Do More By Doing Less

When I started out in business, I had the same impulse that many entrepreneurs have: I wanted to do it all.

I had a very specific vision for what I wanted in every aspect of my business. I prided myself on my energy and my attention to detail, and that meant I spent a lot of time going over things that other people in my organization — smart, reliable people — had already done.

Eventually, I came to realize that I only had the same number of hours in a week as everyone else, and every hour I spent micromanaging details and revisiting decisions was another hour I could have spent fulfilling my ultimate mandate, which was to establish a direction for the company and provide high-level leadership.

So my advice to you is this: Be the best dentist you can be. That means letting your office manager manage the office. It means giving your assistants the responsibility to do all the things they’re trained to do. It means having your treatment coordinator become a champion of presenting case options and discussing financial arrangements. It means keeping your focus where it belongs, giving each patient one-on-one attention in a way that makes them feel they’re being treated by the best dentist ever.

That doesn’t mean you should be entirely hands-off or unaware of what is going on in your business! On the contrary, you can — and should — expect complete accountability and regular reporting from the people around you, and there should be systems in place to ensure that. But once you have the right people and systems, it’s your obligation to spend your time where it brings the greatest return for you, the patients, and the practice.

I realize this can be a difficult philosophy for many dentists to accept. I struggled with it myself! But then I realized that the best thing I could do as a leader was to hire the right people to do the worrying for me. I haven’t looked back since.