I am attending the Yankee Dental Congress in Boston today and love seeing peers and colleagues in the field of dentistry learning and sharing knowledge in all of the courses and workshops offered. As a trainer and lecturer I have seen many enthusiastic teams and doctors leave a class
full of ideas about what to do when they return to the office. The key to successfully bringing new ideas into an existing organization is to make a concrete plan of action and then commit to meaningful follow through.
Ask every team member attending a class to make a pre-course prep sheet. Let all your course attendees know they will need to make some sort of presentation to the rest of the team including ways they think what they’ve learned could benefit the practice. Increase the ownership and accountability from your team members by dedicating a team meeting to their presentations and suggestions. Talk about the ideas that could really make a difference and then make a plan together for an implementation strategy.
Step 1: Engagement in Courses
- Ask Questions
- Take Notes/How does this apply to our practice? My job?
- Meet Presenters
Step 2: Team Presentation Prep
Take all of your notes, insights and the experience in the class you attended and come up with some specific concrete ways that take the content and the value of the course and apply it to our practice. How can we better our business/clinical skills/intra office interactions based on what you learned? How can we implement what you learned to make these improvements? Who will you need to help you implement the ideas that will benefit us?
Step 3: Post Yankee Team Meeting
Presentations and discussion about how we will commit to implementing some of the things we learned at Yankee that will benefit our practice going forward including SMART goal setting and plan for follow up.
By having a plan and encouraging the engagement of your team in the courses they attend you will be able to maximize the value of the investment you’ve made in education and development for your team members. You will also see an improvement in their engagement as they contribute to helping the practice evolve and grow!
