Ignite Your Future

“Light a match in a dark room and watch as the light instantly overcomes the darkness. Observe the power and grace

of that single, solitary flame dancing with life. Now, light several candles and experience the added warmth and comfort extended from that first, vulnerable flame through others.”

1. Lighting the Match: If you were taking a road trip to a new destination, how would you make sure you found your way?

I’m guessing if you’re anything like me, you’d dial up Google maps on your trusty iPhone or load it into your GPS. Sound familiar? Excellent, because the very first step in becoming a great leader is exactly the same. It’s all about VISION or PURPOSE.

YOU need to know where you’re headed.

YOU need to share that destination with your team.

Think about it. If you don’t know where you’re headed, how will you ever know if you’re on the right track? And to that end, if you don’t know, how could ever expect your team to know? So your first step in becoming a great leader is to know where you want your practice to go. This is your vision, your purpose and is for you to decide. With that in mind, my experience with many young dentists is this is much easier said than done. So

DAVID RICE, DDS Power To Succeed

igniteYourFuture 3 Principles Young Leaders Should Strive For

here’s a tip. Don’t overthink it, and if you’re having challenges with seeing your exact destination, simplify. Imagine your road trip takes you from Buffalo, N.Y., to somewhere in California. Although you haven’t finalized your city of choice, your vision, you know a few very important things. You know you’re heading west. You know California’s your end goal. And you know you’re going to need to make multiple stops along the way. So again, don’t overthink it. Plan your road trip a stop at a time. Your first critical step is to make your plan and get in the car.

listen. Once your vision is in place and your team knows where you are heading, embrace the mastermind concept. Understand that the whole of your team is more intelligent and more powerful than any one part, including you. While your passion leads the direction of the road trip, your team’s eyes and ears can scout out food, gas and all the sights you want to see on the way. Together you are powerful. The second quality passionate leaders understand is that great teams are built on the backs of great systems. It’s been said that 94 percent of success comes from the system and 6 percent comes from the people. Now that doesn’t mean that your team isn’t critical. They are! That said, imagine you know where you’re headed. Imagine you have a great team that wants to follow you. Imagine how effective you’ll be when you stop at a rest stop and everyone on the team knows exactly what their role is. One of you gets the gas. One of you gets the snacks. One of you checks the tires, while another uses the rest room. You are a finely-tuned machine because everyone knows and fully understands what their role is and how to execute it. Now imagine the opposite. Imagine your rest stop, still with a great team but no system. Every superstar is running around trying pump the gas, check the tires, get the food and use the rest room all at the same time.

2. Passing the Torch: If you want your team to come along for the road trip, you’ll have to share your plans.

Taking a road trip from New York to California is no small journey. The same goes for building the practice of your dreams. So once you know where you’re headed, the key is getting your team to want to go with you. The key is PASSION.

Great teams follow leaders who seek first to understand.

Great teams are built on the backs of great systems.

Passion and excitement fuel both your initial flame and the torch you pass on to each member of your team. Great young leaders are on a mission and are willing to do all the little things that mediocre young bosses are unwilling to do. So what are two of the most critical qualities I’ve experienced? The first is their ability to seek to understand before being understood. Translation – great young leaders

Measuring the heat. If you want to get to your destination, you’ll have to keep your eyes on your map.

Just like there are critical check points in your journey from New York to

California, there are critical check points in the successful dental practice. So last, but certainly not least, great young leaders understand that their success is dependent on measuring results.

You need to keep your core values, but your strategies may evolve.

You need to embrace change through continual improvement.

At the end of the day, your vision and your passion have inspired you and your team to take that road trip. At the end of the day, your success is defined by getting to California. The final piece in making that happen is measuring your results, but maybe a little differently than you might be thinking. It’s true, my experience has taught me to measure all the traditional vital statistics many practice management consultants recommend. I would highly

recommend you do the same. However, great leaders make two measurements most leave out. First and foremost, great leaders always maintain their vision. The core values of that initially lit match always burn. How they ignite the other candles and how they spread the warmth and comfort… that may evolve. Great leaders realize that just as times change, their strategies change too. Here’s an example. Ten years ago a young leader wanted to maintain communication with his patients outside of office hours. His core value of great communications and customer service led him to send out postcards to remind his patients of their next re-care appointment. Fast-forward to today where another great young leader holds that same core value. Would she still send out postcard reminders? Likely

not. Likely today, she would engage her patients through one of the many customized automated email or text solutions. The core value is the same, and the strategy has evolved.

The final piece to measuring results is very simply what we’ve just addressed. The final piece is great leaders embrace change. It doesn’t need to be crazy, turn everything upside down change. It simply needs to be constant. Great leaders understand that being a little bit better tomorrow than they were today and a little bit better today than they were yesterday adds up to tremendous results. Imagine you are leading a team of four. Imagine every day each one of you improves in only one aspect. That’s four improvements a day, 20 a week, 80 a month and over 1,400 improvements a year. Imagine your one lit match, your VISION, fueled just a little bit every day by your team, your PASSION and the roaring fire, your RESULTS. Imagine how these three simple principles could igniteYOURFUTURE! ■

Dental Trade Shows

102nd Hinman Dental Meeting March 27 -29, 2014 Atlanta, GA

California Dental Association– Spring Session May 15 -17, 2014 Anaheim, CA

155th ADA Annual Session October 9 -14, 2014 San Antonio, TX

Greater New York Dental Meeting November 20 – December 3, 2014 New York, NY

Yankee Dental Meeting January 28 – February 1, 2014 Boston, MA