What’s Your M.O.? by Jay Geier

Have you ever tried to fit a square peg into a round hole? I hope that we now all have enough common sense and life experience to know that will never work, literally. But figuratively, private practice owners do it all the time—most often when hiring team members.

How often have you regretted a hire shortly after she starts? Even if she had the right skills for the job, maybe she lacked efficiency and productivity. Instead of addressing the disconnect, though, you looked the other way and became frustrated but unsure how to deal with it. If you repeat this pattern hire after hire, soon you'll feel like you're on the Island of Misfit Toys, with a practice full of stressed-out, inefficient team members and dwindling profits.

What if I told you that you might be able to bypass these common frustrations by knowing a particular trait of that new hire? Their M.O., modus operandi, determines how they do what they do every day—how they handle deadlines, employee relationships and new challenges, and even their tendency to accept (or fight) big changes in life. Each of your team members has his or her own personal M.O., and they all interact on a daily basis.

Identifying your strong suits
Several years ago I learned of a tool that sees straight through people's skills and intelligence to their M.O. The Kolbe assessment doesn't have anything to do with how smart, sociable or capable you are; it just reveals how you naturally operate within four critical areas:

• Fact Finder: The instinctive way you gather and share information.
• Follow Thru: The instinctive way you arrange and design.
• Quick Start: The instinctive way you deal with risk and uncertainty.
• Implementor: The instinctive way you handle space and tangibles.

The assessment results are the combination of your ratings in each area, scored on a 1-to-10 scale. It's important to note that a rating of 1 does not translate to a poor score. Because each definition focuses on how you complete a task, not if, a low number just represents a different strength within that area. In fact, every single component of your Kolbe score is positive. It's not about whether you're capable of getting something done; it's about how you get it done when you have the freedom to do it your way.

For example: If Person A is a 1 in the Fact Finder category, she's able to simplify a large amount of information and summarize the message—generally able to make a decision without gathering a ton of details. If Person B is a 9 in the Fact Finder category, she likes to have all of the details before she makes a decision, so she reads through the same information in depth. She may even research something she's read or ask additional questions to make sure she hasn't missed anything. Her explanation of the key messages is thorough, lengthy and complex.

Each woman has a totally different M.O. Neither is "better"—each has its unique advantages—and they might even still reach exactly the same conclusion. Their scores just unlock how they do what they do, and why.

Playing to each person's strengths
You make unconscious decisions based on your M.O. every single day, and the success of your practice depends on your understanding and leveraging these unconscious decisions. I can almost guarantee that you and your team are spending hundreds of hours per month on tasks that don't come naturally or are better suited for someone with different strengths.

This isn't just a waste of natural potential—it's a money drain. For instance, I'm a high Quick Start and a low Fact Finder, which means I get excited about big ideas, make decisions quickly and move on without gathering tons of detailed information. While this M.O. has allowed me to create my company, reach seemingly "impossible" goals and multitask among various projects, it also means that I let details (such as meetings and phone calls) slip through the cracks. Once I saw my Kolbe score and began to understand this fact, I made sure that I hired people close to me whose Kolbe assessments provide balance to mine. Those people are some of my most valuable assets; they complement my strengths and help me to stay on schedule and on task.

Now let's talk about you and your team. Understanding the way they operate will allow you to maximize their strengths and leverage your greatest asset and unlock your full human capital potential. Translation? More money for you, more money for your team, more money for your practice.

Here's what a few Townies had to say:

• "I'm a high Quick Start and prefer information via bullets," says Dr. Joe Maio of Apex Dental in Murray, Utah. "So when I would get long, detailed emails from my office manager, I'd simply ignore them. They were too much. She would then get mad at me for not responding, and the tension would trickle down into all of our interactions."
• "This training has helped our team members work out issues that have been a problem for a long time." — Dr. Travis Hunsaker of Salem, Oregon
• "I saw a lot of value in how Kolbe will help me adjust to how I train team members," says Rachel, a team leader in Dr. Mark Lowe's office in Fresno, California. "Knowing their scores is extremely beneficial to understanding your team ... and adapting techniques to benefit each individual."

Understanding your employees' M.O.s provides a whole slew of benefits to your practice. It will:

• Reduce stress that leads to costly turnover.
• Diagnose human capital problems and provide practical solutions.
• Improve team communication.
• Reduce team conflict that leads to loss of productivity.
• Increase efficiency by having the right people in the right roles.
• Help team leaders maximize delegation.
• Help team leaders to become more effective

Reading the signs
Understanding the Kolbe assessment can also help you look for signs during patient interactions so that you can understand each person's M.O. and use that knowledge to create a customer-centric experience. For example, if a new patient asks a lot of questions on the phone, she's probably a high Fact Finder—meaning she will want all the available details and information before making a decision. Patients who are high Implementors will benefit from a tangible experience; bringing them into the office to touch props or models will help them fully understand the treatment they need.

It's worth noting that there is no "best" Kolbe score for a given position; the ideal score for, say, a hygienist at your practice may be different than the ideal score for a hygienist at another office, depending upon the expectations of the practice leader.

The key is to recognize where the individual's strengths fall, and to put him or her in a role that requires more of what suits them. For example, you don't want to put a high Quick Start in a role that requires long-term attention or details, like in research or data collection.

The bottom line
Like it or not, if you own a private practice you're in the people business. And people will always be a challenge. But when you can finally understand why they do what they do and what makes them tick, you can replace many of those challenges with productivity, efficiency and results.

If what you've been doing isn't getting you to where you want to be, it's time to try something new. Rather than continuing to function on autopilot, why not take the next step to success by decoding your and your team's M.O.s? Kolbe is a great start to building a dream team from the people you already have and preventing yourself from wasting any more time or money on bad candidates.

We've seen through countless client experiences the trickle-down effect of a good or a bad team. A good team is happy, engaged, coachable and a valuable asset to your practice. It directly affects your new-patient numbers, collections and productivity. The better you know your team members, develop their skills and have them in the right spots, the better your numbers—and stress levels—will be.

Quick Starters: Jump in now! (Fact Finders: Gather more info)
The Kolbe Corp. offers several assessments, including the Kolbe "A" that Jay Geier discusses in this article. To learn more, go to kolbe.com.