John Meis:
Hey, listeners, welcome to this episode of the Double Your Production Podcast. I'm Dr. John Meis with my partner, Wendy Briggs. Hey, Wendy.
Wendy Briggs:
How's it going?
John Meis:
It's going awesome. So we have
Wendy Briggs:
Great.
John Meis:
a really interesting topic today and we have somewhat of a theme this quarter at the Team Training Institute about analytics and measurements and And so we wanted to talk a little bit about that. How do we measure things? And then how do we talk with our teams about it? Do we talk with our teams about it? What are the pros and the cons? What should be shared? What should be kept private? And so let's just dig in.
Wendy Briggs:
Yeah, absolutely. So our coaching members receive a book from us every quarter and we call it a popcorn book. And we call it that, I don't even know really how long we've been doing that, but it's been a long time, right?
John Meis:
Haha.
Wendy Briggs:
And we send them an interesting book that'll help them grow either on a personal level, leadership level with their practice. And this month's or this quarter's popcorn book is a book called Measure What Matters. And it talks about the importance of objectives and key results, they call them OKRs. in the practice and how I guess a greater understanding and being focused as a team on the vision of key objectives and being able to tie results to those objectives can really drive a practice forward. And so as we were talking about this, there's still some long held, I guess myths maybe we could call them that in dentistry or some blockages that cause some providers to not really focus on numbers much at all.
John Meis:
Yeah, it's really true. And one of the fun things that we get to do when we work with clients is we get to start to introduce them to their numbers if they're not numbers oriented or if they have some hangup or mindset against numbers. But what we frequently find when we start to measure things is that our impression of what's happening in our practices and what's really happening in our practices may not be the same thing. And so we had a practice that was just here in Phoenix for our Executive GPS course, which is a planning course, a strategic planning course, creates a five year strategic plan for practices. And what did he find out? You were the one that heard the whole story. So I want to hear it.
Wendy Briggs:
Yeah, you know, it's interesting because not all of our members can integrate with the analytic software that we use. So we use an analytics program that gives everybody a really, really deep dive into what's actually happening in the practice. Well, they had just recently had a software shift and with that software change, we're able to finally integrate with a deeper analytics program. And once they did that, they noticed a few oddities, right? A few things that weren't quite right. on their financial board, so mainly collections. So when they dug into it a little bit more, they realized that they had a business assistant or a front desk team member at one location that when insurance would pay, they would just write off the difference. So they were writing off everything that would have been or should have been the patient's responsibility. And... The doctors had no idea this was happening. So this wasn't something that the doctors had approved. It wasn't a unique circumstance or brought to the doctor. And the doctor said, hey, we should probably write that off. This was just a team member that was kind of stuck in an old practice model where they treated a lot of Medicaid patients. And they had shifted that from seeing a lot of Medicaid to accepting more insurance. And they were still kind of stuck in the old way. of handling patient accounts. And they had no idea this was happening until they started to take a deeper look at the numbers.
John Meis:
because they were so Medicaid driven, they weren't collecting patients portions at the time of service. So they were writing off a lot. And the practice really didn't have any sense of that until they got analytics. Once they got the analytics, then it stood out. And it could have stood out if they would have looked in the right place, right? But they weren't watching it as carefully as they wished they had. And so this went on for months and months. And in a practice, their size accounted for hundreds of thousands of dollars of income.
Wendy Briggs:
Right, and the good news for the story is, as we come to these events, and as you mentioned, people create their five-year strategic plan, they're setting goals for what to do to improve their own personal performance. And the good thing was, this doctor was able to realize, hey, I'm actually performing decently well.
John Meis:
Nah.
Wendy Briggs:
It's just, on the back end, the systems need to be tweaked and refined. And so there was, I guess if there's a good end to that story is that the doctor knows that there's incredible potential if they just.
John Meis:
Right.
Wendy Briggs:
start collecting money, right?
John Meis:
His kids are skinny because they haven't been able to afford to feed him. But now they will. And now, you know, what his goal was before he realized this was a problem was way too low, right? Because he was going to hit the goal just by having a financial policy, having a team trained well and having a method in order to watch it really carefully with the analytics. So we have some practices. who have a lot of practice information, has analytics, and they don't feel as though they should share that with their team. And so I've always thought that was kind of an interesting dynamic, but what do you think is the mindset behind that, Wendy?
