It takes a great deal of time and effort to build a strong culture. Over the last few weeks, we’ve discussed how to make sure your staff understand the culture you’re striving for, training soft skills to support the culture you build, and staff empowerment through it all. Unfortunately, it only takes a fraction of the time you invest for your practice culture to erode when it isn’t maintained, which is compounded by staff turnover–something most practices are dealing with right now. Culture training cannot be approached as a one-time event; it must be an ongoing process.
Here are some options to consider:
- Peer coaching. Have senior staff coach new hires on the shared values, beliefs, and behaviors that define your practice.
- Monthly “culture topics.” Choose a monthly theme to focus on and discuss at staff meetings.
- Shadowing. Require new hires to shadow staff members who consistently demonstrate the desired culture.
- Lunch-and-learns. Invite reps or speakers to present culture-related topics to your team.
In any organization, it’s important that the team consistently acts in alignment with the defined culture, but the most important tool for continuous culture development is you. As a leader, you drive the standard. You can delegate a lot of things as a practice leader, but don’t completely delegate culture training. It’s too important.
Emulate the behaviors you want others to adopt. Share lessons from books you’ve read. Highlight stories of how your culture drove patient satisfaction and practice growth. When you consistently connect everyday actions back to values, your team starts to internalize not just what you expect, but why it matters.
