You cannot outsource leadership! Warning: contains a mother's rant!
Wednesday, February 09, 2011 : Catherine-Anne Walsh
This is a story about a long-winded beginning! It is about opening my mind to the world outside my profession and learning from people who may not have the same qualification, but have the same passion for creating successful businesses whilst maintaining a healthy work-life balance.
It takes a lot of learning, a lot of planning and a lot of work, but it is possible to create a business which can be running like a sailing ship, racing in strong winds but standing barely moving in calm waters. I can see the possibility and this is enough for me to cling to it and sail towards it. And I am not doing it alone... I am a novice at this, I am the first one to admit it! A "technician suffering from an entrepreneurial seizure" to quote Mr Michael Gerber http://www.e-myth.com. Yet, I feel that I can do better.
As a business owner, in 2006 I set out on a journey which may not have been very clear to me back then and my expectations (if I had any, back in the "bright-eyed and bushy-tailed" days when everything was simply going to "work out") may have been unrealistic. Only a couple of years later, I realized something was wrong and I found this out at the worst possible time: on maternity leave!
When I found out I was expecting, I was elated and proud and......HORRIFIED! I mean, we wanted a child, we planned a child and we were crossing our fingers each month hoping that this would be the month our wish would come true. And now, sitting in my dental chair, sharing my news with my nurse (at the time, the practice was a one-dentist one nurse/receptionist arrangement), something was not right.She was happy for me, yet her smile hid a look of terror. I am sure she was thinking "what will happen to me now?, who will come and replace her? how will I work with a newcomer? I don't think can I run this practice on my own?"... I had completely underestimated what I was about to do: leave my new business (by that stage only about two years old) in the hands of a new dentist whom I had never met before and a nurse who had worked with me for less than a year and had no previous dental experience! AM I INSANE?
I was insane, only I didn't know it yet. In my elated state I still thought everything will work out just fine! I found a respectable, well-trained person to replace me. On paper, this person was amazing. Things were looking good. We job-shared for a couple of months, then I had my baby and he took over full-time. At the time, I was still doing all my own bookkeeping, payroll, bills, solving it and phone issues, I WAS the business and I had no idea how much I was going to pay for that!
CONGRATULATIONS, IT'S A GIRL!
The day I came home from the hospital, there was a phone bill overdue: a quick phone call to the phone company and a "sorry I was away to give birth" excuse turned the call centre into a cooing mess and crisis was averted! Phew, now," I remember there was a pile of bills somewhere which were due last week, but where did I put them? Oh, doesn't matter, I'll deal with it later, I just brought a baby home, for goodness sake".
...A MONTH LATER "Yes, J (my nurse is on the phone, the suppliers called again, the bills have to be paid now or she cannot make any more orders), I got the pile of statements you sent me, I promise I will pay them today! Just call her back and say I am doing it now, I am sorry!", speaking with the handset between the ear and the shoulder, trying not to move as my daughter had just closed her eyes and is having her fifth cat-nap at 10am. Normally they last 5 minutes, let's see if I can stretch this one to 10. I start at the top of the pile, dial the first supplier we owe, process the payment, "this is easy" I think to myself. Yes! I high-five myself in my thoughts, one statement down, five hundred to go (ok I exaggerate, but it did seem that way at the time)! By the middle of the pile baby starts to wake, mid way through the payment, loud screaming can be heard, not from one, but two sources. C (my daughter) is screaming her usual baby "you are the worst mother in the world" scream while I am screaming my credit card numbers over the top of her (the neighbours must have thought I was one very ambitious mother trying to teach numbers to a newborn baby)! It took me a week to complete those payments and a week later, guess what, more statements arrived! MYOB? What does that stand for again? Now, in my stupor, unaware of what day or time of day it was, having not had a proper meal or an uninterrupted toilet break since the last of the family visitors left (about three months ago), amongst other things, I also forgot (and in the odd moments when I remembered it I simply had no time left for it) I was my own bookkeeper. I quickly lost track of all of my accounts, balances, bank statements... Lucky it was January, I would just hand over to the accountants in June, they only had to do 6 months of it, it would be ok! Little did I know it would be a year and a half before that issue would be resolved and a year and a half of entries all neatly coded and reconciled by a bookkeeper! Needless to say, it cost a mint!
...TWO MONTHS LATER J is leaving! How can she do this to me, how can she leave now when I need her? After all I have done for her? I trained her and looked after her and believed in her and was there for her when she was sad.... She wants to have a baby! Is she crazy? Does she know that babies cry and demand attention and don't let you do anything else but carry, feed, change, pat??? Oh, well, her loss, I will find someone else (confidence goes up, I can do this, I am a strong, capable person).....But who (the desperation returns) and how will I find this new nurse and where? And how will I interview them, should I ask them to come to my house and talk to me while I carry, feed, change and pat? Ghhhhhhhrrhrrrr, I cannot lose it now. The phone rings, "THANK GOD!" I say to the person on the other side: it's my sister. Her timing is PERFECT! Just checking on us. I tell her the latest news. She offers to come from interstate and spend a few weeks working at the practice, running it and interviewing candidates. I take her offer. I GRAB HER OFFER!!!! I am so grateful, this will be the solution, maybe she will want to stay forever?
