Creating a Change Culture

By Dr. Trevor Miranda, Optometrist My dear mother (may she rest in peace) used to say “slowly, slowly catch the monkey.” While I am still uncertain how hygienic it would be to “catch” a monkey, not to mention that it may be cruel, I have bought into my mother’s axiom - although, it took years to figure out what she was talking about! Change happens slowly and then suddenly.

At Cowichan Eyecare we have grown into 5 bustling clinics with nine doctors and many staff. We have changed over the years! It is one thing to be forced to change and another to embrace and seek change. The holy grail is to create a culture of change where the team looks to improve, tries new things and embraces the excitement of different technology. I am sure we all have staff that may roll their eyes when the doctors come back from a conference full of exciting new ideas to implement. The staff knowingly smile in their minds, understanding the doctor’s enthusiasm will soon wane and everyone can go back to their staid and comfortable ways in a week or so.

Here are some keys to creating and maintaining a change culture:

Accountability

Every great organization and team has accountability. Sharing the revenue and profit picture, having a team bonus, sharing capture and dispensing rates with each doctor and staff to acknowledge the “current reality” is the first step to embracing change. Russell Wilson, All Star Quarterback formerly of the Seattle Seahawks, said he looks forward to “Truth Mondays” after a Sunday football game where all the plays, good and bad, are dissected. How conditioned is your team to hearing the current reality and the truth? Do they view this as a personal affront or has the notion of improved patient care and business processes, profits and bonuses equated to facing the mirror of truth. Criticism, when it is meant to help the other person, should be welcomed and carefully considered while allowing freedom to disagree without defensiveness or emotion.

Goals are fine but Processes are Better

Creating great habits is key to ensuring new ways of doing things are adopted. It is more important to look to provide processes and require strict adherence to the processes rather than a nebulous goal. Let’s say the goal is to improve sales. One process could be that everyone gets a quote before they leave the office. After a while the habit of quoting every patient a price seeps through every employee and becomes habitual.

Create Change Agents

The hiring process is important to ensuring your team is flexible. Ask new hires if they embrace change or are they slow to change. Find “Champions” on your team that can drive change and be accountable to the processes and ultimately the results. Reward these team members for excellent

accountable to the processes and ultimately the results. Reward these team members for excellent performance with compensation increases, prizes and recognition. It is important to provide positive reinforcement for good behavior. The ratio of “way to go” to “you missed this” needs to be 4:1 in order to give motivation to conform to the standards. New staff should be encouraged to make suggestions to improve processes as they “see” the office for the first time. Never say you can’t change, can’t provide a different product or service, or completely reimagine optometry and eye care. A great book "Think Again" by Adam Grant tells about why embracing an openness to changing your mind is powerful fuel to organizational greatness.

Communicate

Communication is a key ingredient to the “Change Cake.” It is important to continuously encourage and have a high awareness of any team member ignoring the changes. Create team buy-in by presenting it at a staff meeting and encouraging feedback. In this way the entire team “owns” the change. We use Slack to communicate with each other and a “Blue Note” channel to shout out great behaviours. Direct communication is important if the leadership and management team notice poor compliance. We believe in a congruence between the inside voice and the outside voice. This means that it isn’t okay to think about something and not give your team members the courtesy of your thoughts. Sometimes instant clarifications can avoid misunderstanding and provide further motivations to improve.

Embrace Technology

Online booking, e-commerce enabled website, dry eye clinic, myopia control, subscription contact lens services, internet intake forms and telehealth consults are just some of the new advances we have embraced at our clinics. Keep looking for ways to improve and over time your clinic will be ahead of the curve.

Have Fun

Dealing with the public, navigating COVID and competing in an uber competitive field can stress even the most optimistic optometric owners. “Hakuna Matata” mentality is important. The leaders need to project optimistic and fun attitudes. Never let them see you sweat. Manifest the positive and make a change for the better. Enjoy what you do and how you do it!