Ways to Increase Productivity in your Dental Practice

Productivity makes the most of your staff resources while benefiting employee morale, the customer experience and your brand. While a variety of habits can breed productivity, here are three things that every productive dental practice does on a day-to-day basis to improve their overall office productivity.

Check-Ins with Goal Setting

People are critical to your practice's success; whether it is team morale or daily attitudes, your staff sets the tone for productivity. Because of this, it is beneficial to institute a habit of regularly checking in on your staff and setting attainable goals for them to reach, both individually and as a team.

A daily individual check-in covers how your employee is feeling and where they are with their work. Often check-ins can cut down on miscommunication by opening the door for casual conversation. It is much easier for an employee to talk one-on-one with a supervisor about issues and successes when the atmosphere is relaxed and stress-free. Check-ins can create this feeling and lead to an increased awareness of what’s happening throughout the practice for each staff member.

Likewise, goal setting is an important part of daily check-ins. While discussing daily operations, it is helpful to create small goals for each employee. Check-ins help create realistic timelines and expectations between staff and supervisors. When goals are set through casual check-ins, it is easier to create attainable objectives that fit with each individual’s timeline.

Team Huddles

One of the most popular tricks for increased productivity in the workplace is the implementation of daily team huddles. Ideally, a team huddle gathers everyone from your office in one place to discuss the week’s schedule and goals while taking the pulse of your practice.

Team huddles help foster a good team mentality and help delegate responsibility throughout your practice. During the team meeting, everyone should share successes from previous weeks or good things that have happened in their personal or professional lives. Positivity, inside and outside of work, should be a cornerstone of team huddles.

The team huddle also promotes planning and organization as well as teamwork and collaboration. By sharing and discussing responsibilities and goals, it is easier for team members to hold themselves and their peers accountable. This accountability and community feeling can cultivate mutual respect and admiration among your staff.

Constant Evaluation

Setting goals and sharing responsibility is useless without measuring your practice’s success in these areas. Evaluation is an often-forgotten tool to identify which habits are working and which are not. Evaluation is critical for any practice looking to streamline activities and push employees to reach their fullest potential.

Constant evaluation of staff goals should also be incorporated into your daily check-ins, so both you and your employee can learn from what worked and what did not. Evaluation is key when understanding why a goal was not met, or what difficulties were encountered while trying to reach a goal. Conversation and analysis of these problems help lead to better outcomes.

Evaluation should play a part in team huddles as well. Responsibility is a key factor in productive practices. During your team huddles, it is proactive to discuss tactics, habits or procedures that are and are not successful. Evaluation provides a way to identify successful habits that can make your practice more productive.

Productivity is important for your staff and your patients. These three things will greatly help increase your practice’s productivity. Dental practice management software can also help employees create efficient habits for daily office operations. In regard to software and staff, productivity is all about developing open communication to discuss daily operations and goals. Some dental software features are designed to encourage more open, real-time communication and increase employee and office productivity.

When communication is increased through check-ins, team huddles and evaluation, productivity can skyrocket.