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This Is the Make or Break Point for Team Alignment

9/22/2026 10:15:00 AM | Comments: 0 | Views: 24

Does your team feel out of whack? Tiff and Pam pull back the curtain on maintaining practice camaraderie by sharing where to find those daily wins. They discuss not only setting goals, but the most effective way to do so; how to best utilize morning huddles; why ongoing communication is critical; and more.

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Transcript:

Tiffanie (00:01)

Hello, Dental A Team listeners. We are so excited to be here with you today. We love taking over the podcast, giving Kiera a little break, and as consultants coming on. So you have both myself, Tiffanie and Pam here with you today. Pam, how are you doing this morning?

DAT Pamela (00:20)

I am doing fantastic. How are you doing,

Tiffanie (00:22)

Good.

DAT Pamela (00:22)

Tiffanie?

Tiffanie (00:23)

I'm doing good as well. At the time of recording this podcast, it is morning time for us, about 10 a.m. And it's just after a long weekend. It's nice and hot outside. It's 2026, so I don't even know what year you're listening to this in. but we are just excited to be here. We love starting our weeks out with you guys, with podcasting, with delivering awesome information, awesome content. And Pam, I think today's

Topic is something that is really beneficial for everyone. And listeners, we want to make sure that we're always delivering the best quality, that we're delivering the best ideas, and that we're taking the things that we've learned not only in our own extracurricular activities and our own time in dental practices and education, etc., but also what we're seeing in practices that has been

Tried and true, that's been tested, and that's worked for practices. And something that comes to light for us often is camaraderie, culture, making sure that a team is really, really working together as a team and not just kind of like department by department or me here for myself, that kind of thought process. So today Pam and I are gonna be reviewing some pieces that we feel like we've

really nailed in within consulting and within, you practices of our own that really helped to establish that. And Pam, before we get started too much, what are you seeing in your consulting that you feel like kind of comes in alignment with this? What what are what are doctors saying? Why does this idea of really bringing together that camaraderie and that culture piece, why does this seem to be relevant for us today?

DAT Pamela (02:12)

Yeah, I mean that culture piece is huge, right? It's it's everything in a ball and how do we describe that? It's really difficult to describe, but you know it when you experience good culture or a poor culture in especially in a dental office. And I think that alignment, everyone knowing what they're working for is and working towards is super, super important.

Tiffanie (02:37)

Yeah. What do you feel like when you see an office that's not in alignment that maybe isn't having those shared goals or shared wins, things like that? What kind of things are you seeing happen because of that? Like what are the negative impacts of team members not being ali in alignment?

DAT Pamela (02:54)

Yeah, that's a a really good question, right? It's I think what I think everyone in the practice needs to know what that vision is, right? And when it is when the vision does not turn into daily habits, then that's where alignment or misalignment happens, really, right? destroying momentum is what I see. Destroying that alignment is constantly changing, right? If you're the leader and you're

constantly moving the goal, you're constantly saying, well, t we're gonna do this today and then tomorrow we're gonna do this. And you're just bouncing around. That's really difficult. So it doesn't matter what you decide it is, just stick to it and talk about it every day. So the pro that's a big issue that I see. Like a lot of doctors and office managers just feel like they, okay, here's what we're here's our daily things that we're working on to get to the vision that we've created.

But they don't talk about it every day. And it it

Tiffanie (03:55)

Yeah.

DAT Pamela (03:55)

it's it's just something that you have to do, whether that is a one, two, three, here's our focus, three focuses for the month, one focus for the month. It doesn't matter, but you have to that's that's a big issue in a lot of practices. inconsistency, right? Then that would kind of be in the same vein as that. When you know your doctor says, okay, I'm gonna be at Huddle every morning.

And then it happens for three days and then not for two, and then it happens for three more. So that it's it just says it's not important, right?

Tiffanie (04:29)

Mm-hmm.

DAT Pamela (04:30)

another another thing I see is I I again it kind of goes back to too many initiatives create confusion. So simple f simplifying it and giving one or two things that we're doing, accomplishing this day, week, month, whatever that is.

Tiffanie (04:51)

Yeah, no those.

DAT Pamela (04:52)

Yeah, I

I yeah, and I you know, I don't think teams really fail from a lack of information.

Tiffanie (04:59)

Mm-hmm.

