As the turn of the year passes, it’s a traditional time to look back and reflect and to look forward to plan for a new period of development… and to prepare to pay HMRC...
My experience suggests, however that for a significant proportion (the majority) of small dental practices, such reflection never makes it from thought to drawing board, let alone to action. For many, the change of year simply
means “more of the same”, or “how to combat the many and varied challenges that face us”.
Evidence shows that successful and driving businesses do things differently. It’s not unusual to find such entities
expending up to 15 per cent of their revenues on research and development (R&D). In some cases of course, such as e-business or pharmaceuticals, it will be vastly more.
But in practice, how much of our time or resource is given over to such activity? One problem that I see frequently is lack of data. You need to know where you are before you can evolve a strategy to know where you would realistically like to be, one, three or five years hence.
The A word – Audit – has much to answer for. To many professionals, it is seen as pure drudgery, something to be “complied with”. Yet in the majority of practices, the data is now more available than ever before, thanks to increasing computerisation and electronic reporting.
Recently I took part in an exercise to identify what audit data was available in a range of well-performing practices. The answer was disappointing, as other than the ‘required’ audits of infection control and radiology, little
else had been done. Yet this is basic R&D.
It’s often been said that dentists are far better at working in the business than on the business. The “just leave me to get on with the clinical dentistry” approach has become something of a cliché. It has to be repeated that time spent on the business, analysing trends and data, can be hugely rewarding in the longer term.
Who are your most profitable patients? Not a question that ever appeared on any final BDS paper that I’m aware of – and indeed, just to ask such a question is abhorrent to some. Yet a malfunctioning practice serves none of its patients (or team members) well. Everyone is always stretched, appointment books are over-stuffed, time allocated for more complex work is sacrificed to emergencies or walk-ins. Patients and staff are poorly motivated and the analogy of digging trenches in dry sand is not out of place.
How can processes be simplified and made more efficient? This is not a recipe for blunt-edged cost-cutting, but should be an approach that is constantly re-visited to make the best of that most expensive and unyielding commodity – time!
To make a New Year’s resolution to address these issues is not an easy task. But don’t be put off! Take your entire
team with you, and have them identify and articulate the type of business you aspire to be. Look at what information you need (R&D) to describe where you are and where you want to go. Delegate what you can. Carry out a PREST analysis – that’s looking at the Political, Regulatory, Economic, Social and Technological changes and issues that will affect your plans.
If all that sounds horribly difficult and expensive, you can always draw on external support. It needn’t be costly.
Remember that some dental plan providers offer free in-house business planning training – just ask! Or look online for business planning advice – it will be generic, but can be adapted.
Forget the A word. Look on it all as R&D. Something you can do – now – to not just future proof your practice, but something that can yield benefits within weeks or months, especially if you take care to ensure that you make the first steps simple and achievable. So don’t start with radical or expensive change, do it in a gentle ‘first-steps’ approach.
And when you’ve ticked off that first step – celebrate! Reward yourself and the team. Remember that motivation is something that needs constant repetition and left to themselves, people won’t always realise the truism that every journey starts with a single pace.
I’m often told that “things are OK, I like them just as they are”. You’ve probably said that too. The problem is that things never stay the way they are.