In today’s episode of The Double Your Production Podcast, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs are answering a common question we hear from clients at The Team Training Institute, “Should owner-dentists and associates attend team training days?” 

If you’ve ever booked an in-office training day with us, or are considering it in the future, it’s important to know who should be in the room in order to get the best results. 

In this episode, you’ll hear Dr. John and Wendy’s thought process behind these decisions and their advice for getting the most out of a training investment.

In Part 3 of this series, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs are sharing the best technology to use to raise case acceptance in your practice.

One of the most important pieces of case acceptance is educating patients and making concerns visual for them. Because patients usually can’t see what’s happening with their teeth, they don’t understand the severity of the disease or decay. If dental offices can make these things visible to patients and improve their awareness of the problems, patients begin to understand the necessity and urgency of treatment and will more readily move forward with needed care.

The tools discussed in this podcast help to make oral health more visual for patients and help dental teams run more smoothly and effectively. 

Listen to hear Dr. John and Wendy’s top recommendations.

In Part Two of this series, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs continue to discuss how to raise the case acceptance rate in a dental practice by creating smooth, effective patient handoffs (or trust-transfers).

Patient handoffs are a little-known secret to great case acceptance because they’re an important opportunity to build trust, demonstrate excellence, and ensure understanding with patients. When handoffs are handled poorly, patients lose confidence in the recommended treatment and hesitate to move forward with their needed care. When handoffs are done right, patients are put at ease and more readily accept treatment.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• Why most handoffs should be done in front of the patient (and how to include them in the process)
• How to use smooth patient handoffs to build trust and connection with patients
• How to structure a handoff to make sure the team is communicating the right things quickly and efficiently
• How smooth team transfers can help doctors preserve more of their mental energy throughout the day

In this 3-part series, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs are explaining ways to increase the case acceptance rate in a dental practice. 

When a practice doesn’t have a well-defined and consistent case acceptance process in place, patients don’t get the information and reassurance they need to move forward with necessary dental care. When this happens, their health declines, the team gets frustrated, and practice performance declines.

But what we’ve learned working with practices across the US is that with a few key systems in place, the case acceptance rate can rise very quickly, leading to healthier patients and a stronger practice.

In part one of this series, you’ll learn:

·         How diagnostic inconsistencies hurt patient trust and lower the case acceptance rate

·         The importance of clear diagnostic criteria across the team

·         How to strengthen patient trust and connection

·         How the team can support and echo each other in patient conversations

Listen now here or at www.theteamtraininginstitute.com/podcast

When you talk with the team about your practice goals and share key performance indicators (KPIs), are they excited and motivated to reach those numbers or do their eyes glaze over?

Today, we're sharing a segment from one of our recent practice growth retreats. In this session, Heather Driscoll is talking about what you can do to create more excitement and energy around your biggest goals.

Very few dental professionals wake up in the morning excited to increase production by a certain percentage or improve accounts receivable. But, they do wake up excited to connect with patients and improve their health. So, it’s the job of the leadership to connect those dots.

In this session, Heather is breaking down exactly how to design a system like this. You’ll learn how to share key metrics without boring the staff and create real momentum around the activities that not only make the biggest difference for the practice but also for patients.

Learn more at https://www.theteamtraininginstitute.com 

Wendy Briggs comes from a big family of baseball fans, so when the book “Moneyball” was released, she was eager to read it. Since then, she’s worked to apply these lessons to dentistry to allow practices to build teams of superstar performers. 

Today, she and Dr. John Meis are sitting down to talk through specific strategies practice owners can use to create a high-performing team and unmatched results in their practices. This unconventional Moneyball approach gives practice owners an edge in the marketplace, allowing them to attract top talent and develop those people into efficient, high-performing team members.

Listen to today’s episode to learn how they do it.

In today’s episode, Dr. John and Wendy mention strategies from their book, “The Insider’s Guide to Hiring a World-Class Team”. Click here to get your FREE copy (we just ask that you cover shipping) plus a suite of bonus training!

Kellie Black started her career as a dental hygienist helping patients chairside. She found she also enjoyed the business side of dentistry and quickly rose into a leadership position within that practice where she helped the team expand from two offices to an impressive seven. 

Now Kellie is a business coach with The Team Training Institute and she’s joining Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs today on the podcast to share her perspective on practice growth.

Kellie has helped practices around the country improve their performance, grow their teams, and expand to additional locations smoothly and easily. Catch this episode to learn how she helps practices grow and which key metrics she uses to make fast, long-lasting improvements. 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• What systems to put in place to ensure smooth practice expansion
• How to create consistent clinical protocols across the practice 
• How to better understand and manage hygiene capacity
• One of the easiest and most impactful metrics a practice can track

Understanding and monitoring practice data is crucial for a dental office to succeed. If you don’t watch key numbers, you can’t see what’s really happening in the practice and you can’t make improvements.

