter and I literally look at all the tasks that only Kiera can do. A lot of times, the tasks that I'm doing are not things that only I can do, or if they are only things I can do, I might need to train.

0:05:14.1 KD: So for example, I used to be the only person who could podcast on our team, so we decided, Hey, the consultants actually have a lot of great information that they could be sharing, and it doesn't necessarily have to just be Kiera, so we decided to start training the consultants to see, Could the consultants ever podcast, if something were to ever happen to me? And the answer is yes. I trained them about the microphones, I taught them how to podcast, I taught them how to do cadences, but I realized that was something that only Kiera could do before, but you guys, I am looking to try and have a baby. We've been talking about this forever, but guys, don't worry, I'm a walking bag of I feel lethal hormones right now, we are starting the process of IVF, and if you haven't done it, that's great, congratulations. If you have gone through it, please send me help because I literally feel like a lethal bag of walking hormones and don't even know how to control myself right now. It's like one minute I'll be fine, the next minute I'm bawling my eyes out and I heard even after you have babies, this doesn't go away, so I don't quite know what to do.

0:06:13.0 KD: But the bottom line is our team had to be able to start delegating things to our other team members that they could do just as well, if not better than me, but that also came up with... I had to realise, I needed to start training, so delegating, we've gotta look at like what's our ultimate goal? So for me, my ultimate goal was I wanted to ensure that Dental A Team could continue to grow, bless people's lives, positively impact the world of dentistry in the greatest way possible, and for me to also be able to be a mom. So in order for those two things to happen, I had to start delegating and utilizing it. I realize I don't delegate that much. I like to swoop in and save the day because I think I can do it faster and better. Well, the answer is yes, I theoretically can, but that doesn't mean I should.

0:06:58.9 KD: Okay, I'm gonna say that again. Well, yes, I theoretically can do everything potentially faster and better, that doesn't mean I should, because what that does is that actually means that I'm a one-man team rather than a multiple-person team, so I want to have all of the people on my team working super well, and I wanna ensure that they're all able to do the task, and it's not just... It's not just me. So I would say that you guys are going to be able to start looking for your why of why you wanna delegate, so once you have figured out your Why as to why you wanna delegate and the plan, then we go through, like I said, and you highlight all the tasks that are actually tasks that only you can do, like I said, some of those tasks that only you could do, maybe if you trained, you could actually get those tasks passed off your plate, but I really like you guys to ensure that you know exactly why you want these tasks to be completed, why you wanna delegate. I think having a strong why helps you realize that that's what you're actually going to do, rather than it just being a wish that you're hoping one day will come true.

0:08:03.8 KD: Like I said, I'm not a great delegator, and I realize that because I like to swoop in and save the day, make everything better, and theoretically I can do it better, faster, however, I can't ever grow the company, I can only grow as big as I can grow, so realizing that sometimes delegation also will be an avenue for growth for your practice is one of the best pieces of advice I could ever give any of you, so realizing that when you delegate, you allow other people to blossom and shine, you allow yourself to blossom and shine and grow to a larger scale.

0:08:33.4 KD: Now, I will say some people, I watch them delegate and then they get lazy, they will pass all their tasks to other people, they will grow everybody else, but then they forget to grow themselves, so when you delegate off of your task, say, If you're an office manager, and you get a front office lead and then you get a clinical lead, well, sometimes you as an office manager no longer know what you should do, this is where you start diving deep in the areas maybe you don't know. Let's talk about the business aspect, what are the financials of your practice, what about overhead, do you know how to adjust that, you're gonna start thinking like a business owner, also go to your dentist and figure out what's on their plate, have them brain dump and look to see what tasks you can take off immediately and what task you need to learn and grow into, so making sure as you delegate, you don't get lazy, you don't pass too many things there. Also before you delegate, I wanna make sure that you've built in an admin time into your schedule, so Dr time, you can have that as CEO time, you can have it as admin time, you can have it as a golden time, I don't care what the heck you call this time, but it's set block time every single week in your schedule, often times the practices, I'll notice that they'll wanna hire somebody else before they put in this admin time.

