Transcribed from the actual audio of the Dr. Chris Griffin Show...

The Dr. Chris Griffin Show – Season 1 Episode 2

“Putting on the same jerseys doesn’t make you a team. You’re still a collection of individuals until you have a common goal.” Now who said that?

Welcome to the Dr. Chris Griffin Show. Your resource for leveraging systems and technology to easier workload, increase productivity and provide you with the time off you deserve to live the life of your dreams. It’s time to practice productivity in the passionate pursuit of a better life with your host, Dr. Chris Griffin. The doctor is in.

Yes, yes…Hello everybody! Welcome once again to the Dr. Chris Griffin Show. This is actually Season 1 Episode 2 and I want to thank you for tuning in. Now let me go ahead and reveal who made that amazing quote back there. I think it’s very applicable quote to anyone who are in to dental practice or medical practice or any small business. That person was the one and only Mr. Harry Sinden, GM Coach and president of the Boston Bruins. Now if you are not a hockey fan, let me fill you in. Mr. Sinden actually presided over the longest playoff stretch consecutive seasons in the playoffs with 30 seasons as a GM. Now that’s a pretty big deal. 30 years in a row going to the playoffs and also in his 4th season, 6970 he also coached the Bruins for their first Stanley Cup in 29 years and all I can say is who stays with the team for that long? I mean that’s a pretty big amazing thing anyway. I mean I’ve always heard a coach, most coaches I’ve heard says that as a joke, that every year they make 10% of their fan base angry. So after 10 years, no one’s left to be their friend or be a fan of theirs to try to keep them around. I’m not sure about the advance math on that deal but we’ll, we’ll forgive the people that say that because it is a very simple way of saying that “Yes, staying around for a long time in one place as a head coach is a hard thing to do”. And I think it’s a hard thing to do as a doctor or anything else like that to be the boss man and the person that calls the shots for any extended period of time. I can do the first 10 years, yeah. That’s almost like the honeymoon phase. After that, people that stay with you that long and longer, you know, it’s up to, and there are people that are super loyal, and then there’s also going to be people that kind of get in your nerves and sure you keep them around because you think they’re really good or whatever, but it’s always a challenge staying around for a long period of time.

And so now of course I’m speaking with great wisdom as I’ve had the same dental practice since 1999. I do still have, in fact, an original employee that’s still with me. And yes, you know, it’s a give and take but she’s really, you know, she’s amazing person at what she does and so hopefully I’m not the worst doctor in the world to work for. So we have a good give and take. Anyway, that’s the guy that gave the quote and I think it’s a really good way to start this out.

Now we’re going to talk about something today that a lot of you out there, I’m afraid, have not taken advantage of. You guys are probably leaving so much money and productivity on the table by not taking advantage of this amazingly powerful tool that anyone can do, by the way. This is not something that’s left for the ultra rich or the ultra smart. Anyone who’s thinking can get this done in their practice, small business or whatever. So after today, you are going to be privy to the most powerful team productivity building strategies ever invented. And of course, if you know me, you can tell the hyperbole is flowing off my lips as usual. I really do believe it’s a huge deal. And we are going to walk you through exactly how to create for yourself this powerful strategy. Okay? Anyone wondering what that powerful strategy is? Maybe you didn’t read the show notes yet or the title of the podcast. But what we’re going to be doing is we’re going to be teaching you how to create amazing team experiences. Okay? Amazing team experiences. So a lot of times you think, you know a lot of people have this trouble of, they feel like, yes, work is work and when 5 o’clock hits, you know, it’s always like the old cartoon. I can’t think of the dog’s name right now. But you know you had Wile E. Coyote and the white dog with the red bangs. If I remember that, all day long. It was Wile E. Coyote’s job to try to steal sheep and all day long it was the dog’s job to stop him. Now these guys, they beat each other up, they beat each other to death. You know usually Wile E. is getting the worst end of the stick for sure but when that end of the day whistle goes off just like it would in a factory, you know, they stop what they’re doing; usually Wile E. Coyote’s getting pounded over the head or something. They stop, the dog will put him down, and they walk and get their lunch box and they’ll leave. Okay? So that’s the way that a lot of us view the work day at our practice. You think, okay, I will accept the fact that I’ve got to come in and get this done. I’ve got to bust things down and be a good doctor and I’ve got to, you know, I got to be a good leader, whatever that means to me. And by golly, at 5 o’clock, when that bell rings, I’m out of here. Okay? And I think a lot of your team members would feel the same way too. But what I’m going to tell you. Is with just a small amount of creativity, not even a ton of creativity, right? Just a small amount of creativity you can create this either onsite or offsite adventures for your team. Well you call them adventures, experiences, whatever. And these things are going to give you so much invisible currency. This is going to put it in your bank account. So the next time you’re kind of, you know a tail at your practice and you’re acting bad, it’s going to put things over on your side of the column. So they might overlook a little more and maybe things are a little more pleasant. Sort of gives you a little leeway to not be perfect all the time when the team is really on your side. And they know that you’re looking out for their best interest because you’ve proven it to them by doing amazing things like creating amazing team experiences. Okay?

