One-way communication is dictatorial indoctrination. Without dialogue, without back and forth between two parties, it is simply blind indoctrination.
For communication to be effective the message sent must be received, and acknowledged and acted upon.
A message sent, and received, without acknowledgement, is worthless.
“If a tree falls in a forest where no man sees it, did it really fall at all?”
In a very similar vein, a message sent, but not appreciated, should probably at best, have never been sent.
Someone sending a message of humour, or a joke, is best to probably see whether the humour they intend to send is appropriate, or warranted, or expected, or will be appreciated, before they simply just go ahead and send it.
Even some plain old “straight” comments or statements may fall flat if the recipient of the message is not in a state, or state of mind, to appreciate the message.
“The batsman must be ready and have taken guard before the bowler commences his run-up.”
In cricket, a bowler cannot just bowl when he feels like it.
In baseball, a pitcher cannot pitch when the pitcher wants to.
And in tennis, the opponent must be ready to receive the serve, before the server can serve.
In life, it is wise not to utter a comment or statement that might offend, before finding out the opinions, beliefs and points of views of those that the message is intended for.
“The unspoken word never offends.”
When the receiver of a message is offended, and declares their offence, an answer of:
“Well that’s just my sense of humour”
Or
“That’s just me.”
is just as offensive as the actual message.
To ignore the opinion of the offended recipient, and brush their opinion aside, is just as offensive an action as the original comment.
Being offensive, speaking offensively, and then being complicit and failing to apologise, or take action to be apologetic, is really an action of a bully.
We don’t need conversational bullies in our society.
A conversational bully speaks to dominate a discussion.
They listen, not to understand, but only to respond.
A conversational bully always has to have the final word.
There is no place for conversational bullies in a service environment.
*****
Online Workshop: Dr David Moffet and Jayne Bandy:
“How To Easily Run, Maintain And Grow The Ultimate Dental Practice In 2021”
If you’re sick and tired of drilling all day long, and not having anything close to what you deserve, to show for it… or if you’ve ever wondered, “What can successful dentists POSSIBLY know, that I don’t?”… then register for this unique online ZOOM workshop Saturday November 21, 2020
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
The risk of not doing, and regretting, is a gamble.
Gambling is a part of the fabric of our existence.
The aim of life is therefore to win more times than we lose, when we need to take risks.
Doing nothing is not the answer. Doing nothing can be fatal. Taking action is imperative. But we must keep a ledger, and make sure that our wins outnumber our losses.
And if our losses are outnumbering our wins, then we need to take stock.
And take stock quickly.
That “taking stock” may include a change in thinking, a change in our values, or a change in our levels of skill and our levels of knowledge and understanding.
I was talking to a colleague about a recent approach I had from a dentist who had two practices, one of which was under-performing. This dentist wanted to sell the underperforming practice, and was asking me if I could help him with “building it up” for a sale.
I know that I help dentists build great dental practices, but I do that working with dentists who have a GROWTH MINDSET rather than an EXIT MINDSET.
I work best with dentists who want to GROW AND KEEP their practices, rather than flip them.
I didn’t feel there was a match between my values and the values of the dentist trying to sell the practice.
Dentistry can be risky.
It costs a significant amount of money to set up a dental practice and then wait for people to come through your door.
And meanwhile, you have staff to feed, family of your own to feed, banks and lenders to feed.
When a dentist buys an existing dental practice, they are looking for a practice with stability, and cash flow. Or if they are buying a newly set up practice, the purchaser is looking for “opportunity.”
Australians like a punt.
Apparently, Australians like a gamble.
One of my childhood friends came from a family known to like to bet amongst each other so much that it was said about them that they would bet on two flies crawling up a wall.
In my family, on the other hand, my dad laid down the law:
“No betting in the family”
became the mantra quoted ad nauseum by my brother and me to each other.
Yet my maternal grandfather loved a flutter on the horses.
Me? I can’t see the point in horse-racing.
But in business….
In business every decision is based on the expectation that a dollar “invested” returns more than the dollar.
That’s a win.
And whether the business owner invests in trying to make a number of small wins, or make one significant win, a win is a win is a win.
And a win is what is wanted.
Nobody likes to lose money.
Often the small, regular wins accumulate and amount to a significant result compared to trying to make that one big win.
Winning by hitting singles isn’t as dramatic as hitting home runs, but the singles are often easier to achieve and are often more abundant than big-hit, home run opportunities.
The thing about gambling is that you need to be prepared to lose.
If you’re willing to risk it, you must be willing to give it away.
When all of a sudden you’re on a losing streak and you start “chasing” after wins, trying to get back to zero, that’s when things get nasty.
Recently I have had a small number of bets on sporting events with friends.
One friend lost his bet to me [a carton of beer] but was able to offset his result with me in another bet with someone else, so although he lost to me, overall, he ended up ahead.
Now that’s smart thinking.
And the thing I liked about this bet was that although it was only small, I was paid up and settled within 24 hours.
