There is one key change dental companies can make to enhance the patient experience, according to Ryan McCostlin, founder and CEO at Tailwater Dental Partners in Nashville, Tenn.
Mr. McCostlin recently joined the Becker's Dental + DSO Review podcast to discuss the trends he is following in the industry and what effective healthcare leaders need to be successful.
Editor's note: Responses were lightly edited for clarity and length.
Question: What will the most effective healthcare leaders need to be successful in the next two to three years?
Ryan McCostlin: A few different things. More than ever before, these groups that have grown need to watch cash flow and be really careful with their capital expenditures. They need to make smart investments and make sure they're getting returns on those because there is less margin for error than there was 10 years ago. Now the interest rates are higher for any practice or group that has some debt on their balance sheet. So we need to be smarter than ever before about making the right kinds of investments in equipment [and] in people.
I think we need to continue to see these businesses as human-driven businesses. Too often DSOs make decisions based on spreadsheets, and we measure everything too, but the ones that are going to win are going to make decisions based on people and principles supported by spreadsheets. You can run a good business with good systems, but if you don't have the right people bringing them to life, that's not going to work. Leaders in this space need to think long and hard about the investments they're making and make sure they're getting a good return, and they also need to prioritize their people and recognize that this is a very intimate industry. There are people who work elbow to elbow with each other in operatories and practices, and they're working on patients.
Daniel Meyer wrote a book called "Setting the Table." In his book, [he] talks about hospitality and what that means to him and his group of restaurants, and it really resonated with me and I think there are some parallels with dentistry. He says hospitality is when people feel like things are being done for them, not to them. I think too often the patient experience in dentistry is one in which people feel like things are being done to them and not for them. If we can flip that, and once again make sure these practices we're supporting retain their souls and culture and the things that make them special and respected in their communities, that can go a long way toward patient experience and making sure people feel like things are being done for them and not to them.