Strategic planning of your schedule, personally and professionally, is crucial to creating a balanced schedule and life. One factor to consider when organizing your time is to create a schedule that prioritizes stability and consistency into your life. We all find ourselves overwhelmed with many different tasks and commitments. The majority of which are all worthwhile endeavors, but could they be discontinued to allow room for more important activities? What we must individually decide is this, “Which tasks and commitments do I really love and have time for?” Each of us has to decide how to balance our own work, play, love and worship.
If it is true that we reap what we sow in life then it must be doubly true that we reap the sowing of our time management. We often ignore the fact that wasted time can never be found again. Because of this very issue, my team and I plan our yearly schedule, together. In October each year we all sit down together at a team meeting with a large dry erase calendar, everyone’s individual calendars, and the office computer to make next years’ schedule. We know that day with a 90% certainty when we will and when we will not be in the office for the next year. We also know that there will be minor changes in the schedule almost every year, but those rare occasions can be managed, together, as they arise.
This system works because the calendar includes every holiday, doctor and team member’s vacations, seminars, and any other occasion that the doctor may need to be out of the office for. We create the schedule in this same order; holidays, vacations, seminars, etc. We have found that we must work an average of 16 days a month to cover expenses and to live comfortably. This equals out to be 192 days per year. We do not necessarily work 16 days every month. We may work 14 days one month and 19 days another month. It depends on the days needed and the days off for that month. We will work a Friday periodically if we find a month that has 14 or fewer days.
Even though it is now past October and 2007 will soon be a memory, it is not too late to begin balancing your schedule for 2008. You and your team can create next years schedule at the next scheduled team meeting and then resolve to make this a yearly October task. Of course you will need to create your schedule to fit your specific hours, family commitments and financial responsibilities. I have found that when the entire team is involved in this decision making process it creates unity and strengthens the team. No one resents working Fridays because everyone understands their importance in the scheme of the year long schedule.
Striving to stay balanced in our personal and professional lives throughout the year as well as each day is our ultimate goal. We have only so much time that our life circumstances will allow us to do the dentistry that we all love. If we deal with undue stresses on a daily basis, like those caused by an unbalanced schedule, our dental careers and those of our team members could be shortened. These stresses could result in having medical issues arise; not to mention the diminished quality of life personally. Make your first 2008 resolution now to “design balance” into your life and watch the rewards that you, your team, your family and your patients begin to reap.