One thing I’ve got down here on my next course, you guys as usual. You can all get a copy of the mind map that I’m actually using that I built myself. This is the way that I built everything in my life. As I do mind maps to begin with because that’s just how I think. So you can get a copy of this mind map over at the website, drchrisgriffin.com. Also, when you go there, you get these mind maps. Now we’re going to have other stuff there, links to things that I’m talking about. I’m going to go back and put all that in at the end of the day. And we’re going to do that. So there’s always some good ways to get some goodies and stuff like that. But when you get these mind maps, you’re going to see a lot of notes on here. It’s a lot of stuff, I probably just going to gloss over and never even talked about on the actual show. Right? But it’s there and it’s all useful information. A lot of times I put little links and stuff in the mind maps myself, you know, for me. But it’s there for you too. You can absolutely use it for inspiration and your team building, trip building stuff too. So anyway, that’s what you do if you want to copy the mind map for today’s show.

Now let’s go over a few examples of some of the things that I have personally done with my dental practice to create these amazing experiences. Actually I’ve done this with Griffin Dental, my dental practice. I’ve also done this with Capacity Academy or Effective Dentistry, my other company. So let’s think about some of the options that I’ve done over the years and some of the, let’s also create some segments, some differentiation points. So what are some things you can do? What doesn’t have to be the most extravagant thing in the world, right? You can do things that are fun and rewarding for your team and sort of a team building thing. You can do it locally.

For a long time, well, actually many times, we’ll set these goals at the beginning of the year and some of the goals are mundane. In dentistry, some of the bigger goals that everyone keeps are production and collections. Production, of course, means the amount of money you produced in practice. And collections, means the amount of money you actually collected. Now we all wished we collected 100% of what we produced but as anyone who runs a business knows; you’re never going to do that. So whatever is going to happen is going to happen. You know, you’re going to run problems with insurance companies. You’re going to run the, there are various different issues, you know patients not paying all their bills, whatever. But anyway, those are couple of the big things we like to watch. And then also over the years, I’ll probably do a show on this too. But there’s an amazing book called “Mastering the Rockerfeller Habits” by Vern Harnish. Now that book right there allows you to sort of really sit down and think about dividing your year into time modules; like quarters even. And so each quarter, it’s even like a yearly goal, and it’s really hard to keep up with for the whole year. You might have quarterly goals or monthly goals. And each one of those periods of time, of course that has its own reward and things are really cool, you know, you might give it a good name or something. Anyway that’s a whole different episode down the road and we’ll absolutely do that. In fact, one of the goals of this show is I have an amazing, I mean I say it’s amazing, I have a really big library. Okay? So anytime I go somewhere, I’m always looking for business books. Or reading any books but then I personally love business books, right? For whatever reason. And so I’ve got this huge collection. Well right now, I’m just looking at my wall of my bookshelves. I have 2 big bookshelves at my office room recording this. And those bookshelves are just full. It’s bursting to the seams with business books. Right? And so I’m looking here at that book. There’s probably 100 books that anyone who’s serious about running a business should have some exposure to. I’m not saying you have to read every one cover to cover but you kind of need to know the basic concepts behind each one. So it’s one of the goals for me as we go through this show over the years. To periodically pull out examples and sort of have a, almost like a book party day and talk about the book and how it can relate to you as you’re trying to run your private practice.

