STAFF SALARIES- How to Afford a "Rock Star" Staff

My Reply: I think the key phrase here is “high for our office”. If we wish to keep our percentage staff costs in the low 20s as our practice grows, then that percentage can be influenced by three variables:

1. the number of staff,
2. the amount we pay them, and
3. our collections.

To meet the overhead objective, then, we can either:

1. hire more people at the same pay scale as the practice grows or
2. increase staff “productivity” so the same number of staff can take care of more patients, allowing you to pay them more and still maintain ideal staff overhead percentages

I always chose #2. We always wanted to have the best trained staff being paid near the top of the pay scale. 

So how do we increase “productivity”? Well, we do it by improving our “systems”, training, and support. Let me give you an example of training for productivity.

At one point, we realized we had “fast” chairside assistants and “slower” ones which were limiting the number of patients we could see each day. We realized that they all didn’t have to be as “fast” as our “best” assistants, but we wanted all assistants to meet certain minimum “speed” requirements to remain on our staff. (By the way, the "fast" ones will eventually resent the "slower" ones and the slower ones often feel bad about not keeping up.)So, here's what we did to increase "productivity".

• We timed all chairside assistants on 10 consecutive standard AW changes (We picked a similar procedure by going from the initial archwire to the second wire in both arches during one visit)
• We took the average of the “fastest” times, added an additional 20% ,and it became the “minimum speed standard” for clinical assistants in our office. (So, for example, if the average of the fastest times was 20 minutes, then our "standard" became 24 minutes for this procedure.)
• Then, the "fast" assistants helped train and support our “slow” assistants, observing how they lost time (perhaps getting up for missing instruments or not being organized during the procedure).
• And when the "slow" ones declared that they were ready to challenge the exam, we timed them with their next 10 consecutive similar AW changes.
• If they didn't make it, no problem. They were encouraged to try again once they identified what held them back.
• Surprisingly, this became a friendly race to see who could be one of the first to challenge and achieve the standard and become a "five star" assistant.
• Over a period of several months, all eventually reached the "standard" with each being proud that they were no longer one of the “slow” ones. Together, we celebrated the achievement of the group, both the "students" as well as the "teachers".

With creativity, we can create similar challenges to increase productivity throughout the office.So, by focusing all our efforts on streamlining our systems and raising the level of everyone’s performance, then that 10-20% of practice growth can now be handled by the same number of staff and pay can increase accordingly, giving us the "Rock Star" Staff we've always wanted.