Ready or not, Helena, here we come!!
Alas, it’s time for The Gathering, and Summit partners and their staff will be converging on Helena for a couple days of great colleagueship, great dialogue, great food and drink and great fun! I hope you and some team members will be joining us there, but in the event you can’t make it this year (or if you’re coming), I wanted to share some planned focuses of our time together this weekend and get the creative juices flowing.
For starters, and a new efficiency twist, this year the Annual Summit Partner Meeting will be happening (Friday later afternoon) while partners are gathered for the SUMMIT SUMMIT. Hats-Off to the Summit Optical Team for organizing this two-birds with one stone line-up this year, always great to make the most of our time and travel.
OK, here’s the SUMMIT SUMMIT line-up for the doctors.
Yes or No on Vision Plans, PART 2!
Our Yes or No on Vision Plans conversation last year proved to be the right topic at the right time, and the conversation has continued on the partner HELP DESK pretty much non-stop since then. Although participating in some or all third-party vision plans in this day and age is very much a decision specific to each practice in its given time and place, some group discussion of pros, cons and what to do about it all is helpful for all of us as we keep our heads on a swivel regarding this topic and keep always ready to proact accordingly.
Keeping this conversational (which I love about the SUMMIT SUMMIT), we’re going to tackle key factors in making our decisions as well as continue our discussion on strategies for both “yes” and “no” on vision plans, like team management of metrics for team participation in decisions, killer “first-party” internal vision plans (including partner program examples), training-up the team for patient presentation and avoiding vision plan pitfalls.
Retaining Staff in a Challenging Labor Market!
This is a topic all too familiar for all of us in bricks and mortar small business, certainly including private practice optometry. Focuses of this discussion will include getting a better and more accurate understanding the team’s thinking, conducting a Team Input Survey to achieve and leverage “skin in the game,” developing a Strategic Plan of initiatives designed to engage and retain staff, the importance of committing out loud, engaging employees by delegation without surrender, right compensation strategies and a better program for praises, raises and phases.
Associates and Practice Transition DONE RIGHT!
This is another of those non-stop partner conversation topics, and the SUMMIT SUMMIT gathering is the perfect venue for gleaning helpful perspective from close colleagues in private practice. We’ll discuss being mentally ready, performance ready, schedule ready, team ready, space ready, patient ready, website ready, marketing ready and doctor ready for thriving associateship. We’ll then shift gears and discuss recruiting your first or next associate in these times and follow that with a conversation about The 5 “Sates” for Thriving Associateship – Compensate, Integrate, Communicate, Valuate and Evaluate. Again and as always, we’ll be welcoming partner input to keep our focus on these critical success topics fully conversational!
Leadership, Management, Culture, Teamwork!
When it comes to team focus and/or education, it’s not unusual for the staff and doctor to be focused on different things at the same time or on the same things at different times. For this Saturday morning session, we’ll ALL be in the same room focused on the same things at the same time. We’ll be discussing the need and way for all team members to engage in LEADERSHIP (the way we think), MANAGEMENT (systemizing that thinking to make it fully and continuously deliverable), CULTURE (the vibe we choose and own for life at work) and TEAMWORK (the whole hopefully much greater than the sum of those parts). As the old saying goes, it takes a team, and that is certainly true when it comes to these components of great teamwork.
Golden Nugget Game Changers!
This session is also doctors and staff together and will cap-off the 2024 SUMMIT SUMMIT. For this one, we’ve invited attending teams to plan one “Golden Nugget” to share with the group (and if you’re joining us in Helena, please consider this a helpful reminder to make ready! ) It might be something they’ve been doing for years, something they’ve just started doing, something they’ve stopped doing, something they’ll soon be trying, something helpful for recruiting/hiring, a scheduling, website or social media idea, ways they’re doing incentive bonuses, building team culture or managing metrics, a new Vision Benefits Program that’s killin’ it or whatever it might be. So we’re all doing a little thinking in advance, and then we’ll share with the class!
Well that’s the plan, Partners. If you’re joining us in Helena, fantastic, and if not, hopefully this helps you and your team with some focus topics for Q-4 and Q-1. We look forward to seeing you in Helena this week, or in a future year, for some game-changing partner dialogue!
Like all THRIVE content, the purpose of BOWEN’S BLOG and SUMMIT TALK Podlecture conversations is to keep us driving together toward IMPACT. If something here has struck a chord, shoot us an email or give us a call and let’s talk it out! Tbowen@mythrivecoaches.com or 402-794-4064.