Wendy Briggs:
I think in my experience, many times they are worried that they're going to come across as the team. I think they just don't want the team to know all of the details behind their personal financial situation. So I think some of that is motivated by fear, fear of being judged too greedy by the team, fear that the team is going to ask for raises, that they know how much revenue is really going through the office. fear of disconnect, right? The teams see the money coming in, but they don't really have clarity and understanding of all of the expenses going out. And so I think if I had to summarize why some doctors choose not to share with the teams, I think it's mainly motivated out of fear.
John Meis:
Yeah, no, I think so too. So there is the fear of them, you know, figuring out the personal income of doctors. And typically, because we've had the experience many times, Wendy, where we were the instigator of them beginning to share their financial statements with their leadership team, you know, in bigger, more complex practices, so that the leadership team can now start taking over the running of the business. If they don't have the business data, how can they run the business? So having gone through that now with many practices, The interesting thing is the team is usually surprised how little the practice is actually making. You know, what the profitability really is, they're usually surprised how low it is. So here's another reason why I think doctors don't do it. It's fear as well, but it's a different fear. It's the fear of if I have the data and my team tells me it's one thing and the data tells me it's another, there's gonna be conflict there. And I don't like conflict. I'm a dentist. I like to be loving and peaceful and nurturing and all those things. And sometimes I think that they're afraid that they're going to have difficulty handling the conflict.
Wendy Briggs:
Yeah, I see that as well. And I see that's one of the main reasons, I deal the same thing with hygienists. There's a long held belief that if hygienists are focused on the numbers, they're not the right kind of a hygienist, right? That they're not focused on patients if they're focused on the numbers. And I believe they go hand in hand. I think if you really are focused on patients, you've got to be focused on the numbers because how do we measure how well we're caring for our patients if we aren't aware of what we're actually providing to them day in and day out? And so I think... You know, one of the things that I've seen that's most gratifying in recent years is a shift towards a recognition or ownership that we are providers and providers really do need to know what we're doing. You know, so production isn't necessarily a bad thing. And in our model, production isn't our goal. Our goal is to take the best possible care of our patient, but we know that production will follow that. So if we're taking care of our patients at a very high level, then we should have high productivity as a result of that. So I think that's been a great shift in my opinion, a recognition and understanding that you can be an exceptional hygienist, really focused on patient care and also be a top producer in the field.
John Meis:
Yeah, you know, we both don't like the fact that a lot of metrics that we get out of analytics software is denominated in dollars, because if you focus on the dollars, you have your focus on the wrong thing. But they are a good measuring stick, though, of the care that you're providing in hygiene and on the doctor's side as well. So if we have a hygienist that's performing at a certain level and we're measuring that by dollars per visit or dollars per hour or... day or some metric like that, it's really a reflection of the care they provided. Have they offered patients the options of having preventive care at the highest level? Have they done a great job with diagnosis of periodontal disease and encouraging patients to move forward with treating that disease? So it really is a reflection of the quality of care, but the problem comes when people focus on the dollars and not the care. It's a good measuring stick, but it's not the thing to focus on.
Wendy Briggs:
Yeah, you know, one other thing I want to talk about in regards to hygiene performance, I've often heard another fear from doctors and from hygienists, honestly, that they don't want to share specific individual performance with the team because they don't want anybody to feel ashamed
John Meis:
Yes.
Wendy Briggs:
or they don't want anybody to feel belittled or anything like that in front of the team, in front of their peers. And while we understand that, we also understand that can be quite a motivator. for people. And so there is a way to share personal performance of your team members and certainly of your doctors if there's multiple doctors in one location and have it be a positive thing and not a negative thing. No one feels embarrassed or chastised or guilted if they're not up to par, but they recognize that there may be opportunity for them to grow.