0:09:37.9 KD: I was chatting with a front office team, typically, we like to have one front office team member per doctor, unless it's a solo doctor, then I for sure what two front office people, just so we avoid any temptation of embezzlement or fraud or anything of that nature, so what happens is, a lot of times people feel like they need to get more people up front, but they don't realize you can delegate tasks that would actually make the patient experience better, for example, chair-side treatment plans on an iPad, taking fluoride payments in the hygiene operatories that make it so much faster and easier for every single person in the practice. What about tasks like insurance verification that might take a long time and it might actually be cheaper to outsource that, so looking at that, but also before we even consider that, I wanna see, are you actually doing that admin time every single week, and if you're not, that might be a critical place to start before we even start delegating, because a lot of times, a lot of those projects that we wanna delegate, if we just had one or two hours in a week where it is dedicated not interrupted time, we could actually crank a lot of those things out and be super hyper-productive.

0:10:42.6 KD: So for me, I have a business focus time, I have a three-hour block every Wednesday from 7:00 AM To 10:00 PM, my team knows, do not even think about scheduling something there, don't do it, it's not good for you or for the business. So that is my blocked, golden time, and I work on big project items, so for me specifically, I work on... I'm looking to bring in a different position in our company and I'm mapping that out, talking to mentors, figuring it out, writing job descriptions for it, other things like... I'm not going to use that time to podcast as much as I love to podcast, I have that built into my schedule in another place, I'm not going to use that time to answer my emails, instead I'm going to use that time to work on high level, most productive projects. For some dentists, that's where you might be designing cases, so getting all that ortho completed or designing those cosmetic cases that you know you need to get completed.

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0:11:36.3 KD: Hey Dental A Team listeners. You guys have heard the early bird gets the worm, right? What does that even mean? Well, it means that the early bird is the person who maximizes on benefits, optimizes their practice and they take advantage of great deals. So guys, right now this week, last chance to save on Dental A Team's, virtual team summit, it's all about optimization and execution with an emphasis on full team, and then Saturday is all about leadership. So guys, don't miss out, you know you're going to come, so you might as well pop on over to thedentalateam.com, snag those early bird tickets because once they're gone, they're gone, and you'll be paying more for the same event, so head on over to thedentalateam.com, snag your early bird Virtual Summit for April 22 and 23, and I'll see you there.

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0:12:22.5 KD: That's where we're gonna be able to have a much more successful and productive schedule, if you actually block that time. For office managers, this time might be where you actually go through your one-on-one employee check-ins, it also might be where you work on... Maybe signed development or looking at all the KPIS and figuring out what KPIS need to be adjusted, doing a deep dive on the numbers. For billers, this is the time where you call on those collection calls, you work on your AR, that's the deeper projects. The ones that have to have a ton of time dedicated to solving them and figuring them out to get them paid. That's where we utilize this time. For our scheduling team, this is the time when you call all those unscheduled re-care calls, same thing for treatment coordinators. We call those unscheduled treatment lists, just think if every person did this... Oh, I forgot the clinical team... Let me give the clinical team some ideas, don't wanna let you guys feel left out. So for our clinical team, we might want to give them some block time to maybe get those crowns or those ortho cases done, this might be the time that our team actually orders for the practice.

0:13:27.7 KD: It could be the time... For a lead hygienist this might be the time that you create like the Perio protocols or review the numbers on your hygiene, on your hygienists and see how is their fluoride ratio, how are their perio numbers? This is the time, when you'll deep dive in there, it's not the time we dedicate for sharpening scalers. This is the time where we literally are maximizing and doing those high level projects that will move the practice forward. So again, before we ever delegate, I want you to make sure you have that time built in, after that, I want you to figure out why you wanna delegate, what's the bigger purpose as to why you wanna delegate these tasks. Then what we do is we come up with a game plan of, "Okay, fantastic, this is what we are going to delegate, this is how we're going to delegate, this is why we're going to delegate, then we actually have to delegate." Okay! So, we have to delegate guys, that's part of the game. That's what we have to do. Now, people get really nervous to delegate because why, we don't wanna what? Dump on somebody else and make their life stressful. Well guess what, they might already be doing half of what you're doing, and if it just was their project, you might make their life a lot less stressful, just pivot that a little bit.

