by Ginny | Jun 8, 2007 | Practice Leadership, Team Development
10. Know Your Patients and Greet Them By Name when they arrive in the office and at every point of contact during their visit. Most practice management software stores patient photos so even a new team member can recognize patients.
9. Engage Your Patients in Conversation. Don’t just confirm their arrival and ask them to have a seat. Follow Walt Disney’s advice and treat patients like they were guests in your home.
8. Honor Their Time. Make it a point of practice pride that patients are seen within five minutes of their appointed time. Your patients will love it and they’ll arrive on time too!
7. Come into the Reception Area to Greet Your Patient – don’t call their name from the doorway! The clinical team can preview patient photos so they recognize patients.
6. Be Aware of Your Tone of Voice. Professional behavior doesn’t mean you need to be dead serious. You don’t want a call for a hygiene check to sound the same as if you were announcing “iceberg ahead.†Patients hear everything so be aware and be consistently friendly and upbeat and involve them in your conversation when possible.
5. Remember Their Special Days. Make it a point to notice if a patient’s birthday or anniversary occurs near their appointment date and recognize it with a cupcake or card.
4. Let ‘em Eat Cake. Have patient appreciation day once a month in the practice and treat everyone to coffee and donuts or cheese and crackers. Make it a party!
3. Celebrate the Holidays. Fill the office with poinsettias in December and Tulips at April and have patients take one with them. They’ll be so pleasantly surprised and will talk about you to their coworkers and friends!
2. Send Cards. Have each team member choose a patient each day and write a personal note about his visit. “It was great to see you today John and to hear all about your cruise to Alaska.†It takes two minutes and makes a huge impact in the community.
1. Call Patients After Treatment. Doctors, many patients have questions after treatment and don’t want to bother you. A two-minute call in the evening will make a huge impression that will distinguish your practice as a cut above the rest.
by Ginny | Apr 20, 2007 | Practice Leadership, Team Development
The biggest irony in the hiring and recruitment process is that just when you are understaffed you have more work than ever to do. Don’t wait until you need to hire to start preparing. Start right now and you’ll reap the rewards and lower your stress too.
Create ads and telephone screening guides for each position in the practice that allow you to attract and quickly sort through the resumes you receive to choose the best potential candidates to invite into the office. Prepare behaviorally based in-person interview guides that will spotlight the candidate who will be the best fit for your practice.
Check out our Resources for Managing People Well at www.ginnyhegarty.com A hiring system along with interview and training guides are all ready to go.
Our client, Dr. Bill Linger had this to say “Don’t hire or train another employee without these guides! We’re blown away by how this system has transformed the way we choose and train new employees. With this approach you can immediately separate the winners from the pretenders. We’re saving time, we’re making better hiring decisions and there’s no more baptism by fire for our new hires. This system is terrific.â€
by Ginny | Apr 2, 2007 | Team Development
Do you have a philosophy of care that encourages all patients to stay active with their preventive care? If so, engage your team to bring this focus to life. Set a guideline that the team will check the hygiene status of every patient who calls the practice and encourage all callers who are overdue to schedule their preventive visit. Do this with every caller, every time. View the hygiene status of family members for increased impact. Take it one step further and ask all new patients “Are there any family members I can schedule appointments for today?†If you don’t ask, the answer is always no
by Ginny | Mar 20, 2007 | Team Development
A few minutes spent previewing patient care slips (routing slips) the day before their visit will earn perpetual dividends for your practice while raising the level of care and service for patients.
Highlight incomplete treatment so the team will be prepared to snap a digital image of the teeth involved as soon as the patient is seated. This creates a proper sense of urgency so you can then engage the patient in a discussion about moving forward with treatment. Highlight family members of the scheduled patient who are due for preventive care visits so you improve patient retention and keep the hygiene schedules humming.
This is a worthy investment of time that will help you achieve dramatic results to fuel your practice growth.
by Ginny | Jan 4, 2007 | General, Team Development
We all know how true it is, yet when shorthanded it can sure be tempting to hire the skill and think we’ll train the new hire to be nicer and friendlier. Don’t do it! By the time we reach adulthood we’re either personable and nice or we’re not. You either know how to be a team player or you don’t and won’t. Okay, some people can fake it better than others but if you hone your interviewing skills you’ll see right past their charade. Nordstroms has the right idea that it’s the parents who teach people how to be nice. If you want your patients treated like guests, hire the smile.
by Ginny | Nov 6, 2006 | Team Development
I returned a doctor’s phone call today and the call began with the dreaded “Dr’s office, can you hold…click” I was then on hold for nearly four (4!!) minutes before being told, “I’m here all by myself, can you call back later?” I wish I could tell you that this was shocking to me. Unfortunately, it happens more often than you’d think.
This phone call and the greetings I received are disturbing for several reasons. First and foremost, every team member should know the value of presenting news so it reflects positively on themselves and the practice. Second, every team member needs and deserves to be trained in how to handle the telephone professionally.
Consider the difference that exceptional verbal skills would have made, for example “I’m currently speaking with another patient, may I please have your name and phone number so I can call you back within ten minutes when I will be able to give you my undivided attention?”
Every phone call is an opportunity for practice growth yet far too often the least experienced team members are sent to the phones. Your practice could be paying a very high price for this error. If your team needs training, check out the Office Magic Book of Scripts and our telephone skills coaching program.
