One Root Cause of the Silence and Lack of Empathy Too Often Seen in Dental Practices (Part 2)1/10/2019  January 10, 2019
By Trude Henderson Today I am following up on last week’s blog and plan to share with you the first of three main root causes of the silence and lack of empathy (Merriam-Webster defines empathy “as the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts and experience of another”) that can plague dental practice. This will involve my asking questions that can help you determine whether you have issues that bear looking into further. In doing all this, I will draw on my experience working with High Reliability Organizations (HROs) and on the results of the 3-year-long pilot study. The root cause under discussion is simply a lack of leadership. Silence and a lack of empathy are both undesirable communication-related behaviors, and a large majority of problems in a dental practice can ultimately be traced back to a breakdown in communication. Even the best-equipped teams, under poor leadership, may not be able to salvage the situation. Patients who are delighted with your service are more likely to be loyal to your practice, even if competitors offer the same service and treatment options, as they cannot duplicate your people and your culture! However, when weak or distracted leaders are in charge and exercise the kind of hands-off approach known as laissez-faire leadership, it’s not likely that your practice as a whole will demonstrate enough value to satisfy patients to sustain it in the long run. As Eileen Morrissey, RDH, said in a recent article (“Serving at the Pleasure of the People: Clinical Excellence Does not Excuse the Absence of Basic Etiquette,” RDA Magazine, September 1, 2017): “Serving patients cannot be limited to providing optimum clinical treatment. It has to be the entire package.” We couldn’t agree more and would like to reiterate the point we have made several times in the past: essential as it is, technical competence will not by itself enable your dental practice to enjoy its full potential. We would also like to repeat something else said many times before: whatever is going on within your culture is almost always transferred directly to your customer experience, and vice-versa. The most successful practices are based on deeply shared values (we recommend that you make a list of these and make them very visible to staff and doctors) that define their success in concrete terms, for the benefit of staff and doctors alike. Such values are shared and reiterated in daily collaborative huddles. Like the results of such huddles, performance metrics, including e-survey patient feedback results, are given priority and help the team understand where they are now and where they need to be in order to create the most value for patients. High Reliability Organizations (HROs) are headed by proactive leaders who stay the path, actively helping staff and doctors connect or reconnect to the “why’s” behind their tasks (Gamble, 2013). In addition, they are not afraid to hold people accountable when they deviate from the practice’s standards. They are, however, skilled at building relationships with team members based on trust and enlisting their help in solving problems. They understand that the more issues are identified and resolved in the work area (not in the occasional conference room meeting), the better, because once patients take their grievances to social media, the damage is already done. If your turnover is high, you should do your best to understand ‘why’ via exit and team member interviews. Research reveals that most turnover is misdiagnosed: practice managers too often attribute it to problems in the personal lives of employees or a fit/job mismatch, when in fact the majority leave because of their supervisor. Our pilot study revealed that when employees feel underappreciated and/or that their supervisor fails to recognize and utilize their talents to benefit the practice, they become disengaged (as shown in a poor attitude, impatience, silence, or lack of empathy in their conversations with patients) and then leave the practice. We found, however, that the opposite is true if supervisors engage daily in two-way feedback with employees and empower them to exercise their talents in the course of their work. In every practice, people are greatly influenced by those who exemplify and model defined values, whether or not they have an official title. If the values aren’t specifically defined by practice leaders, staff will define them on their own, often with devastating results for both the practice and the patient experience. The pilot study found that practices failing to properly define, communicate and model values functioned poorly because staff wasted a lot of time trying to figure out what they should be doing and how they should be doing it. This, in turn, led to many formal and informal procedural inconsistencies that transferred directly into shortcomings in the patient experience. These included employees being immersed in their personal cell phones, ignoring patients or looking down while clicking on their keyboard with a patient directly in front of him/her, and failing to follow up with patients or address their concerns in a friendly, empathetic manner. An employee’s attempt to minimize the importance of such behavior by saying that “it was just a bad day,” is unacceptable. Laissez-faire leadership can work very well for businesses that require trial and error in order to perfect products and services. This often applies to engineering firms, advertising agencies and research organizations – but not the stress-prone, schedule-packed dental office. How Do You Know if You Have an Issue?The following are some questions you can ask yourself designed to help you determine if your practice might be on “auto-pilot” and suffering from the kind of leadership that can generate poor communication, including silence and/or lack of empathy with patients:
If you answered “yes” to one or more of these questions, we recommend that you investigate further to see if you in fact do have an issue. HROs are keenly aware of their operations, on the look-out for the smallest signs that their work processes might break down. They resist the temptation to accept ‘simple’ explanations or excuses regarding problems. Long-held beliefs are challenged because people, processes and technologies change. And, most importantly, they take proactive measures designed to prevent problems from arising in the first place, and take immediate actions to solve them when they do! At Identify one of our cardinal rules is: never ask a question that you are unwilling to address. We feel strongly that you should approach our questions to you in the same manner as you would our e-surveys and patient feedback. After all, gaining insights or collecting feedback and then failing to act on it has no value! Daniel Goleman, the author of Working with Emotional Intelligence, said, “How customers feel when they interact with an employee determine how they feel about the company itself.” Very simply put: your dental practice cannot afford the high cost of laissez-faire leaders. Based on our experience, dental practice leaders must make a concerted effort to make people, communication, customer service and process improvement their priorities. Great communication, practice improvement and the expectation of providing a high-quality customer experience cannot be delegated down or merely organized into a program. It requires a culture where every single manager, supervisor, doctor and employee is engaged every day. In our next blog, Part 3 of the series, we will discuss other root causes of the silence and lack of empathy often haunting dental practices. Visit the article by Eileen Morrissey, RDH, here Works CitedBabcock & Wilcox Technical Services LLC. (2008). High Reliability Operations: A Practical Guide to Avoid the System Accident. Amarillo: U.S. Department of Energy. Gamble, Molly. (2013, April 19). Becker’s Hospital Review. Retrieved from http://beckershospitalreview.com/hospital-management-administration/5-traits-of-high-reliability-organizations-how-to-hardwire-each-in-your-organization.html Goleman, Daniel. (1998). Working with emotional intelligence. New York: Bantam/Doubleday/Dell. Shingo Institute. (2016, Jan). Leading a New Era of Enterprise Excellence. Retrieved from http://archive-org-2014.com/org/s/2014-10-26_4813234 The Lewen Group. (2008, May 1). Becoming a High Reliability Organization: Operational Advice for Hospital Leaders. Retrieved from Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality: http://archive.ahrq.gov Trude Henderson is the co-founder of ToothFairy, a startup elective dental and medical practice improvement software company which delivers an unparalleled customer experience that inspires delight, loyalty and positive emotional connections to improve the lives of patients and the practices they visit. In 2016, she was the first to introduce High-Reliability Organizational Concepts to the dental industry. For questions, contact her directly at Trude@GetToothFairy.com. Follow Trude on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/trudehenderson/ (no email required). Go to ToothFairy's website: www.ToothFairySoftware.com.
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3 Secrets to Providing Your Dental Patients with a Collaborative Customer Experience (Part 2)11/7/2018  Published on November 7, 2018
By: Trude Henderson In our last blog (“3 Reasons Why Collaboration Can Pay Off for Your Dental Practices,” November 1, 2018), we discussed Ryan Kh’s views (see “How Effective Collaboration Equals Great Customer Experience,” Customer Think, October 9, 2018”) on the rationale for collaboration in an organization. Today, we talk about another topic that interests him, “What are the secrets to a collaborative customer service?” His answers (1,2) and one from us (3) that we recommend for your dental practice:
As a quick test, ask yourself, “Is my practice easy to do business with?” For a better and more accurate test, ask your patients the following: “ How can we improve communication with you?” “What can we do to improve your experience with us?” “How can we make your visit more enjoyable?” We recommend a good e-survey platform, in use year-round, to ensure you’re always listening and responding to patients’ wants, needs and concerns. You might ask, “What are some ways that I can eliminate silos within my practice?” At ToothFairy we recommend a couple of steps. First, do your best to hire people who would rather work in a team environment as opposed to working alone. They are less likely to adopt the “us against them” mentality. From our experience from conducting Hogan Personality Profiles, those who score low on the “Sociability Scale” prefer to work alone, and are also quieter and more reluctant to seize the initiative - in short, the kind of employee unlikely to 'consistently' win patients over. Hiring the right people is always a high bar; don’t be fooled by the fact that most candidates can be taught to say exactly what you want to hear during an interview. We encourage you to check out our October 2nd blog, (Part3) More Root Causes and Lack of Empathy in Your Dental Practice for a more in-depth discussion, and tips that can help you hire people who are the right fit for your dental practice. Some effective interview questions recommended by Hogan that we ourselves have utilized include:
Finally, consider adopting ‘collaboration’ as a core value of your practice. This can optimize the capacity of your team members to extend beyond their comfort zone (something that is not easy for most people), develop, and in turn, stretch the boundaries of the practice. This can give your dental practice a competitive advantage because knowledge helps prevent missed opportunities including those that commonly leave money on the table. We recommend that you appoint at least one champion of collaboration (preferably a practice manager or owner) charged with showing the practice’s commitment to it, as well as with working on continuous improvement of the practice as a whole. Change and leadership author John P. Kotter (2012) said, “Major change is often said to be impossible unless the head of the organization is an active supporter.” From our experience, when the conversation about an initiative ends, so does the initiative. Our advice: keep it fresh on their minds through fun daily conversations and colorful graphics and metrics so that your priorities and initiatives remain top-of-mind. Now that you know these ‘secrets’, we hope that you will avail yourself of this knowledge to boost collaboration among the members of your dental practice team, thus improving your customer experience and giving your practice a competitive edge. Read our other articles regarding High Reliability Concepts below: Ten Steps You Can Take Right Away to Improve the Reliability of Your Dental Practice High Reliability Concepts: Insights of Value to any organization. Trude Henderson is the co-founder of ToothFairy, a startup elective dental and medical practice improvement software company which delivers an unparalleled customer experience that inspires delight, loyalty and positive emotional connections to improve the lives of patients and the practices they visit. In 2016, she was the first to introduce High-Reliability Organizational Concepts to the dental industry. For questions, contact her directly at Trude@GetToothFairy.com. Follow Trude on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/trudehenderson/ (no email required). Go to ToothFairy's website: www.ToothFairySoftware.com.  Late engagement leaves opportunities, patient relationships and potential revenue on the table -Dr. David Shen Published on October 21, 2018
By: Trude Henderson According to a November, 2016 report by Salesforce, “The customer experience is now the Top Sales Benchmark.” With this said, we at ToothFairy believe that the power is in the people - your dental patients and your employees, all stakeholders - and it is they who determine if your dental practice excels or falls behind. We recently lighted upon an excellent blog (“7 Foundations of a Great CX Program,” CCW Fall Executive Report, February 21, 2017), by Ben Motteram that we think illuminates the truth of this assertion, and we would like to share it with you, the dental practice leader. The blog’s author, a proud native of Adelaide, Australia, says that he derived his “foundations” from the 9 principles for building the city from scratch enunciated by Edward Gibbon Wakefield in the 1820’s. Below you will find Motteram’s 7 foundational principles for building a superb CX program, accompanied by some responses of our own:
Our 3-year pilot study revealed, for example, that saying ‘Thank you!’ often helps foster resilience. Employees who feel appreciated are more likely to endure the inevitable bumps in the road and continue moving forward, favorably impacting the patients in your practice. In addition, we recommend that you discuss and resolve issues on-the-spot, rather than waiting for the occasional conference room meeting, but make sure that all conversations regarding these matters are held out of earshot of your patients. A daily huddle, if executed properly, can be one of the most effective leadership tools at your disposal for making small real-time, incremental changes. In fact, a well-executed huddle of five minutes can be more effective and inspiring than a twenty-minute, poorly-executed one. 7) Then, “measure and communicate success.” The author suggests that you use metrics to enable customers, employees and everyone else involved, to understand and appreciate the extent of your gradual progress in making the aspirational experience a reality. We would add that based on our experience, dental practices that encourage transparency usually have higher-performing teams than those that do not. As Peter Drucker said, “What gets measured gets improved.” Transparency and trust go hand-in-hand. People who are open and honest generally inspire greater esteem and confidence than others. The same applies to leaders, customers and organizations. Our advice: utilize visual metrics in daily huddles to reward ‘right’ behaviors and help your team understand where they are now. Then, ask them ‘what or how’ questions like this: “What are the gaps that need to be filled in order to get where we want to be?” or “How do you propose that we accomplish this task?” In short, we suggest that you, the dental practice leader, remain mindful of these 7 pointers while honing your CX program. Trude Henderson is the co-founder of ToothFairy, a startup elective dental and medical practice improvement software company which delivers an unparalleled customer experience that inspires delight, loyalty and positive emotional connections to improve the lives of patients and the practices they visit. In 2016, she was the first to introduce High-Reliability Organizational Concepts to the dental industry. For questions, contact her directly at Trude@GetToothFairy.com. Follow Trude on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/trudehenderson/ (no email required). Go to ToothFairy's website: www.ToothFairySoftware.com. |
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