Where is your practice heading?

By Jamie MorleyOctober 14, 2021

It is important for any business, team or dental practice to be clear and aligned on the direction it is heading. To create a vision of the future that inspires and engages everybody in and around the business to contribute to taking it there.

There are multiple reasons why this is important.

Firstly, having a clear picture of where the business or practice is going can be emotionally inspiring to those in the team. This can provide a constant level of engagement, drive and motivation as it gives meaning to their work. It answers the question why am I doing this, other than for financial reward? Money motivates people only to a level, after which many studies have shown that other factors such as having meaning to their work gives people additional drive and motivation.

Secondly, it gives everybody clarity as to where they should put their resource in terms of time and money. Some people may have a budget at their disposal, whilst everybody in the team will have that most valuable resource of their own time. Ultimately this is limited and so you want all this resource focused in the same direction. In essence if people are spending their resource on anything that doesn’t take the practice or team in the agreed direction then it is a waste of resource.

Thirdly, it also gives clarity for individuals within the team and practice as to where they should be focusing their creativity and thinking in order to overcome hurdles and come up with new ideas to reach this destination. If people don’t know where the destination is then either the ideas will be rejected as they don’t take the practice in this direction or the ideas will be accepted but ultimately there will be disappointment and wasted effort when the idea doesn’t take them in the right direction. There is nothing worse than getting on a train or bus that is taking you in the wrong direction. In fact many will not get on the train or bus if they don’t know where it was going.

Finally, great visions can also remove limiting assumptions that people have about the future. Often our minds have very limiting assumptions about the future. Creating bold visions can remove these barriers in their own right.

There are 2 examples I can give of great visions…

The first is an old one which is often quoted in the business text books and I think illustrates this perfectly. Back in 1980 Bill Gates, then owner of Microsoft set the vision of wanting ‘a computer on every desk in every home’. At that time this was seen by many as completely crazy and very bold yet we are way beyond that today. It really removed assumptions about what was possible.

When I was at Align we talked about ‘superceding fixed braces’. This was again seen by many as mad back in 2011, 2012, but when you thought it through, there wasn’t any real reason as to why this couldn’t happen. Now look at how far Invisalign has penetrated the orthodontic market.

When I discuss this with people they may sometimes give a long list of things they are going to do. They immediately go into action mode. This is great, but take a step back first and be clear on the direction otherwise all those actions and hard work can be wasted.

People will also say that they want to hit X million sales by year X. This is different in that this is a clear numeric goal. This is also important and should be aligned behind the vision and should be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time bound. (SMART). It is not the vision though and serves a different purpose. Goals are great as they show progress and this is a big motivator for people to be able to see progress, but a vision is different….

What you want with a vision is literally to be able to paint a vision of the future in people’s minds. What will it look like? What will it sound like? What will it feel like? By doing this effectively people already start to imagine that they are there. Our minds are incredibly powerful in being able to visualise the future in a way that means it is very similar to the real thing in terms of the activity in our brain.

Despite the importance of creating a clear picture of where the practice or team is heading, I would challenge anybody reading this article who leads a dental practice or business or team on the following question:

Does everybody in the team have a clear picture of where the practice or business is heading? If I asked them right now where is the practice heading, what would they say?

That is a different question as to whether you know where the business or practice is heading. If you are not clear on this then the team certainly will not be. Even if you are clear on it you have to constantly reiterate and communicate this to the team for them to be clear on it….

In order for this to be the case you need to communicate this to everybody in your team consistently, both formally and informally. It is not just about communicating this in formal team meetings, but also in referring to it in ongoing, informal 1:1 conversations with team members and even customers. It is incredibly important that you really believe in the vision in order for the communication to have meaning and authenticity. People will feel this. It you don’t believe in it, then neither will they….

Having input and dialogue with your team around the vision helps you validate it and helps them buy into it. This is an important first step in creating a vision of the future that everybody is behind.

So, where is your practice, team or business heading? What do you want it to look like in 3 years time?