DAT Pamela (05:00)

perhaps they feel f they fail when there's a lack of focus.

Tiffanie (05:05)

Mm-hmm. Yeah. And today we're talking about daily wins. Like how what how do daily wins help the progress of the practice? And how do daily wins help keep us in alignment? And some of the pieces that I think I see that come up that show us that this isn't happening, that shows us we're out of alignment and shows us that maybe some of those pieces that you were speaking to, Pam, are happening as when a doctor comes and they're not profitable.

they're they're not able to find the profit or they're not able to fill the schedule or they feel like their schedule is full, but it's hectic, they're not reaching goals, or maybe they don't have goals, or some of the biggest pieces, or I have a lot of clients that will come and say, gosh, we need more new patients, but then we look at the schedule and I'm like, Well, where are you gonna put new more new patients? So it might not be an acquisition issue, it might be a scheduling issue, but though those pieces really kind of point us in the direction.

of a misalignment and that misalignment is typically going to like to your point, Pam, be really related to the goal setting and the clarity around the goals. Like you said, they they don't always need more direction, like more words, but they sometimes lack that clarity that creates that confusion. And really, maybe not confusion so much as to like our monthly goal is 150. Like we need to hit 150,000.

But maybe confusion on what is a priority. So when we don't have that clarity, when we're not all rowing in the same direction, we're not talking about it frequently, we start to make decisions that are based on what's easiest, what's gonna clear up the busywork in front of me right now that may not be moving the needle forward when there's maybe an option for something that could move the needle forward. And I just put that on the back burner. And what I mean by that is maybe

Maybe I'm cleaning up a protocol because it's a little messy and a little confusing, but there's a patient who's just called to schedule treatment and I said, you know what, I'll call them back. I need to finish this first. But my priorities are a little out of sync there and out of alignment with what the actual goals are. And I think, Pam, when clients come in and they say the schedule's, you know, a schedule's one of the top things that clients come in and and talk to us about or that we get

random emails from our listeners at Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. You guys send emails all the time, please continue. We love those. But we get those emails that are like, gosh, my schedule's full. I'm not hitting goal. My schedule's full. It's chaotic and it's crazy. My team doesn't know how to deal with the chaos, right? I don't, my team doesn't know how to mitigate the chaos. and a lot of those pieces, to your point, Pam, can be discussed daily multiple times. So

When you're helping a team find that alignment, Pam, where's one of the first spaces that you help guide them to speak of those daily wins?

DAT Pamela (08:05)

Yeah, I I mean it's it's really like when you're setting your goals, setting those KPIs and and setting your goals, it's it's not only saying we are gonna do 150,000, this is our monthly goal, but it's how do I get there? Me as one person in the practice, right? So you know, that that momentum telling each individual, like, okay, your job is this today. So

For example, if you were to set your vision as being like, okay, we want healthy patients, a happy team, and exceptional dentistry, right? That's not giving me a lot to go forward. So it's making sure within those goals, let's say it's 150,000, that you do actually say, and this is your job today. We are going, you're going to be looking for all the opportunities that we have. If something comes up, make sure you let everyone be aware. So

It's keeping that communication, I think is a big part of it. And really and and it is like to your point, Tiff, it is something you can talk about every day. Like are we staying on task? Are we staying on priority? And you know, we can do the tasks, yes, but the priority is production today, right? So or

Tiffanie (09:23)

Yeah. Yeah.

DAT Pamela (09:24)

the priority is you know

Patient experience. What whatever that is that you're doing, but you have to describe exactly what each team member needs to do.

Tiffanie (09:34)

Yeah. And that can come down too to like their job descriptions being super clear, right?

DAT Pamela (09:38)

Mm-hmm.

Tiffanie (09:38)

So if I'm a scheduling coordinator, I know my goal of my position is that the schedule is full to goal, right? So taking that monthly goal and then breaking it apart into weekly and daily goals and then putting it into perspective per position. So if I'm a scheduling coordinator, I know the hygiene schedule needs to be scheduled to X amount of dollars and I know the doctor's schedule.