John Meis:
Yeah, no, absolutely. There's a way you can do it that is growth oriented, that's nurturing, that's helpful for the hygienist to improve their skills or doctor to improve their skills. You know, you could do it in a mean and awful way. And of course, that would be a mistake because then you all of a sudden start to have that build into your culture where there's a judgment and blaming. And you know, as we know, teamwork ends where blame begins. So, but there is a way to do it and we have many, many practices that do that. And, and I'll tell a little story about my own practice. Our hygiene team would get their daily production number and they would write it on the white, on a whiteboard in the room where we did our morning huddles. And so every morning we could come in, they had their, their numbers from the previous day up there and they would color code them. They would write them in a different color pen, depending on how well they performed. compared to their goal. And they each have different goals, because their schedules look different and some people got more SRPs than others and so they each had a different goal, but they would write that down. So in a glance we could see, you know, how did everybody do yesterday. We always celebrated the champions, the ones that really did well. We made a big deal to congratulate them on that and that was it. And our team didn't feel like they were... you know, put down or embarrassed or whatnot, but they did feel like they were striving to be even more effective at helping patients get the care that they want and need.
Wendy Briggs:
Yeah, I think, you know, what comes into play, Dr. John, and this with doctors, hygienists, and really all team is the willingness to be coached, to be coachable,
John Meis:
Yeah.
Wendy Briggs:
um, and realize that we're all on a path to continuous improvement. And, um, you know, we never really end our quest to become better. And I think, you know, Those that become offended or embarrassed or feel ashamed are those that maybe aren't committed to getting this improvement. They kind of feel like they've arrived in some way. And therefore, if they have a bad day, it's a reflection on who they are as a provider, not just a recognition that we're all human. We're all going to have a bad day now and again.
John Meis:
Absolutely.
Wendy Briggs:
And the instigator behind sharing and measuring and looking at some of those key results is really to make sure that we're learning from the days that don't go well. we're committed to every day is a new day. You know, that's something that I think we feel very strongly about. We've seen the transformation that happens in a practice when they shift their thinking from, you know, I'm just punching the time clock to now I'm owning my own performance in patient care and the resulting productivity that comes from that. You know, it's a really powerful shift to see that happen. And I think that's what we're trying to get at with. our focus for the next few podcasts, you know, when we talk about measuring what matters and key analytics and key statistics and objectives and things that practices can take back and apply right away to provide better care is really that, I guess, overarching theme that technology of today provides us with so much information, but that information really doesn't do us any good if we're not utilizing it. Right? So figuring out what to look at, what levers or knobs we can turn that can have a really tremendous impact is going to be what we'll be focusing on talking about here in the next few podcasts.
John Meis:
Yep, absolutely. When we don't share results, people don't get the pride of improving. In great teams, that is such a huge motivator that we're getting better, and here's the measuring stick. Yeah.
Wendy Briggs:
Yeah, well, I love it. A great kickoff. I know we have a couple of really great guests lined up as well that are gonna add some value to this topic. And if you're listening to this and it's after July, see, we have a retreat coming up here in just a few short weeks, July 14th and 15th in Salt Lake City. And we've opened up a few seats for guests. My guess is most of the people listening to this podcast, it's gonna be past that. But the good news is every single one of our retreats is captured and is on our member website. So if you have a desire to learn more about analytics and to really dig in to see where your practice is performing in regards to national benchmarks, we have national benchmarks and we'll have benchmarks amongst our clients, which are usually much higher than the national averages. And there'll be some really great content loaded on our member website for you to dig into that topic. And certainly we have a variety of ways that Even if you're not a current member, you can access that member website. So we'll go ahead and post some of that information on the show notes for this podcast so that you can get access to that information even if you weren't able to join us at our retreat live.
John Meis:
Yeah, terrific. So a mindset shift that I think everyone can take advantage of is to begin to share metrics, begin to share numbers, start with the clinically relevant numbers. And in future podcasts, we'll go into some of our favorite things, the things that we measure the 11 choke points in a practice. So we'll be going over those in the podcast to come. But don't feel afraid to share it. Share it, celebrate the wins. Don't worry so much about the ones when it's an off day because we're all gonna have those sometimes. And by doing that, we get to celebrate improved performance, celebrate the improvement of the dental health of our patients. Yeah. All right. Well, that's it for this episode of the W production podcast. We'll see you next time.
Wendy Briggs:
Thanks everybody.
