Episode 624: Are You Tracking This?

  It’s a consultant takeover! Tiff and Tina put their heads together to share what they’re hearing and implementing in dental practices all across the nation when it comes to key performance indicators (KPIs).

Transcript:

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0:00:05.9 Kiera Dent: Hey everyone, welcome to the Dental Aid Team podcast. I'm your host Kiera Dent, and I have 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, biller, 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 team. Welcome to the Dental Aid Team podcast. Hello Dental Aid Team listeners, this is Kiera, and you guys, you are so lucky. Today you are going to get to hear from Tiffany and Tina. They are coming in with some dynamite info for you, and as always, thanks for listening. I'll catch you next time on the Dental Aid Team podcast.

0:01:05.2 Spiffy Tiffy: Hello Dental Aid Team listeners, this is Tiffany, and you are here on Dental Aid Team Consultants Takeover, where the traveling Dental Aid Team consultants take over the mic, and we share tips and tricks from hundreds of offices nationwide. And today we have myself, Spiffy Tiffy, and Tina with me, and I'm so excited to be doing this with Tina. She has a wealth of knowledge, and you guys, she's just bringing so much spunk and fun and really knowledge to our team. Like there's just so much in that brain, and she's an excellent writer. So if you're noticing your, your newsletters are coming in hot and strong, you can thank Tina for that. She's fantastic. So Tina, thank you for being here with me today. It's so much easier to do this with someone else. So I appreciate you giving me the time today.

0:01:50.0 Tina: Oh yeah, thank you. It's so fun to be here, and I'm definitely gonna replay this on any day where I need to pick up, because that was a great intro of like, here are all things Tina.

0:02:00.9 ST: Good, good. I know, Kiera's so good at that. Like she is just so, she's so fantastic at always just letting us know how amazing we are and I always feel the same way coming into these podcasts with her. I'm like, dang, okay, should have recorded that. So I needed that today. So I'm glad you felt the same. Awesome. Well, Tina, I thought it would be, it would be fun and smart to talk a little bit about KPIs, key performance indicators today and why we track them. I think we're going into the new year or by the time you listen to this, it probably is the new year. And I think starting the year off strong, tracking different metrics within the practice from the get-go is really smart. If you're not listening to this at the beginning of the year, you could be listening to this two years from now. I have no idea when you're listening to this, but it is never too late to start tracking your key performance indicators or your KPIs and to teach your managers to start tracking them, biggest, biggest reason for me personally on tracking KPIs is because I really love to see trends.

0:03:01.7 ST: I like to see what's working and what's not working so that I can make educated decisions. I really, truly from the bottom of my heart thinks it's insane. I'm in a business to make emotionally driven decisions because your emotions will change, right? So if I make a decision based on my emotion today, my emotion could be very different tomorrow. It could be a very different decision. But if I make a decision based on KPIs on seeing the metrics of something, the black and white numbers, and I say yes or no, it is or isn't working. So we need to pivot or we need to keep it the same. My emotion can be whatever it is, but that black and white of it all really makes it a solid decision for me, choice and movement. I know a lot of practices are dropping insurances or picking up new insurances or doing, new patient specials and all of these pieces. And so if you're making these decisions and you just say, you know what, Delta has low reimbursement and I feel like their claims are difficult to work with. Well, are they difficult? Is the reimbursement like, do you just feel like that or do you have the proof in the pudding?

0:04:05.6 ST: So don't make a decision without it is my perspective and tracking those KPIs I think is, is literally key to key performance indicators. Tina, what do you, what do you think when you think of KPIs? Like how do you, how did you utilize that in your practice and your past and your training? I know you trained a lot of people. Like how did you best utilize those KPIs and tracking them?

0:04:29.9 Tina: I think that everything that you just said, I like to make decisions based off the data and I definitely kind of take a step back even when I feel emotional and I'll be like, okay, I need to look at the information because emotions aren't logic. So what is it that we know? But then also with KPIs, we're bringing in how the whole team can help. And so really having the team assigned to what they can do to help reach what this goal is. So if that's asking, existing patients for referrals, did we talk to three people today about who do you know that you could refer to us? And it really makes it to a vacancy how their effort is playing into the overall picture for the dental practice and the direction that you're moving.

