You may not realize it, but there is a tool that is too often forgotten (or never considered at all) that can be the start of taking back control of your practice and life. This strategy and word were never used prior to the early 1860’s. Its use today doesn’t carry the strong implication it had during its inception. Let me give you a little ...

The phone keeps ringing and, for about the last 6 months, every question posed by the caller has centered on the fact that it is hard to keep or find good staff members. It started from the day we reopened our business from the COVID shutdown last year and the hygienists decided that they were not going to work in dentistry as long as the ...

Many things can hold you back. Most doctors are looking for the one thing that can turn their practices around. Like Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men, most of these same doctors, “can’t handle the truth”. The person who asks but doesn’t really want the true answer will never get better. They want to put the blame on a lack ...

Too often, I see doctors and their practices struggling to find a solution to overhead, productivity, and patient marketing and retention. In most cases, I see a high turn over of staff, few new patients and an out-of-control overhead spiral. The Doctors response is taking more continuing education to improve his clinical skills. As it turns out, ...

The phrase, what gets measured get done, is attributed to Peter Drucker decades ago, but is as valid today as when he coined the phrase. You might want to consider this as one of the top ten leadership habits in creating the practice you always wanted to have. This, being the start of a new challenging year, should create some phantom pressure to ...

Yep, it’s that time of the year again. One year ended and the next one under way. We weathered 10 months of a pandemic and the start of a financial recession along with a change in leadership in the White House in 2020. The next page is uncertain but a few things are likely to be on the agenda for the New Year. Taxes for each of you are going ...

Looking back on the past six months of this year, there is nothing more important than the lessons we should have learned from the forced closures, the restart, and challenges coming back to finish strong with just three months to go. At the top of the list of things I should have learned but seem to be destined to repeat, is the “warm body ...

If we are honest with ourselves, each of us has had a mentor (or many) that never knew that you tried to emulate them: People in your life that taught by doing. Modeling the things that made them great leaders, teachers, and examples for you to follow. There is a lost art in leadership, far more important than the words you utter. Every minute of ...

The final rule of leadership is that owners who do not have people following them are not leaders. Kind of a “duh” statement in a Captain Obvious fashion, but one overlooked by almost ever doctor I talk to. The symptom would be a “group” of people working together rather than a “team”. These doctors feel they need to micro-manage every ...

Before starting this week with another installment by Captain Obvious, if these rules are not resonating with you or they are not obvious, you too may struggle with leadership. Rule number three is: You have to precede your practice to the next level of production. If you want more, you have to do more. The next level of commitment always precedes ...