Great Teams Start with Great Leadership w/Erika Pusillo

Bulletproof Dental Practice Podcast Episode 25 Hosts: Dr. Peter Boulden & Dr. Craig Spodak Guest: Erika Pusillo / Practice Optimizer @ Spodak Dental Group Key Takeaways: Running a 4-person office is quite different than running a 40-person team, the key is having the right leadership for your team. Every new stage in your life requires a different version of you. Seek areas that need improvement and try to optimize those areas. Leadership is essential for practice growth, having one person running the whole show can lead to breakdowns. Leadership is bringing other people around you up and into ownership. Nothing will ever be perfect. Start and try, if it doesn’t work the first time then identify what that is and change it. If it does, then multiply those things that work great. The goal is to allow team members to think for themselves, with leadership’s guidance on best practices to get results. Writing down your vision and sharing it creates a snowball effect. Your whole team will be inspired and empowered. Any relationship that is transactional is not a good relationship. Raises should be based on contributions to the practice and producing results, not simply showing up and doing your job. Any practice’s greatest asset is its human capital. The first step in making sure everyone is aligned with the practice’s values is to define your vision and include the team in your goals. Have the team be a part of the decision-making process. Set goals and attach a metric to them. Make sure your team is motivated and ahead of the game to achieve those metrics. Drive your team to be hungry for knowledge and give them leeway to seek knowledge in many different forms. Is there one person already in your business that thinks and acts like a stakeholder? Help them develop their leadership skills. Mastermind with your team. Reward and recognize when the team is doing things right. Great leadership isn’t when the leader has all the answers, it’s when they recognize they need other people and their experiences for the greater benefit of the team. Resources Mentioned: GOTT Summit Bonnie Hickson – The Progressive Dentist Chuck Blakeman – Why Employees Are Always A Bad Idea Chuck Blakeman – Making Money is Killing Your Business Dave Logan, John King, & Halee Fischer-Wright – Tribal Leadership Napoleon Hill – Think and Grow Rich Jim Collins – Good To Great Liz Wiseman – Multipliers Tweetables: Management has to happen; it just has to come from inside. – Dr. Craig Spodak Managers are focused on the process; leaders are focused on results – Dr. Craig Spodak The leader’s job is to ask really good questions, if you’re not getting the answer you want, change the question. – Erika Pusillo Work is not just for money, it’s for fulfillment. – Dr. Craig Spodak We don’t get where we are as individuals by ourselves. – Dr. Peter Boulden Everyone wants to work for a company that is not plateauing, but growing. – Dr. Peter Boulden Employees are all stakeholders in your business. – Dr. Craig Spodak The lives of a lot of people are attached to the decisions that you make. – Dr. Peter Boulden You get more of what you praise. – Dr. Peter Boulden A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves. – Lao Tzu