For a doctor, each doctor is probably a little bit different, needs to be scheduled to X amount of dollars. And so then celebrating those wins daily is hey, guess what? We were scheduled to goal yesterday. Or hey, we were a little bit under goal yesterday, but for the month, we're ahead. Or we're a little bit under goal, and I know we've got three holes in the schedule today. Let's fill those and let's assign out how that's going to work. And Pam, I think that's what you mean too, with the morning meeting, right? Is looking at those wins and then saying, hey.

these things need to be done today. Let's assign them out and make sure that someone's responsible. And something as you're speaking, Pam, I'm thinking, I've seen this really, really off like off day, like it's frequent, frequent thing where teams come together for the morning huddle and we've got our back office that talks through you know, health histories, unscheduled treatment, needs for the back office for the patients. We've got our front office that talks about holes in the schedule.

talks about the financials, are we on track or off track? And then we split, right? So the so we say this is all the unscheduled treatment. We say, cool, this is all the holes, or hey our patients, our patient at 10 a.m. needs this thing. And we're like, okay, cool. And then we split and nothing applicable happens with the data that we just spoke about. We just kind of say, okay, great, we had our morning huddle, we're all aware, and it does it's just gonna happen. Right. So we kind of lean on the like universal

it just will happen and fall into place. and oftentimes they're not assigning those things out. So I think Pam to your point is saying, hey, this patient at 10 AM he needs a call to make sure that they took their pre-med or they need to remember to bring in their night guard or their retainer because we're we're delivering a crown today and we need to make sure it fits. So Pam, will you call do you have time this morning to call that patient and make sure that they have that reminder? So we're really

like divvying out and assigning those things so that we can win and we're all working as a team because I know a lot of times PM the front office thinks, well, it's a patient coming in on the schedule today. So that dental assistant needs to call that patient. The dental assistant is like, we don't get on the phone. The front office does the phone call. So me saying it means automatically that the front office is going to take care of it. But that mismatch communication in the middle is where we get a skew from alignment.

DAT Pamela (12:18)

Yeah, and and to exactly to that point is, you know, even if there are holes in schedule in the schedule, sometimes people need to know what is important to do. So, hey

Tiffanie (12:29)

Mm-hmm.

DAT Pamela (12:29)

guys, we have a couple of openings coming up this week and dental assistants, can I get you to make some phone calls today?

Tiffanie (12:38)

Yeah.

DAT Pamela (12:39)

and just really directing what is important. Like, yes, they need to, you know, stock the rooms and and and this and that.

but what is important today because our ultimate goal is to schedule 150 this month and we're down or we're up or wherever we are, and let's keep focused on what is going to move us forward.

Tiffanie (13:00)

Yeah. Yeah. Keeping our goals, our our eyes on those goals and then making sure we're taking the steps that are going to get us there and communicating those things. So it doesn't always have to be like a set, this is how we get there every day, like this these are the things you do. We're gonna have adjustments and changes and making sure that we're communicating those. So I think Pam to your point there, like that alignment and keeping that momentum every day.

Celebrating those wins is that right there. Like we're assigning things out, we're discussing them, we're making sure we're all in alignment, and then we're celebrating, hey, guess what? Because of the work that we put in, because we assigned them out, because we knew what we were doing, and everybody had a daily goal, we were able to reach this. And so that continues that momentum, and they see the fruits of their labor are creating change. And Pam, with that, I know I've seen this a ton, and and you probably have too.

Teams get like stale and stagnant when they don't have that, right? When they're not talking about alignment and not talking about those things, but they're also not seeing, that thing I did created that change or pushed that needle forward. Because when we do get in that, like just checklist, right? Like I'm just checking my boxes and I did my stuff today and I'm out of here. We don't have that sense of ownership and that win when we can see.

Hey, this isn't actually moving the needle. Like these things that I'm doing, they're not it's not moving it. I'm gonna adjust it and do this. And then we see that win. Then we can really gain the personal momentum and that creativity in the space. Do you notice that as well, Pam?

DAT Pamela (14:42)

Yeah, it's it's moving or I guess focusing your mind on those things that are a lot of busy work and yes, those things are super important. But also it's like keeping like you're saying, just really focused on what is it, what is our ultimate goal this month? Maybe our ultimate goal is to hit that one fifty. So that means that even by the hour, sometimes we're saying, Hey, we got a cancellation. Does anybody

Can we think of a patient that we can put in there? I mean, just like anything, keeping your back, so your back office doesn't have to come up and go, hey, what happened? shoot, our goal, you

Tiffanie (15:20)

Yeah.

