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Short waiting periods, friendly employees, efficient workflows, and positive reviews are signs of a functional team. If you struggle in these areas, these chiropractic team-building strategies could help you bring the office together and prioritize your shared values.
Consider Your Values
Before you make any changes, you'll need to define your office's values. Your values influence many business decisions, including hiring employees, talking to patients, choosing technology, and working with business partners. For example, if your team emphasizes clean energy, you might opt for technology that uses less power and produces as little waste as possible.
Common values include:
- Honesty
- Compassion
- Attention to detail
- Patience
- Environmental friendliness
- Wisdom
- Teamwork
- Open communication
- Continued education
Once you've chosen your values, try hanging up a sign or posting about them on social media to keep your employees informed. You'll also think of ways to showcase your values throughout the workday, such as building on existing knowledge or listening to patients with an open mind.
Define Responsibilities and Expectations
If you've ever worked in retail or food service, you've probably seen how quickly teams fall apart when they don't have defined duties. Employees have to double or triple their workloads, leading to reduced satisfaction and frequent customer complaints. To make matters worse, the extra responsibilities don't come with increased pay.
Respecting your employees means clearly defining their roles, responsibilities, and expectations. You'll ask each person to complete their job and no one else's. When everyone has a specific duty, your office runs more smoothly, encouraging employees to work together as a team instead of competing against each other. This also helps your workers become experts in their positions.
Encourage Open Communication
Open communication gives your workers an outlet for their problems. Fostering a safe, trusting environment can resolve conflicts before they interfere with your chiropractic team-building strategies. You'll also show your team that direct communication, not gossiping, is the best way to build strong relationships.
Ensure that every employee has your email address and business phone number so they can reach out at their convenience. Invite them to visit your office if they need to talk in person. While you don't have to be available 24/7, you could invest in a chiropractic answering service for after-hours calls.
Offer Recognition
Showing appreciation doesn't just make one employee feel good. Instead, it gives the entire office a reason to get together and congratulate them on their accomplishments. When a coworker excels at their job or reaches a milestone, such as working at the company for one year, don't be afraid to give them a gift or acknowledge them during a meeting.
While at it, promote a sense of community in your workplace by appreciating everyone's efforts. You could surprise them with lunch catering, give them holiday gifts, or praise everyone during a meeting when you achieve a goal, such as improving patient satisfaction.
Trust Your Employees
Micromanaging might increase productivity in the short term but also lowers workplace morale and shows your employees that you don't trust them. This behavior could also encourage coworkers to turn on each other, thinking they'll get special favors from management. Building a healthy workplace ultimately means trusting your employees to do their jobs.
Your team should know they can reach out if they have questions, but you don't have to hover over their shoulders. Instead, give each person the freedom to organize their duties and work at their own pace. When employees can make decisions and set goals, they'll enjoy coming to work every day.
Schedule Team Building Activities
Chiropractic team building can be difficult when employees work in small groups and don't mingle often. To build relationships, try hosting events where your entire office can get to know each other. This could be as simple as a potluck where everyone brings a dish or a night at the local theater.
Most communities offer events for large groups, such as trivia nights, sports games, craft fairs, escape rooms, and concerts. You might even get a bulk rate for group tickets. For more fun, consider private events, such as cooking classes and "paint and sip" nights for wine enthusiasts.
Be a Role Model
Your employees might not say it out loud, but they look up to you and expect you to set the tone for the workplace. For this reason, it's important to remember your values whenever you interact with your team. Show them the importance of interacting with others in a kind, considerate manner.
At times, you might have conflicts with your employees. Take this as an opportunity to demonstrate patience and conflict resolution, then complete an activity with this person to create a united front. This might involve taking this employee to lunch, inviting them to help you lead a meeting, or collaborating on an important project.
Encourage Professional Development
Sometimes, your teammates want to advance but fear that they lack the skills to apply for better jobs. Professional development programs help them learn more skills, meet higher-ups, and socialize with their coworkers. You could even take this opportunity to sneak in a few team-building exercises that encourage shy employees to open up.
Try hosting classes and workshops that teach your coworkers what they need to succeed in this industry. For networking, give them opportunities to talk to chiropractors, business owners, and managers. When the program ends, you could celebrate your team's accomplishments and discuss ways to build on their existing knowledge.
Request Feedback
No matter how warm and open you are, you'll always have teammates who avoid directly discussing issues. Give them an outlet by asking for anonymous feedback. The anonymity encourages people to share their honest thoughts, and you might learn about conflicts, pain points, and technology issues that are holding your team back.
Periodically, try sending a survey with open-ended and multiple-choice questions. Most people won't spend too much time responding, so make sure the survey takes no more than 15 minutes to complete. To maximize your number of responses, you could offer a reward at the end, such as a coupon for a local restaurant.
Invest in an Answering Service
Outdated technology places an extra strain on your employees and patients. If you lose potential patients because they keep calling after your business has closed, it might be time to invest in an after-hours answering service.
PrimeVOX will give your team a unique phone number. When someone calls this number after hours, they can leave a voicemail or talk to an employee. If they can't reach an employee, your team will receive a notification so that you can call back as soon as possible. This helps you broaden your reach and schedule more patients than ever before.
Call PrimeVOX to learn more about our after-hours answering service. We can also set up a VoIP business phone system, text messaging service, and digital fax.
