How to set goals for your dental practice

Rebecca Boartfield

Tim Twigg

Did you read our last Staff Issues column in Dental Economics titled, “The end of the annual performance review”? Did it make you feel good and nervous at the same time? The article proposed giving up the age-old annual performance review (that’s the feel-good part). Instead, it proposed putting goal setting at the forefront of your performance management going forward (that’s the nervous part). While the shift to focusing on goals may seem daunting, it is worth it and easier than you may think.

Why goals?

The simple answer to “why goals?” is, to gain employee engagement. You can’t be a practice manager without being concerned about employee engagement.

In its research, the Gallup group created the Q12 Survey. Gallup “conducted decades of research—writing, testing, and refining thousands of question items to find the ones that would best measure employee engagement. In 1996, Gallup finalized the 12 question items that consistently and powerfully link to practice outcomes, including profitability, employee retention, productivity, safety records, and customer engagement.”1

What was number one on the list? It was, “I know what is expected of me at work.” This would seem to be a fundamental component to high performance and employee engagement. Goals, among other methods of communication about expectations, such as job descriptions, can be a good way to create that experience for employees.

Creating goals

As the manager, owner, and employer of the practice, creating goals begins with you. You must know where you want your practice to go in order to determine the best way to get there. Therefore, you need to carefully analyze your practice to determine what needs to be improved.