One of the rewarding things about mid-life is that we can begin to see ourselves as we really are…we finally get to know ourselves. Unfortunately, we find out we’re not perfect and we all discover things about ourselves we wish would be different. Similarly, virtually every private business owner will come to see some aspect of their personality that has been reflected in their business they wish was different than it is. In the early years of a business’s existence that isn’t necessarily bad or a disadvantage. As the business grows, develops and matures, however, some of these personality aspects can become limiting. That is probably the primary reason entrepreneurs end up backing out of the operation of businesses they have created or selling them outright. The wise entrepreneur has the insight to understand their own limiting affect on the business (or simply want to get rich quick by cashing out).

This dynamic of personality overlapping into the business applies just as strongly to dental and medical practices except for the backing out or selling out part. That isn’t as readily available as an option to medical professionals because they themselves are, for the most part, the business. So the dental/medical professional’s dilemma becomes overcoming their own recognized limiting impact on the business without leaving it.

I have been really impressed by the desire, of every medical and dental professional I’ve met, to stay concentrated on providing the best medical care to the patient, so concentrated, in fact, that the practice can suffer. Recognizing that the “practice” is a business entity and dental/medical service is a professional calling seems to imply that focusing on one will necessarily take away from the other. But, it doesn’t have to be that way. The key is to make the practice business operating systems “unburdensome” to the delivery of medical and dental services.

Fortunately for the dental/medical professional, there are many well developed business operating principles that can be applied to private practices. Most of these principles have been developed in large industrial settings so it is not readily obvious that they may be relevant to smaller professional service types of businesses. These “world class” and “proven” business practices are not pie in the sky strategic directions or broad concepts. They are the “Lean” and “Total Quality Management (TQM)” methods.

Lean and TQM methods focus on how to get actual tasks done more efficiently and predictably. By putting these proven Lean and TQM methods in place, the day-to-day operation of a medical/dental practice can be structured, organized and predictable so the medical professionals don’t have to worry about them. The key aspects of the practice can be set up to provide visual indicators or cues to the staff and owner of the practice. Are we running out of a particular supply or not?….Are our overdue receivables in control or they growing?….Are our bookings 3 months and 6 months out stable, going up or going down?…etc., etc.

Structured, visual day-to-day operating systems can take these and hundreds of other concerns off the mind of the practice owner so nothing stands in the way of the dental/medical professional focusing on delivering quality patient care. On top of that, in every case, the application of Lean methods has a positive impact on the financial bottom line of the practice.

Written by Robert Angeli.

I found the interaction unsatisfactory.

On the one hand, I understand if the practice doesn’t want to offer Wi-Fi. On the other hand, the FD person could have been more sociable. The oral surgeon has a practice where return customers/patients are less important than at most practices, so maybe it doesn’t matter. If my daughter’s primary dentist asks “how was the experience at the oral surgeon’s office?”, the answer will not be as positive as it might have been.

The questions I would ask this oral surgeon include:

1. What is your standard for customer interaction?
2. Is the person who sits in the waiting room, and pays the bill a customer?
3. Have you thought about the customer experience of those who wait? (beyond the radio playing and magazines)

First, what is a customer to your practice?

• Are customers the patients that walk in the door?
• Are customers those who receive services from the practice?
• How about you? Are you a customer of the practice?
• How about your staff? Are they customers of the practice?

I would use Webster’s definition as a logical starting point: 1) a person who buys, especially on a regular basis; 2) a person with whom one must deal. The U.S. GAO defines customer as groups or individuals who have a business relationship with the organization–those who receive and use or are directly affected by the products and services of the organization. Customers include direct recipients of products and services, internal customers who produce services and products for final recipients, and other organizations and entities that interact with an organization to produce products and services

Are patients the only customers of the practice? No, the dentists and staff are also customers of the practice. So are specialists, such as oral surgeons and so forth. I’m sure that your practice has many customers other than patients. A practice will have a number of customer types such as types of patients, types of staff (less position than temperament/motivation), types of specialists, and so forth.

What kind of customers do you want?

• Rich and famous?
• Elderly?
• Pediatric?
• Families?
• Industrial?
• Cosmetic?
• Restorative?
• Pleasant and competent coworkers?
• Entrepreneurial/self-motivated or “employee”?

As you have already noticed, we can’t begin to talk about customer satisfaction until we know who are customers are. Until we understand who the customers are by type, we cannot design processes to satisfy them. Another way to look at this is until we understand what kind of customers we want, we can’t design processes to attract and satisfy them.

What are your goals for the patient experience? How do those goals translate into measureable outcomes for your practice? Should you have a set of standard practices for… greeting patients? …for seating patients? …for taking payment? …for taking x-rays? … for answering the phone? and etc.