Many practice owners resist involving the team in analytics and financials because they’re worried about difficult money conversations and the risks involved with transparency. But interestingly, we found that when the whole team has a general understanding of practice economics, there is less overall frustration and a wholehearted focus on improving results. 

When everybody on the team knows how to monitor key numbers for their role and how to improve those numbers, the practice can reach its goals much more quickly.

In this episode of The Double Your Production Podcast, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs are sitting down to talk through how to involve the team with data and key metrics. You’ll learn the mindset shifts necessary to get everybody on board with better data in your practice.

In this episode of The Double Your Production Podcast, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs sit down with Paul Lowry from Dental Menu to talk about how to use membership plans, discount plans, and rewards programs in your dental practice. 

In-house benefit plans are a great way to serve patients who don’t have dental insurance. Offering your own plans and perks ensures these patients have the financial flexibility to keep up on their preventative care and move forward with needed restorative treatment.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• The difference between a dental membership plan and a discount plan
• How membership plans improve patient retention
• How discount plans help improve case acceptance and close treatment
• The best ways to incorporate rewards in your practice to incentivize retention and preventative care
• How to get the whole team on board with membership plans and better financial options for patients

Within the episode, Paul mentions 5 free modules where you can learn all about the process of dental membership plans. Click here to access the free modules: http://www.dentalmenu.com/education 

If you have any questions or would like to get in touch with Paul, you can reach him at paul@dentalmenu.com 

Paige Hood is a practicing hygienist and a Certified Hygiene Coach with The Team Training Institute. She’s got years of experience not only improving her own skills as a hygienist, but also helping others excel. 

Today, Paige is joining Wendy Briggs on The Double Your Production Podcast for an in-depth conversation about how hygienists can raise the standard of care in a dental practice.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• Which qualities separate top-performing hygienists from the rest
• How the company culture of a practice impacts hygiene care (and how team members can improve the culture each day)
• Important mindset shifts hygienists need to make in order to better serve patients
• A breakdown of how to spend your time with each patient (30% is spent on personal things and getting to know the patient better)
• How to use a risk assessment conversation to help patients move forward with the care they need

Kaizen is the Japanese business philosophy of continuous improvement. Rooted in post-World War II economic reform, Kaizen is about making steady changes for the better. Toyota famously used this concept to develop its lean manufacturing process and become a leader in quality in the automotive industry.

Kaizen can be used in a dental setting as well, allowing a team to revisit processes and make improvements for greater efficiency, effectiveness, and better patient care. In this episode of The Double Your Production Podcast, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs are sitting down to explain exactly what Kaizen is, how it works in an organization, and how to apply it to a dental office.

The dental environment is filled with challenges: declining reimbursements, increasing costs, staffing shortages, and increased competition. With this shift in thinking, dental practices can be more adaptive to the changing dental industry and well-positioned for continued success.

Bert Triche is a practicing hygienist and a Certified Hygiene Coach with The Team Training Institute. She’s got 43 years of hygiene experience and has coached other hygienists for 12 years. She’s joining Wendy Briggs today on The Double Your Production Podcast for an important conversation about how hygienists, dentists, and office managers can navigate the current shortage of hygienists around the country.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• The current market challenges in hygiene staffing
• How to calculate your actual earnings as a hygienist
• How to ask for a raise with an understanding of the practice’s economics
• How to protect a positive company culture amid staffing shortages
• How production-based compensation better serves the hygienist, the patient, and the practice
• The best way to handle burnout or stagnation in hygiene

Most dentists don’t have extensive experience in property negotiations and this puts them at a significant disadvantage when purchasing or leasing property for their dental office. 

Today, Colin Carr is joining Dr. John Meis to talk about how to level the playing field in these negotiations and allow dentists to expand and grow more seamlessly.

Colin’s company that provides commercial real estate services for healthcare providers. They represent dentists and other healthcare providers in commercial real estate purchase and lease transactions to make sure they get the very best deal possible.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

·         Common mistakes dentists make when renewing a commercial lease or purchasing property

·         Why real estate experts can save you hundreds of thousands of dollars in lease rates

·         Why it’s important to approach any negotiation with a strategic position

·         Why it’s crucial to determine the total cost of a deal (rather than just looking at the lease rate)

·         How to avoid the trap of negotiating on just one property at a time

To learn more about Colin’s company and how they help dentists, go to www.carr.us 

There are pervasive myths in all industries that, if left unchecked, can damage the morale of business owners. Dentistry is no different. Today, we’re debunking some of these myths so you can make decisions in your dental practice with confidence.