0:14:36.5 KD: Also, we might be able to do things like... We might be able to find efficiencies. I will tell you, if I give Shelby a project that I've been working on for quite a while, Shelby is way more efficient and organized and structured than I am, and so she usually can come up with a better way of doing it than I can. That's gonna create if, ease and efficiency for our entire team. So when we go to delegate, we can check in with people, ask how much time and say, "Hey, here's the list of items", first and foremost, you can have a team meeting and be like, "Here are all the items up for grabs. Who wants to own this section?" Now, I say to team members who are being delegated to, one of the number one ways for you to lose confidence in your practice, the person who's delegating to you is by not following through. If you say, "Oh yeah, I'll take that on, but then you never actually do it, I do not wanna delegate to you again." I lost trust, so when people do this, I'm gonna say, "You've gotta own it with integrity."

0:15:32.0 KD: So if I say, "Yes, I'm gonna take this on." I don't care how I've gotta remember it, I don't care how I need to figure it out, my job, because I committed, I'm going to own this process, I'm going to own the fact that I need to do this, because I committed to it and I own my word, it's not accountability, you don't want your office manager following up like, "Okay, Kiera, I know you said you'd take on ordering, did you get it done?" The answer is "Yes, the office manager should still do that, but me as a person who took this on, I need to have an attitude of ownership in my practice where I don't need somebody to come follow up with me, check in because I know when I say I'm gonna do something, I will follow through 100%. So team members, leaders, everybody listening, check yourself, are you a person who actually owns your word, takes ownership of the things that you commit to doing with your job, with your personal life, all those areas, do you actually take ownership of it? Do you take ownership of your health, do you take ownership of your happiness, do you take ownership of your financial well-being, do you take ownership of the schedule if you're a scheduler, do you take ownership of making sure every doctor hits goal every single freaking day, if you're a treatment coordinator.

0:16:43.3 KD: Do you take ownership as an office manager that you will continually hit a minimum of a 10% growth rate every single year and make sure that your team is super happy and content. As a doctor, do you take ownership that you are going to produce and increase your clinical skills, so you can be the best provider that there ever was. As a hygienist you own that you should be producing 3.3 times or 3.5 times your pay or 3.0, I don't care, guys, choose your number and stick with it, there's a million of them. Minimum three, maximum 3.5 unless you're a fee for service then I For sure, for sure, for sure, for sure, want you to be producing at least 4.5 times your pay, okay?

0:17:19.5 KD: Do you take ownership that it's your job, not the schedulers job, to ensure you're hitting your production every single day, that you're mixing your schedule, that you're maximizing, that you're getting a 98% reappointment percentage. Assistants, do you own the fact that you should not be getting up in a procedure to go get something, 'cause you didn't set up your operatory, do you own your job, do you own that you should be looking for same day treatment, you can add on because you look at their treatment plans. You don't just robotically do it on the schedule, you actually proactively look for things and own that as your job. Okay. So if you're not there, let's start there, that way when people come to you to delegate to you, you know that you can count on yourself to own whatever is coming to you to delegate. So then, once we delegate, we pass it off, we have to make sure we've got clear expectations of when we want people to follow back up with us. So for example, I passed a task to Shelby, I wanted to find out a report on our consultant, that was something guys, that was on my to-do list for about nine months. Yes, nine months, and I did not complete it.