DAT Pamela (15:20)

know. just keeping that communication. So, you know, if if typically let's just say it's an office manager or front office lead person, keep that communication going between front and back. Get up, manage on your feet, look around, see what's happening in the office, and then just

visualize what is that ultimate goal that we need to accomplish today, this week, next, this month, whatever that is. And you know, also you mentioned something recognizing those wins is super, super important. And it may be you recognize somebody for something that they did almost right, you know, just

Tiffanie (16:06)

Yeah.

DAT Pamela (16:06)

not wrong.

So it's get used to finding things right that people are doing and that behavior will get repeated. And I know that's a hard thing to hear because it's a hard thing to do. for for some people, some people it comes pretty natural, but you know we're so busy as leaders and dentists that it's difficult to do that. You're in your you're in your space. but even as an office manager, a lead, hey guys, that was awesome. We did so good.

Those kind of things get repeated when you mention them.

Tiffanie (16:39)

Yeah.

I agree. It makes me think of my home life, right? And I I say this a lot. And

DAT Pamela (16:45)

Mm. Totally.

Tiffanie (16:47)

what we try to do is we try to recreate this entire wheel in the workplace because we're at we're at work. It's gotta be totally different. But like people are people and how we operate, how we think, how we behave, right, is pretty similar no matter where you're at. You're still the same person. And so

DAT Pamela (17:05)

Right.

Tiffanie (17:05)

I try

to think of like what works for a family, what works for my family and for my family every night at dinner and make the kids tell me what their favorite part of the day was. Because their first, you know, the first words are, school sucks. I hate school. Why do I just sit there all day? Why do we have homework? This sucks. Why are we doing this? And I'm like, cool,

DAT Pamela (17:21)

No.

Tiffanie (17:21)

what was awesome today? Like what about today was amazing. And sometimes it's at lunch, right? I got pizza at lunch. I'm like, Well, that's cool. You wouldn't have pizza if you were home, you know? But like

Taking those wins every day and seeing looking teaching someone to see and look for the positive because it's so easy. There's so many things that you could change about every single day, no matter where you're at. You go to Disneyland and be like, this could have been better. Right? You go in you go to Europe and be like, This could have been better. Absolutely anywhere you're gonna find that. That's the easy part. The hard part, like you said to your point, Pam, is finding the amazing places. Where do we do really well? So great.

We didn't hit goal yesterday, but you know what we did do? We made a load ton of calls, and those calls are gonna turn into calls back for future schedule. We may not have hit goal, but we got the whole practice deep cleaned, right? How many times as a dental assistant did I clean those operatories? Because we had that hour, you know, every six

DAT Pamela (18:23)

Yeah.

Tiffanie (18:23)

months something comes about, and I'm like, great, we had a cancellation. Deep clean, ladies, like get get these suckers cleaned up so.

There's always gonna be, there's always a space for the positive. And to your point, Pam, if we can keep our eyes on the positive, noticing, noticing what we didn't hit. So we're not forgetting about our goals and we're not saying, it's fine, we didn't hit goal. It's not fine, but let's look at the progress that we did make, the work that we did put in that's going to help us get to those goals and figure out what else can we do? So cool, this worked, let's keep repeating that. You know what? This one actually didn't work.

So like don't repeat that. Don't keep doing something because it's something we've always done. Let's not repeat that and let's replace it with something that could work better.

DAT Pamela (19:09)

Yeah, yeah. You know, for some reason I just went to a a quick way to do this, and and many people have heard this before, but doing an end-of-the-day high five huddle,

Tiffanie (19:19)

Yeah.

DAT Pamela (19:20)

right? So the the second a lot the very last person leaves, you know, your patient leaves the office. I had one office that they the office manager would ring like this bell and

Tiffanie (19:32)

Yeah.

DAT Pamela (19:32)

er everyone would literally drop what they were doing and run to the front desk and they'd all stand together and it

took two minutes to do

Tiffanie (19:40)

Yeah.

DAT Pamela (19:41)

and they would say, my gosh, I saw, you know, Jackie was helping Susie today and she helped clean a room. That was so awesome of you to do. Or somebody says, thank you so much for assisting with that patient. That was very difficult and I appreciate you know what you did. Really fast, a quick five minute like, how did you see, how did you show up today? What did you see from me? What did I see from you? And

you know, helping teams do that in a quick end of the day, five minute huddle, then you're back to doing your thing. It ultimately leads to, I guess, change management, what

Tiffanie (20:19)

Yeah.