In this episode of The Double Your Production Podcast, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs are clearing up 3 myths that have been floating around in dentistry lately and sharing 3 ways to improve performance and profit during times of uncertainty.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• Why focusing on cost-cutting strategies can hurt business opportunity (you should be aware of your spending, but don’t make cost cutting your primary focus)
• How to use small changes in the practice to create big improvements in profitability
• A crucial shift the practice philosophy to make sure the team and the patients feel valued
• How to use the Toyota method to create greater efficiency in the practice
• Easy ways to expand the practice and the procedures offered
•  

Don’t let yourself get swept up in the fears of economic uncertainty. As the industry shifts and changes, it’s important to keep yourself informed and equipped with great strategies. Listen to today’s episode for our latest recommendations.

Did you know… on average, 40% of the incoming calls to a dental practice go unanswered?

The loss involved with phone inefficiencies is much larger than most practice owners think. When patient calls don’t get answered, appointments don’t get scheduled, and the practice loses a tremendous amount of opportunity. 

Amol Nirgudkar is the CEO of Patient Prism, a company that provides dental practices with the technology needed to optimize phone calls and improve patient flow. While AI is currently a trending topic, Patient Prism has been using artificial intelligence and machine learning for years to revolutionize how the front desk performs in practices across the country.

In this episode of The Double Your Production Podcast, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs sit down with Amol to talk about the advantages AI tools can provide practices to increase patient flow and improve performance.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• How dental AI tools actually help team members perform at a higher level (don’t worry, these bots won’t replace real members of the team)
• How Patient Prism tracks key metrics during phone calls and provides the practice with important data
• Why it’s important to track phone call patterns and how to identify potential problems within the practice
• How AI can help practice owners and leaders identify areas of growth and expansion
• How Patient Prism can help spot problems or gaps in service and allow more patients move forward with care

To learn more about Patient Prism, go to https://www.patientprism.com/

Carrie Marshall grew up in a family dental practice. As an adult, she worked as a dental assistant and helped her dad grow the practice from 2 chairs to 10 chairs. As the practice continued to grow and her brothers joined, she noticed the stress level in her parents rising. She watched her dad stay up late at night trying to build a practice that could sustain them all comfortably.

Carrie started to see that this stress and isolation was common across dentistry, so she decided to shift her career and study tools to help dental professionals better understand and improve their mental health. She became a Master Certified Coach and now helps dentists and teams manage their mental energy, deal with emotions in a healthy way, and avoid burnout.

In this episode of The Double Your Production Podcast, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs are sitting down with Carrie to get some immediate tools to alleviate the stress and isolation that is so prevalent among dental professionals.

We’re also thrilled to announce that Carrie Marshall will be joining us at this year’s Champions of Dentistry Summit in Orlando! In her session, she’ll be sharing strategies to help you achieve your personal and professional goals while truly protecting your mental energy and wellbeing. These tools are great for dentists and the entire team and we can’t wait to learn from her.

Listen to today’s episode for strategies you and your team can use right away to improve your life at work and at home.

Jim Philhower was the Director of Sales & Leadership at Henry Shein for decades. He helped develop and lead the sales team and worked with dentists around the country to create better results in their practices. Jim has been in over 1000 practices across the US and has intricately studied what works in the dental business.

We’re thrilled to announce that Jim Philhower has joined us at the The Team Training Institute and will be speaking at our Champions of Dentistry Summit coming up in April.

In today’s episode of The Double Your Production Podcast, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs are sitting down with Jim to talk about some of the key lessons he’s learned throughout his career in dentistry and to give you a behind-the-scenes look at the content he’ll be sharing at this year’s Summit.

Jim’s got an incredible wealth of knowledge in the dental industry and we couldn’t be more thrilled to welcome him to the TTI family. 

We hope you’ll join us at our upcoming dental conference, the Champions of Dentistry Summit hosted this year in Orlando, FL. Learn more and register to join us at http://www.championsofdentistry.com 

In today’s episode of The Double Your Production Podcast, Dr. John Meis and Wendy Briggs are sharing a sneak peek of this year’s Champions of Dentistry Summit.

The Summit is happening April 28-29 in Orlando, FL where we’ll be working with practices around the country to rapidly improve their results, all while soaking in the magic and business lessons from Disney World and Universal Studios. 

We chose Orlando for this year’s event because there is truly so much to learn from these brands. The Disney legacy of pristine experiences and high-touch customer service has created enormous business success that spans generations. During this immersive 2-day event, we’ll be pulling important lessons from these iconic brands and applying these principles to dentistry. You’ll leave with fresh systems and strategies for building a stronger practice while also being inspired to run your office with the leadership of a top CEO. 

Listen to today’s episode for all the details about this year’s Summit and get a preview of the content we’ll be sharing!

We only host the Summit once a year, so if you haven’t joined us for this event before, now is the time to register. We’ve got an incredible group of dental experts joining us, we’ve got solution-packed sessions planned, and the most successful dentists from around the country will be gathered in one room sharing ideas and building a bigger future for themselves and their teams.

We hope to see you there! Click here to register: http://www.championsofdentistry.com