0:18:25.3 KD: So I decided, this is something that is not just a Kiera only task, Shelby is probably much faster and could probably get this done faster for me. So what do I do? I pass it to Shelby, I asked her, "Hey, this is what I need done, what do you need help with me?" I gave her all the resources and tools so she could actually execute on it very well, and then I asked her, "Okay, what will you need from me?" She told me, and then we said, "What date could you get this completed by?" Shelby had to methodically think about, "This is gonna take me a while. I have a lot of tasks on me, I think Kiera, I could get this done by the end of Q1. Does that work for you?" So that means a March 31. I said, "Totally, no problem." We put it in, we have a task organizer, we utilize a CRM, so it's kind of like your guys's Detrick open dental, and it's where all of our clients are housed, plus it's where all of our tasks are housed.

0:19:13.0 KD: So we have it there. Shelby and I put the deadline on there, and then when she gets it done, she checks it off, if you guys don't have a Task Manager or things of these projects, I would suggest you get one. For practices, I've seen the software, Asana or Trello, or Google Docs all work really, really well, when we're assigning out a bunch of projects and needing to have deadlines on them. So those would be the ones... Some offices love Basecamp, other offices love monday.com. For me, Asana is probably your easiest, fastest one to set into place or a simple task manager, Google Docs is honestly going to be your easiest one, and then just make sure you review it every week and check it off, we notice with our team, we were delegating our team was taking ownership of it, however, we didn't have a consistent follow-up process, and I would say that's the next piece of delegation that oftentimes fails in a practice is we don't follow back up.

0:20:01.5 KD: So for us, we just set it as Friday morning at our morning huddle. We pull up the tasks sheet and we pull up our Asana board, and we go through every single task that should be done and everything headed up for the next week to make sure our team stays responsible and they don't forget, and we have a consistent follow-up process, so that way it's not sitting here thinking, "Oh well, I'm sure Shelby will do it." We actually have a set process in our company where we follow up every single week, that was because we realized we were passing out tasks, our team was doing a great job, but then we all kind of would get side-tracked and forget what we had committed to doing and we needed to have a place where we could have everybody aligned. So those are some of the key pitfalls that I see with delegation. Those are some of the solutions that I've seen work well. But at the end of the day, we can sit here, we can talk about it, we can create solutions, all these different things, but what really is the number one piece is actually doing it and then following up, those are the two most paramount pieces with delegation.

0:21:01.0 KD: I will say having a strong why is going to make you delegate faster and more consistently than just talking about it, until I decided, "Hey, I'm getting pregnant", hopefully, fingers crossed, I didn't really see the need to delegate. Yes, I did for my own mental sanity, but until I had that why. And other times when I've opened up a second practice, instantly I've got a strong why that I need to delegate these tasks so that way all the information can come back to me as a regional manager, and I'm not having to micro-manage or check in all the time with my team. Guys, there is a difference between micro-managing and checking in. Checking in, keeping track of all the projects is not micro-managing. Micromanaging is where I come, sit over your shoulder and tell you how to do your job. That's micromanaging, but checking in with you to ensure that you're actually doing your projects, that's just called running a business, that's called running a team, that's making sure all the team is rowing in the same direction. And the team knows the set expectations. So guys, try delegation, I see it happening.

0:22:03.6 KD: You can make your team work so much more effectively and efficiently. So I suggest one, get a list of all the things that could be delegated. Two, let's pass it out to the team and ask people who can own it. Three, let's make sure we have a set time of where we can actually follow up as an office and ensure all projects and tasks are being completed and done. And four, create a culture of ownership, where when we say, "We'll take something on." We own it. We don't drop the ball. I wanna sing the song to you guys like, "We own it", you can go look it up, I didn't do it justice, and I'm not going to sing karaoke for you guys, however, get your team to own it, delegate, rise everybody up, make sure that you guys have a set process for it and realize how much more effectively your team can operate when all of us are working together, growing the company in the way that's best for the company to grow.

0:22:49.9 KD: Alright guys, as always, so much love to you. Thank you for being a Dental A Team listener. I super appreciate it, guys. So, thanks for listening, and I'll catch you next time on the Dental A Team podcast.

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0:23:03.1 KD: And that wraps it up for another episode of the Dental A Team podcast. Thank you so much for listening and we'll talk to you next time.