A MONTHLY GENERAL TEAM MEETING, ONE NECESSITY IN YOUR OFFICE

Over 33 years of dental practice management consulting has convinced me that one General Meeting per month is minimal.  In fact, some practices schedule two or more General Meetings each month.  This meeting helps to assure efficient management, achieving practice goals, effective intra-team communications, and smooth over-all operation of the practice.  

Each meeting should have an agenda determined by the dentist and/or the practice administrator with input from staff members.  Incidentally, suggestions by team members must be taken seriously and considered for inclusion in the agenda to encourage continued participation and interest by the team.  Front desk and clinical concerns also should be included in the agenda with meeting time spent assessing if goals for each area were met.

The privilege of leading the meeting may be retained by the dentist, delegated to the practice administrator, or rotated among staff members.  Allowing experienced staff members to lead an occasional meeting is one more way to encourage feelings of involvement, participation, and commitment.

Another excellent tool to maintain staff interest and help them stay abreast of changes in dentistry is to include a brief (5 to 10 minute) “lesson” presented by the dentist as the closing agenda item.  With this tool the entire staff can be made aware of clinical updates, new methods, new treatment options, new services, enhanced computer technology, different payment options for patients, changes in CDT coding, etc.