0:05:11.5 ST: I love that. I love that you said that. So bringing it, bringing it on like a smaller, large picture is really cool because we think of, I think that was brilliant. We think of KPIs as like production collections, new patients, right? And maybe marketing ROI when people are tracking them, but realistically a key performance indicators, anything that's gonna move the business forward. So if you've got your smaller KPIs that are individually based or department based, you can then see how those smaller KPIs progress and push the big KPIs. So like you said, the referrals, right? So if you're asking for referrals and your KPI metric is, you have to ask for five referrals a day, right? And then you track it and you see, okay, we asked for three, then you can see one, you see that it's gonna help your new patients, which ultimately helps your production and your collections. But then two, you're gonna be able to say, okay, well, if we only asked for three and we're supposed to ask for five, why did that happen? 'Cause that would be a downtrend, right? That was something that's not working.

0:06:11.8 ST: We didn't reach five. So why didn't we reach five? Did we not have enough patients that day on the schedule? Did we not utilize our opportunities? Did we have bad patients to ask for referrals? Like do we need verbiage training? Like what are the pieces of the puzzle there that contributed to that downtrend or I think to [0:06:30.8] ____ the opposite, right?

0:06:33.8 Tina: Yeah, for sure. And you said you kind of touched on training and I really liked KPIs for that because sometimes we don't realize the additional help that team members need. And once you kind of assign a task to them and if they aren't hitting it, most of the time it's that they just need more support. So, okay, we aren't getting in as many new patients as what we want. Now we can break that down further. What can each team member do to contribute? And then are there some that are continuing to not contribute? Most likely they just need more help. They need to know how do I talk to patients about this? I don't, I'm, it makes me nervous and you just need to know that so that you know how to support them and move them forward.

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0:07:09.1 KD: Hello, Dental Aid Team listeners. This is Kiera and you guys, how was your 2022? I want you to look back and tell me, was it the year of years or was it a really hard year? Did you crush it or did it crush you? This is the time guys for end of year Dental Aid Team platinum is welcoming you where we will physically fly to your practice.

0:07:32.7 KD: We will come and we will elevate your dreams and make them into a reality. And guys, space is limited and prices are going up. This is not a sales pitch. This is not something where I'm trying to scare you into it. I'm just facing the reality of inflation is here. Flights are expensive and I want to see as many people as we possibly can and serve as many as we can. So if you wanna be part of our elite group of people, there are limited spaces because our consultants can only see as many. We are taking on 10 new platinum offices by the end of the year and that's it. That's all we have space for. So if you wanna be one of the elite 10, come join us. Be a part of our top notch elite doctor community. Be a part of our office manager and hygiene and front office communities. Get your operations manual done and live the life that you've only been dreaming of today. Email me hello at the dentalateam.com and make 2023 truly a year that's unforgettable. We are a complete tax write off and like I said, we are only taking 10 offices.

0:08:35.0 KD: So don't get left behind. Be one of those 10 and I cannot wait to give you the biggest warmest welcome to completely and utterly changing your life for good. Welcome to the Dental Aid Team. I can't wait for you to join us. Hello at the dentalateam.com cheers to 2023 and making you your best self yet.

0:08:56.7 Tina: I love that you said that I think that's freaking brilliant. Number one, and I think that rolls into a really good way for practice managers and owners to present tracking to a team, right? Because we track our KPIs to see that we're doing well for our patients, that we're progressing our business and that we're thriving and we're profitable 100%. We are a small business. We need to make sure that we're working, but it's also telling us that we're helping the community, that we're doing what we're here to do to serve our patients and our community. And so when we take it into a spin like that with our team, when we say, hey, we're looking at these to make sure that we're doing right by our patients and our community. And then also we're looking at this so we can see weak points, right? Spots where individuals or departments or leaders, whoever it is, might need a little extra training. And that's totally fine. I think the way that you just said that is, is perfect because a lot of people will look at these KPIs. I think in my experience I've seen, right, they'll look at the KPIs and they'll think, oh, this is just another, another way for you to see that I'm not doing my job.

0:10:02.7 KD: And they're nervous to be, they feel like it's micromanaging, right, when it's actually the opposite, but they feel like they're being managed and they're being looked at and they're, they're somebody waiting for them to fail. And in reality, it's the opposite. Like we're as leaders looking to see where can I be a better leader and make sure that the team that I'm leading is successful because I'm not here. I hate hiring and firing. I think most of us do, and I'm not here to just like onboard new people and then let them go. If they need to be let go, we will, right? But I think that I'm really here to be a better leader and see, okay, where is my team coming up short that I can do a better job of giving them the tools so that they can be successful.

0:10:47.2 Tina: Yeah. And I think that that's a great thing to make sure that you're paying attention to is when you approach team members who need some more support, taking a look at as a leader, what is actually happening here? So it's showing me as a leader that I do need to provide this. And then sometimes even incorporating other team members and being like, Hey, I noticed that you're doing really well with this. How do you feel about making sure that that's being discussed when a team member who maybe isn't doing as well with it is around so they can see it and kind of model after you. So it definitely helped to get a full team involvement too.

