How are you being an ostrich?

How are you being an ostrich?

I was with a group of successful business leaders from Oxford and Cambridge yesterday and we were thinking about a very simple and powerful question.

 

“What do I know about by business today that it will take me six months or more to realise?”

 

You know things about your business that you are not facing up to, because as soon as you do you will have to do something about it and you don’t want to. Are you like many business owners and dental principals,  spending as much time as possible with your eyes covered not looking at the reality of what is happening around you, you may have your hands over your ears singing “la la la la la”  so you don’t have to her the early signs of discontent, or  using other distractions to bury your head in the sand  and not face the truth of what deep down you know to be true.

 

The great news is that as soon as you recognise the problem the sooner you can solve it and save yourself a lot of time, money and hassle. If there is one thing you know as a dentist prevention is better than cure and if you have to intervene intervene early.

 Common things that you may know and wait to discover include, and there are many more

·        finances, you may have a feeling that patient numbers are dropping off and those patients who are in are spending less and because you don’t have a system for recording your key performance indicators on a monthly basis it won’t be until you can’t pay the wages or other bills that you realise there is a problem.

·        Team, you may have a sense that a team member is not totally honest, you think they may be dishonest about their hours for the odd 5 – 10 minutes here and there, the odd ream of paper my go astray and it is not until a large amount of cash goes missing from the till that you realise that you should have done something about it

 

 As I talk to dentists and other business owners all over the UK and Europe about the challenges they are having in their business that have come to become an acute problem, without exception they all tell me,” I knew there was a problem and I hoped if I ignored it it would sort itself out.” It never does and will always cost more time, money and stress.

 

So in your practice or business, “What do you know about your business today that it will take you six months or more to realise?”

 

If you would like some help  dealing with an acute business problem, or have a problem that you would like to resolve early e mail me on Jane@iodb/.co.uk or call me on 07989 757 884