But anyway, just make it here or there. But you can have the local fun day like if you meet your yearly goal. So this past, I guess this past year, yeah January 2015. We had met our yearly production goal. Okay? We set a goal. It was our first year back in the new building. We are actually on there half a year after a fire destroyed our practice that have been there forever. And we set a yearly goal and we met it. Okay? Now it might just be giving pats on the back or handing out $5 dollar bills. I mean what are you doing? $100 bills, well that’s even better. Well what we decided to do in my practice, if you don’t know the entire story, I only work on patients, Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Now Thursdays, I’m there but I’m just sort of there, I’m running my other businesses and there are things that’s going on at the dental office catching up on paperwork, whatever. You know, just simple stuff like that. I’m there if there’s an emergency or whatever but I mean that’s never, that never happens hardly. But I’m there. Anyway, we decided to take one of those Thursdays and didn’t tip them off until it was just about time to go. But so we tell everybody on Wednesday, “Look, tomorrow you need to show up and be ready to go somewhere. We’ll be back normal time. You have to get the kids in school. You have to pick them up, that’s fine, no problem. You know, we’re still going to be on time but we’re going to have a fun day.” So we loaded up at 8 just like normal and we head out to Memphis, the closest big town to me. And unfortunately it’s 66 miles to the mall in Memphis but that’s just the price you pay for living out in the boondocks, that’s fine. That’s what I’ve always done so I’m not too terribly against driving to go places, so we you know get out of town at 8:15 or so. You would drive to the mall, they’re not open yet but there’s like a breakfast place in the mall that’s opened. So we go in there and buy some breakfast and then I tell them the big kickers not just “Hey, we’re having a fun day instead of working. But I’m actually giving everyone of you a…” I think it was 3, thank you for reminding me that. I gave everyone $300 bills. And so we had a little game. Everyone had to go out and spend the $300 on themselves. Okay? And they had to bring me the receipts back to prove they did it but whoever gets to spend closest the $300 without going over, and it was on themselves, they got another $200 as a bonus. See that’s not an inexpensive day. However many employees I have times 300 plus another 200. Then we all met at lunch, at 12 o’clock, at the Firebird Steak House at the mall. I bought everybody a big old lunch. And of course, as you can imagine, I told them to order what they wanted. And they’re all trying to fair how to get steak and lobster with a salad and lobster, whatever, you know stuff like that. But anyway, whatever, it’s okay. We had a good time and a lot of fun and that was a huge plus as we we’re building out this year. It gave everybody a good head start, they had a lot of energy, and have a good attitude and everybody on the same page for this year.

What are some other things that we’ve done? Well we’ve done off site training/planning days. Now these are probably the more underutilized things that I’ve seen in dentistry or private practice anywhere. These off site days, I mean these things are so beneficial because you spend 4 or 5 hours on a day or two days planning out your next year, planning out your CE events, planning out your goals, planning out all kinds of important things for the practice. And we actually went to a little bunkhouse getaway. It was a little dude ranch kind of thing. And we all had a…with cabins and stuff like that. You know, it was really native and we did it on a Friday and Saturday. And you know, it was a driving distance so we drove on Thursday evening and got back Saturday afternoon. And you know when you get back from something like that, you didn’t, you usually do it on December, something like that. And once you got that done in December, so that it’s all mapped out January through December of the next year. All the really fun stuff you’re going to do. We have also done off site fun trips. So the examples are those couple of things we’ve done in the past, if we’ve met our yearly goals or whatever. I’ve sent them on a cruise, I actually didn’t go on the cruise myself. Well I’ve just sent my team on a cruise, one year from meeting one of our goals. Well it has to be a pretty good goal, like I think it was the first time we hit 1.5 million a year or something like that and I was really proud of that number because I know how we’d work to get there. So I sent them on a cruise. The next year, they still met their goal and I sent them to New York to a Broadway play. By the way, I found out that hotel rooms in New York are very expensive. I did not realize that a 100%. I mean I’m from Mississippi now. I know they say that whatever you do in Mississippi, moneywise, you can multiply by 3 up in New York. But I did not know it was that serious and they told me too that not only was the hotel room, it’s right there on Rockefeller Plaza, they say it’s not only 3 times more expensive but it’s probably 3 times smaller than the hotel rooms we have around here, whatever. Anyway, they had a good time. You know, and when you do something like this, it’s also, it’s not just the team building. It’s the stories, you know, the memories that last forever. That’s really is most powerful about it.

What else can you do? You can do, you know, go to the conferences. CME’s, CDE, straight up CE, anything like that. After people have put in a good day of studying, of being good employees, learning for you, you can have little getaways. You can grab a bite, eat together in a nice place, go listen to a band or whatever. After hours of conversations, those are always really popular. Just a good old CE trip with after hours fun. That’s a really good reward for a team. But today, what I really want to talk to you about is what we just recently did. And I think as it turns out, it’s probably one of the most fun things that we’ve ever done. And that’s why I wanted to show you and outline it so that you might want to do something like this for your team if you had the opportunity. Because I’ll tell you what, it’s still fresh on my mind. It hadn’t been that long but I’m telling you, guys, ever since we’ve been back, our productivity has been through the roof. People had a better attitude towards each other, they had better attitude towards me. I think now when I’m kind of a jerk at the office, when I’m deep in thought or thinking about something or not super sticky sweet nice to everybody, like a little more of a pass on it. Hey maybe it’s strands in, it may not last forever, but I’m telling you, it’s really neat, it’s really fun right now. So what did I recently do? If some of you may know, we lost last year, several long time employees for various reasons. And it’s been a challenge, not so much in that the patients aren’t there to work on but the challenge has been in just the management of that practice. And so our software that we used to run everything at the dental practice is, this one is used by a lot of dentists, it’s called Dentrix. And so Dentrix, even though it’s a pretty intuitive software, it’s complicated, you know. There’s a lot of, my wife says, “You got to do...