0:11:19.3 ST: I love that. I love that. And I think talking about the KPIs together too, and, and reviewing those metrics in an open forum helps to make people more comfortable with it as well. And, and I think maybe it even helps make people, I know it would for me at least make me more comfortable to ask questions and to ask for help when I need it, because we're talking about it all the time and we're all here. I don't feel like I'm less than or like I'm dumb, right? Because it's all here. We're all in the same place. We're all tracking our own stuff and, and we're all gonna hit at some point, we're gonna hit a low metric and we're going to be like, okay, help me get out of this, right? Or help me find a solution. So I think it actually dispels a lot of that as human beings, like we're scared to be wrong. We always wanna be right. And so it's really scary for most of us to be like, Hey, especially when we're new, right? Hey, I don't know this and I need help because we wanna come in and we wanna roll the roost and, and know all the things.

0:12:17.3 Tina: Yeah. I love that that trust kind of comes into that. So you just start to trust your team more so that you can grow from it.

0:12:22.5 ST: I love it. I love it. So thank you. I think, I think we know why we track KPIs right? We for training. I think that was huge for morale and trust within the practice accountability pieces. And then also just so we can see the trends of the practice, the black and white. So we can make unemotional educated decisions based on actual proof that's sitting in the pudding there. So those are, those are why we track KPIs. And I think to get you started some good actionable items are really to figure out what is progressing your practice that you can start tracking today. Easiest pieces like we said before, production collections, new patients, you guys are probably already looking at that, but are you tracking the metrics? Are you looking at it month over month? Are you looking at it year over year? Are you looking at December this year versus December last year to see, are you growing or are you, are you in a downtrend where you're not growing?

0:13:16.2 ST: Those are the KPIs that you should be looking at. So from a simplistic view, start really tracking those KPIs in comparison to your goals month over month, year over year, and start comparing the trends between it all. And on a, on a less simplistic, more detailed view, look at further what within the practice do we do maybe every day, maybe every month that pushes those metrics to be where they're at. It's either they're not working or they are working. What metrics individually and departmentally can we look at that progress those so that you guys can start tracking those as well and get your team on board. So your action items are figure out your metrics and figure out what's progressing your business. Start tracking those month over month, year over year to look even deeper and see, are there at least department KPIs that you can start tracking, if not individual KPIs, and then three, start talking about it with your team. I know numbers can be scary. I know a lot of you out there, like your guts just hit the car seat because I know you're driving right now, right? I know your guts just hit the car seat.

0:14:22.8 ST: But it's okay if you I think if you take the approach Tina just gave you I think those freaking beautiful it was gorgeous wrapped up with a with a bow for the training piece and just let them know like we're here to do better for our patients. And this is how we're gonna know that we're doing it. Do those three things start tracking your KPIs start getting off on the right foot and reach out to us if you have any questions we love to hear from you. If you need help, if you need ideas on how to track it. I love Excel spreadsheets. I'm like old school when it comes to that. I know there's so many programs that do it for us, but I really do feel like if you if you're not inputting the information yourself into some sort of a tracker yourself, you're only looking at it. You're not actually paying attention to what you're what you're seeing. So that's my that's my two cents on that. Do you Tina do you have any action items? I think I mean I gave him quite a few. Do you have anything that I missed in there?

0:15:17.6 Tina: No, I think that you did awesome. I think that those action items are great and just really getting your team buy-in is just helping them to see what they're doing. That's actually going to help with this. And so if people help you create it, they are more motivated to make it happen. So let them help you create what they can do to reach these goals.

0:15:33.7 ST: Beautiful. That was brilliant. Look at that. I told you that mind is gonna come out. It was here. It was here for you guys. So go do the things they're not hard. They're really easy and your system has all the answers for you. You just have to know how to pull it. So if you need help again, reach out. You can talk to us. You can talk to your system software engineers, whoever those people are, but let us know what's working for you and what's not working for you. We want to hear from you. So that's it guys that wraps up the Dental Aid Team podcast consultant takeover. Let us know what you think. We actually really, really, really do love hearing from our listeners. I don't think you understand how much we do. So drop us a five-star review or email us over at the hello at hello at the dentalateam.com. Thanks so much for listening you guys, and we'll catch you next time on The Dental Aid Team podcast.

0:16:21.4 KD: And that wraps it up for another episode of the Dental Aid Team podcast. Thank you so much for listening and we'll talk to you next time.