Last week, we talked how important it is for everyone to be involved in the numbers, not just as a group but as individuals. I also told you that you can’t just know the statistics but you have to actually use them.
Here’s an example:
Treatment flow, patient flow and money flow are all obviously related.
But, they have nothing to do with production. Production is the end result; yet most see it as the beginning. Thus, looking at production tells you nothing (in case you didn’t pick that up in last week’s huddle).
Using the numbers means you have to be a detective by finding clues to identify the actual problem.
If you are tracking diagnosis, scheduled treatment, advanced collections (and you are doing so by each person as to where these numbers are originated from), you can laser focus in on the place that presents the opportunity for the most leverage.
A few weeks back, I mentioned how shortsighted the idea of monitoring case acceptance percentages along was because it is another number that doesn’t mean very much. None the less, in our example today, if you have a great case acceptance percentage but you are not getting the financial results then you have to figure out why…
Is it poor diagnosing? Or if diagnosing seems solid but you still aren’t hitting your numbers then you have to ask yourself “Hmmm, is every dollar that is diagnosed getting presented?”
If it is and still your numbers are not good, then you have to say “Okay, we have enough treatment diagnosed, it’s getting presented, we have solid case acceptance but there is not enough money flowing in…”
That means one of two things and probably both.
1st – It means no advanced collections
2nd – It means bad scheduling and probably broken apart treatment into small pieces instead of big bundles and quadrants at the minimum.
Another example:
Lets say you have poor diagnosis coming out of hygiene. You should have at least $2,500 per day per hygienist of new closed treatment and that’s on accident; $5,000 per hygienist per day for closed and scheduled treatment should be your goal.
If you are in a specialty practice without hygiene, then you would consider consults or looksee’s or whatever else constitutes your feeder system.
Now we look to see: is the doctor creating the treatment, is the hygienist preparing the patient, taking pictures, etc.
Or if everything in the room is good but then the transfer is being missed, void of the triangle or some other problem (such as patients existing by themselves).
This is how you use numbers. You find out what the numbers are, you set benchmarks by reverse engineering… (which I taught you how to do last month in the advanced training session and implementation workshop, if you missed it – GO HERE NOW) …and you figure out what does each number mean and where did it originate. Finally, you work the trail backwards to find where the gaps are.
Now you go to work on the improvements specific to the number and you do this again and again. Then repeat continuously.
That is how you build a successful organization – you grow your people and enhance their performance.
Lots to talk about and work on this week. So get to it and make it fun. Champions want to keep winning and improving, for them this is fun.
