Adam Lueken
As the year winds down, you may be looking at your team’s performance this year as a whole and with individual reviews, to get a sense of what’s working well and what isn’t. This is a great way to set practice and team goals for the upcoming year, and help your team members continually advance themselves.
An important factor to consider (which may not be as clearly defined) is your team’s engagement. A team cannot be successful if members are not engaged with their own positions and helping each other. A fully-engaged team will be more focused on building more meaningful relationships with patients and increasing overall practice satisfaction.
It’s not always easy to maintain ideal team engagement either. Many factors can cause team members to feel stuck in their role, lose their sense of purpose and become frustrated. And that can lead to frequent turnover, a decrease in team morale, team performance issues, etc.
As the practice leader, it begins with you creating an environment that keeps your team engaged. To achieve and maintain this, here are a few thoughts.
Recognize Your Team
When your team achieves great things (or even just small things), acknowledge them. Simple recognition can go a long way for keeping team members encouraged and positive. Reward achievements too. Have celebrations or give small tokens of appreciation. Or even a thank you note or email will mean a lot.
Make Yourself Accessible
Many leaders claim to have an open-door policy, but don’t actually live up to it. Make that claim and stand by it. Make sure your team knows they can come to you with any issue or problem without being judged or looked down upon. You still want to empower your team to stand on their own without coming to you with every single issue. But knowing that you have their back in any situation will help give them the confidence to do that.
Don’t Forget About Continuing Education
A great way to avoid getting stagnant in your role is to learn new things and advance your skills. Depending on their roles, encourage your team members to seek out continuing education opportunities that will help them succeed. Depending on your budget, covering the costs would also show your commitment to your team’s advancement.
Give Feedback
If team members don’t know or feel connected with what your expectations are, it can be difficult to stay engaged. When team members can give and receive important feedback in a constructive way, it will help them feel more motivated if they know what specific areas they are succeeding in and what opportunities they still have. It’s important to do this on a regular basis as well, so progress can be tracked.
Overall, these steps will make your team members feel valued, which will make them want to engage. This means a stronger team and most importantly, a higher patient satisfaction and level of care.
If you need extra support with team building, we’re just a quick phone call or click away. Schedule a consultation with one of our practice management experts today!