Another doctor friend of mine and I had a wager of “a bottle of wine” on a recent rugby league match. During the match, my doctor friend started text messaging me for my address because he could see [or he felt] that his team was not performing.
And when my doctor friend “delivered” [he sent the wine by courier], to my surprise he sent six bottles as a very nice sweetener.
In a third instance, a friend and I could not come to a mutually acceptable wager on a sporting event, and so no bet was established.
And probably wisely so, as the game result ended in a very tight one-point win.
In life and business, sometimes there are times when it is BEST NOT TO take a risk, when the result is too close to call.
Sometimes “no bet”, or sitting out this dance, is the best result.
Lastly, I’ve recently had two small [winning] bets with someone who despite asking several times, has failed to pay up.
This reminds me about when I worked as an associate dentist for three years and was paid on the Monday, by cheque, for the work done the week before.
On several occasions, I used to have to go to my boss and ask him for my cheque.
I felt this was not the right thing that I should have had to do.
I don’t believe that anyone should have to “beg” for what they have earned, be it salary, or a from a bet.
And I vowed that when I became an employer I would NEVER put my employees through those horrid feelings that this boss made me feel.
Not paying up on time is a DOG ACT, and there is no excuse.
At best, it’s sheer laziness. At worst, it’s straight out bullying. An act of power.
Employing the right type of people is a gamble…
As an employer, you’re always hoping to be able to get the best people to work for you.
People with the best balance of skills, attitude, and ethics.
Finding that balance in a group of people, let alone in just one person, is a daunting thought.
One thing is for sure….
Not taking a risk at all results in a life of slavery.
It’s true, life is risky, and as Cinderella said:
“If you want to find your Prince Charming, you’re going to have to kiss a lot of frogs.”
Those are the rules of the game.
And everyone who plays the game needs to agree to abide by the rules.
*****
Online Workshop: Dr David Moffet and Jayne Bandy:
“How To Easily Run, Maintain And Grow The Ultimate Dental Practice In 2021”
If you’re sick and tired of drilling all day long, and not having anything close to what you deserve, to show for it… or if you’ve ever wondered, “What can successful dentists POSSIBLY know, that I don’t?”… then register for this unique online ZOOM workshop Saturday November 21, 2020
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
The best way to succeed with your customer service in your dental practice is to be a solver of problems that your dental patients have.
Sometimes your patients are aware of their problems, and sometimes there are problems they have that they are not aware of.
When you offer a solution to a patient’s problem then that patient will see you as their hero.
When you discover a problem that your patient is unaware of and you are able to offer up an immediate solution to that problem, then that patient will be in awe of you.
Here’s where dental practices are failing their patients:
I listen to recordings of incoming dental practice phone calls.
Caller:
“I’d like to make an appointment. I have a sore tooth and the gum around it is red and sore.”
Dental office phone answerer:
“I haven’t got any available appointments for two weeks.”
What should the dental employee have said?
Let’s start with a few basics:
“How bad is the pain?”
“Who am I speaking to?”
“When were you last in to see us?”
“Are you having to take any pain killers for this pain?”
“Is it a front tooth or a back tooth?”
In the above example, there was no question back to the caller about their well-being and their current situation. The dental receptionist went straight to PUTTING A NAME IN A SLOT, without even finding out ONE THING about the caller and their situation.
Don’t laugh.
Your phones could well be being answered this way, or worse!
Just because the caller has asked for an appointment doesn’t mean we have to depart from our protocols of finding out exactly what’s going on
Are they an existing patient?
Can we check their records while we are listening to them describe their situation in more detail?
Once we know more about their situation we can then determine the urgency of when we need to help them, but WE CANNOT PIDGEON HOLE THEM into an appointment slot in our schedule before we know who they are and how much pain they are in and how seriously they want to save their tooth.
Otherwise we’re just playing pin the tail on the donkey.
When our appointment scheduling policy [or lack of policy] is to put anybody in anywhere and hope for the best, then all we will end up with is a MISH-MASH of appointments in a schedule of repeated days of poor daily production.
When you fail to plan, you are planning to fail.
Appointment schedules of no structure that are made up on a daily basis are a recipe for a life of poor production and financial failure.
To create a schedule of purpose, you need to be digging deep on your calls and extracting key information about the patient that will have them wanting to come and see you sooner rather than later.
And that key information is all about problem solving.
When the caller on the phone feels how much you care, they will be more committed to their appointment than if they feel as if you’ve just been “going through the motions” and giving them a spot that suits you.
Have a listen to the “message” that your people are sending to your patients when they call your dental practice.
Are people calling your practice being given First Class, World Class Service when they call?
Or are they being made to feel “less than wanted”?