...THREE MONTHS LATER My poor (and I mean, "poor" as in "too kind for her own good" not "financially disadvantaged") sister stayed for 6 weeks! She hired a nurse who was not exactly a "perfect fit" but was the best we could do under the circumstances, now that nurse had to go and I was back and I was going to take control of this place! I hired a receptionist, I found new nurses, I met with the other dentist regularly. I then decided I had to return full-time to protect my business. I hired a bookkeeper. The bills and the books were being done, she even did the payroll. It felt like I stepped in at just the right time. Things were looking up once again!
MANAGEMENT CONSULTANT
(if you have read every word up to now, trust me, this is where the big revelation is, so worth reading on, you've come this far!)
I was excited about my new staff and about being back at work. I love this place, I am in control here, what I say goes, what I do counts and is appreciated! Yet, I feel I am not giving it my best. I run to childcare in the morning, I run to childcare in the evening. I am not spending enough time thinking about goals and the future of the business. I just go to work. At home, I am a useless mom. I hyperventilate at the thought of the next meal, I struggle not to burn things, I struggle to keep my eyes open long enough to read my daughter a story at bed-time, I forget about the dirty dishes, laundry and general house work for days. Luckily, I now outsource that too, once per fortnight. Six months after my return, I felt we needed to expand. I hired a management consulting firm who specialize in dental practices to help with the expansion. I was excited about learning more and taking my practice to a whole new level in customer service and overall care. Several in house, full day workshops later, a whole new set of staff changed and a whole new practice philosophy having been adopted, I was facing yet another staff crisis!
I sat my staff down and asked what they thought of the program? They were polite enough to say "it confused them", "they didn't find it very relevant", "they could not follow the rationale behind what we were being told to do". I just could not figure it out: my staff are hard workers, reasonable women, we all get along, I cannot fault either of them! Why are they resistant to new suggestions? Why can't they see how interesting this all is and how much we can improve our service and customer satisfaction by implementing the suggestions we are given? I was feeling very burnt out and needed a holiday. Just before we all went away on a four-week break, mid year, my receptionist came to me and suggested I read a book on small business, which I may find interesting and helpful. The book changed my life. It wasn't just what was in it, it was the realization that I got it all wrong, I was trying to sail a massive sailboat all by myself, a skipper without a crew. Yet, I had a crew, but I didn't show them the ropes! So all they did was "get in the way". I suddenly imagined my big boat with every crew member pulling their weight. How much easier would my life be, how much more enjoyable the trip, no matter how rough the sea got? After all, without strong winds, a sailboat would not get very far!
I FIRED MY CONSULTANT! We expanded our views by hearing other people's views on practice management.
WE BECAME OUR OWN IN-HOUSE CONSULTANTS! We started having weekly meetings. We started learning from each other. We made up our own protocols. We implemented our own ideas. What's more important, we could see how a problem we were facing was potentially going to be solved by our idea. If it didn't work, we would go back and try something else. The process of arriving at a possible solution is half the solution! It means we are all willing to commit to implementing the solution, because, after all, it is OUR OWN IDEA!
I JOINED A BUSINESS NETWORK AGAIN! It is a coming together of people who want to expand their business and solve problems their business face by seeing how other industries and businesses approach similar problems. I am always surprised how much a software engineering company has in common with a dental practice.
THIS IS ONLY THE BEGINNING! The most important lesson I have learnt so far is that you cannot outsource leadership! As a business owner and employer, I bear a strong responsibility towards the people I employ and towards our customers. To give our customers the service and quality they deserve, I need to ensure the staff are well-trained and empowered to provide this service. To give the staff adequate recognition for their work the business needs to keep sailing, just like that proverbial sailboat. That whole circular reference requires only one thing: leadership and from one person: me. To be a leader, I need to educate myself and my staff. I need to outsource duties I cannot complete. I need to listen to those around me who are kind enough to share their feelings and thoughts with me.
I AM NOW WORKING ON MY BUSINESS, NOT JUST IN IT
I took some of the advice from various texts I read since my realization that I needed to be a better leader. The first one is to start working "on" my business and not just "in" it. As of March, I plan to work half of my working week as a dentist and half as a principal of my dental practice. I have employed a dentist who will cover the rest of the clinical hours. I am looking to employ a second nurse to help our existing nurse with the workload. I will now have quality time at home to dedicate to my little daughter. She really wants a baby sister and you just cannot say "no" to a 3-year-old, now, can you?