DAT Pamela (20:19)

you would say, and and helping the team adop adapt like a maybe a different way of thinking, a different way of doing and and wow and and really making making the change be what is what is the thing that we're focusing on. You know, this

Day, month, week, whatever.

Tiffanie (20:39)

Yeah, I love that idea. And really it like ends the day on a positive note, which then progresses you

DAT Pamela (20:44)

Yeah.

Tiffanie (20:45)

to start tomorrow on a positive note because you left thinking about the good. So I love that idea. I think that's phenomenal. Awesome.

DAT Pamela (20:52)

Yeah. Yeah.

Tiffanie (20:54)

Well, I think that we could pretty much sum up our action items with making sure you know your goals that you're talking about your goals frequently. And doctors, I know there's a few of you out there that are like, You guys are nuts, I'm not talking to my team about my numbers. Call us, please.

call us. We are huge advocates for making sure everyone knows the direction that you're rowing. So call us and let us help you figure out how to get those numbers over to your team. So know your numbers, talk about them often and allow people to have those wins. Talk about wins. Morning huddle, great place to talk about wins and I love this idea of an afternoon huddle. You can do a quick 10-minute morning huddle and then do a quick two to five minute afternoon huddle. I love the bell. I've also seen like the easy button from Staples. Whatever

DAT Pamela (21:35)

Mm-hmm.

Tiffanie (21:37)

I know I know there's actually a team I had Pam that did a song. So they would put this specific song on the radio and as soon as that song came on, as like Michael Jackson or something, right? They would all come running to the front. So end-of-day huddles

DAT Pamela (21:49)

I love it.

Tiffanie (21:50)

can be really fun. and and no matter what, making sure that everyone has that clear direction and that things are being assigned out. So those would be those would be our three action items today. Go make sure that you're doing those things. If you're doing those, you're like, okay, ladies, this is phenomenal, but I'm still missing something.

please reach out. Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. You can head over to TheDentalATeam.com You can sign up for a quick little meeting with us. Like we love to just give as much as we can. So allow us that space if you need that help. Even if you say guys not right now, I'm not ready for full consulting. We're still here to help give you some guidance and direction and we want to. So please reach out. Drop us a five star review below. We love hearing from you guys. Pam, thank you so much for

DAT Pamela (22:34)

Thank you.

Tiffanie (22:34)

busting out

this podcast today. It was so much fun. I love picking your brain. and I really love talking momentum and team stuff. You have a knack for that and a knack for the consistency in it. So anyone who gets

DAT Pamela (22:47)

Thank you.

Tiffanie (22:48)

to work with Pam, you're very lucky. You are going to become an insanely consistent practice and be able to see within those consistencies areas that yeah, I'm being consistent but it's not getting the change that I want. Pam's awesome at being like, cool, then stop doing it.

Let's do something different and do it consistently and watch the change, which I love. It will happen. Yeah. And it happens too

DAT Pamela (23:03)

Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. 'Cause it will happen. It will it will happen. Yeah. It just it is

Tiffanie (23:12)

where it's like it is getting it. And then all of a sudden it's like, it's not working anymore. You know, yellow pages don't work anymore. Phone calls aren't always

DAT Pamela (23:18)

Yeah.

Tiffanie (23:20)

our best bet anymore. That's okay. So I get it. You're welcome.

DAT Pamela (23:22)

That's true. That's true. Thanks, Tiffanie. Yeah.

Tiffanie (23:26)

Thank you, Pam. And listeners, sign up today. If you're lucky enough, you may get Pam.

And there's a few of the ladies here that are ready and willing to help you talk numbers, talk change, and really just propel your future. Okay, that's a wrap. Thanks everyone. We'll catch you next time.

DAT Pamela (23:44)

Hmm.

Bye.

Category: Ethics, Jurisprudence and Malpractice, Office Design, Practice Management, HR and Accounting

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Dental A Team with Kiera Dent
Dentists, this is your playbook for building a practice that THRIVES rather than just survives! If you're ready to scale, streamline, or simply want to lead like a CEO, we're here to support you with our strategies.
Blog By:
Dental A Team