*****
Online Workshop: Dr David Moffet and Jayne Bandy:
“How To Easily Run, Maintain And Grow The Ultimate Dental Practice In 2021”
If you’re sick and tired of drilling all day long, and not having anything close to what you deserve, to show for it… or if you’ve ever wondered, “What can successful dentists POSSIBLY know, that I don’t?”… then register for this unique online ZOOM workshop Saturday November 21, 2020
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
The COVID-19 pandemic has really EXPOSED several home truths about what goes on at the front desk of dental practices…
Here are some of them:
1. No matter how bad you think your phones are being answered, it’s always worse than you think…
Putting it simply, unless you are listening to all of the calls being made into and out of your dental practice, you have absolutely NO IDEA about the truth of what really is being said on your dental office phones.
Walking by your dental receptionist “occasionally” during the day while the receptionist is on the phone will only give you PART OF one side of her conversation.
The response you are hearing on your end of the phone in your office may not be a true reflection of the real enquiry being asked by the caller.
And because you have no idea what the caller is asking, you trying to “educate” your employees on THE CORRECT THINGS TO SAY ON THE PHONE is really like you throwing darts blindfolded.
After being spun around three times and not knowing which direction you are facing…
2. Some dental front office staff don’t follow instructions given by their dentist on how they should answer the phone
Some dental office staff simply answer the phone the way THEY THINK THEY NEED TO. These team members either don’t understand why things need to be done in a certain way.
Or they don’t care to want to understand why a better way is needed.
The purpose of answering the phone in a dental practice is to find a solution for the problem that the caller has phoned about.
More often than not, the solution needed is a scheduled appointment in your dental practice.
And it is an appointment scheduled, and confirmed, with an iron-clad commitment.
But, if the dentist doesn’t know the exact processes required to secure commitment from the caller, and if the dentist has never actually ever answered a dental practice phone, and the dentist doesn’t know how to teach what he actually doesn’t even know, there’s a reasonable chance that the front office team won’t take the dentist seriously.
“How would he know? He’s never answered a practice phone? Why should I listen to him?”
3. Some dental front office staff don’t follow instructions given by their dentist on the type and purpose of outbound calls they need to be making on the phone
I even heard about a dentist who was having difficulty getting his staff to do TLC calls to patients the day after the patient had been in [and spent a fair bit of money too].
I don’t understand how these dental practice staff could even consider NOT DOING TLCs to be an option?
Isn’t the role of the employee to do what their employer asks, in exchange for wages and benefits? [so long as the requests are fair, reasonable, and not illegal].
4. Those dental practices that have consistently attended a regular phone training programme are “STREETS AHEAD” of other dental practices.
It’s like going to the gym and getting into shape.
Some people think they’ll end up with a trim, taught and terrific body, just by joining a gym.
Others think they can read a book on fitness, or watch a video, and magically, they will become and stay fit.
There are some who think that going to the gym for a month and then stopping will give them that great physique permanently.
Truth be told, fitness comes from consistent and regular and continued training.
And the best fitness results come when you engage a personal trainer.
During COVID-19, we saw some dental practices close their doors and put their phone training on hold during these times, while other practices continued with their training.
And after all, the phones rang anyway, despite the fact less actual dentistry was being done.
What we saw categorically across the board was that those practices that “took a break” from phone coaching slipped significantly in their skill levels compared to the practices that continued with their trainings.
And the significant amount of “slippage” then needed to be remedied.
5. Some dental practices decided that the high demand for dentistry when lockdown was lifted meant that they were busy enough and didn’t need any phone training
Have you ever heard the analogy:
“It’s like drinking from a fire hose.”
This phrase simply conjures up the image that the capacity and the ability to be capturing water from the hose is less than the output from that fire hose.
And therefore there is spillage.
And wastage.
In dentistry, every incoming telephone enquiry on your phone comes as a result of either money spent on external forms of marketing, or time spent in your practice doing things that generate referrals, and other forms of internal marketing.
And to me, failure to capture every one of those enquiries and turn them into a valued and kept appointment at your practice is an opportunity lost.
6. “We’re doing fine. We don’t need help at the moment. We’ll call you when we do.”
Sadly, this attitude is very prevalent.
And it is akin to trying to catch a falling knife.
Or trying to sell shares in a bear market.
Mystery shopper phone calls to practices with this “belief” always uncover a very different story.
The fact is that nobody out there in the general public ever calls a dental practice because they have spare time.
Every time the phone rings at your practice it is someone who already has decided that they want YOU to be their dentist and solve their problem.
It is THE DUTY of whoever is answering your dental practice phone to ensure that each and every phone enquiry is turned into a valued and kept dental appointment.
It is your duty, as the dental practice owner, to be mindful of the economic climate, and to capitalise and benefit from opportunity, rather than just cruise or coast along with the current…
*****
Online Workshop: Dr David Moffet and Jayne Bandy:
“How To Easily Run, Maintain And Grow The Ultimate Dental Practice In 2021”
If you’re sick and tired of drilling all day long, and not having anything close to what you deserve, to show for it… or if you’ve ever wondered, “What can successful dentists POSSIBLY know, that I don’t?”… then register for this unique online ZOOM workshop Saturday November 21, 2020
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
You can order your copy here:Â Click Link To Order
You can order your copy here:Â 
You can order your copy here:Â 
