Should dentists give out staff incentive bonuses?

When I was a younger dentist I would have said emphatically NO! It seemed to me somewhat unethical to reward my staff based on our offices statistics. Instead I gave automatic raises every year of five percent. This became a nonviable policy when my practice didn't grow additionally during the previous year. I had to come up with a better system.

It seemed to me that my staff, although extemely loyal didn't have the same burning desire for our practice to be busy in the same way that I did. They sometimes seemed happy when patients cancelled or when there were  holes in our schedule.  This made sense since when the office got busier or did more procedures they needed to work harder and their salary was fixed.

This fact made me remember a time long before when I was a teenager and I went to a country fair with my father and we went on a ride that involved us both working in unison to use centrifugal force to make the ride flip over ( think of a swing with a cage for people inside). If we applied sufficiently well time pushes we could make the swing flip over the bar. I tried my hardest and every time we were about to make the flip, I noticed that we lost momentum. I watched carefully and my father was surreptitiously pushing in the opposite direction (he had no interest in making the ride flip over the bar!)

This led me to the insight that if I wanted my practice to do better I should come up with an incentive system that would make us all work together and be on the same page.  I  decided to  install monthly bonuses instead of my automatic raises. Each staff had a statistic that their bonus would depend on. My office manager was given a small bonus when we saw the desired number of recall patients. My hygienist were given a daily bonus when they achieved the production numbers that could be expected if they saw seven or eight patients and did the procedures that they needed. My Assistant and Office manager would get an additional small bonus if our overall monthly numbers came out as expected.

Now, keep in mind that I made sure my target levels are easily achievable, as long as my staff and I did our jobs correctly.  All we really needed to do is  was to  keep our focus on our work (and not Facebook and texting!). Ever since I implemented this system, I have found my staff and I are more on the same page and we are working toward our common goal to make sure our practice has continued success!





from Ask Dr. Spindel - http://ift.tt/2ohKP9G - http://ift.tt/1SpPbm6

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