Identifying and living your core values is the most important thing you will ever do. In this episode, Miranda Beeson, ACT’s director of education, brings in ACT’s founder, Kirk Behrendt, to share the story behind their core values, how they came to be, and why core values matter to a dental practice. To gain insight and inspiration for your core values, listen to Episode 967 of The Best Practices Show!
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Main Takeaways:
Quotes:
“I remember the journey that I took on this. As we started to grow ACT, it got complicated and I didn't have core values. Let me tell you what the world was like before core values. Before core values, I was just trying to be good to everybody. So, you bring in dynamic people. There were no rules on how to behave. You honored everyone's opinions. You honored when they were upset. I had a lot of people that would come into my office and cry. Then, I would go, ‘Don't worry, it'll be okay.’ Then, I would talk to another team member, then go to another team member. It was a constant putting out of fires. Now, I don't want to discredit previous employees of ACT because, if you're listening to this, I love you. I just wasn't the right leader for you at the right time. I didn't know how to put my flag in the ground and say, ‘Listen, this is how it works here.’ I didn't have the tools to be able to do that.” (3:01—3:55) -Kirk
“We become friends with, or we feel comfortable around people who share our values. The same thing happens in our office. If there's ever an issue or a challenge in the office, it's generally when something is rubbing against core values. If there's a team member who we just keep coming back to a challenge with, more than likely, it's something around the behaviors and how they rub against the core values in our practice. And sometimes, we haven't identified those yet. When we start working with teams, if there aren't core values present, I can start to identify this common challenge. It's clearly because there's not an expectation of how we behave here. A lot of practices will say they have core values. But if you ask, ‘What are they?’ ‘Oh, I have them written down. Hold on, let me look that up,’ or they point to a sign on the wall. But that's different than them being truly woven into the fabric of the everyday culture in your practice.” (7:14—8:14) -Miranda
“It really is important to make sure that we make very clear, as a leader, the expectations of behavior in our practice. It's just like in your home. You're going to have so much less conflict if it's very clear from the leader, the parents, what the expectations are in our home. It's the same in your practice. So, to me, that's what core values are, that compass. Like you said, you filter all decisions through them. You guide all feedback through them. They become woven into the fabric of everything that you do in your practice.” (8:46—9:20) -Miranda
“[Core values] is the single most important thing you will ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever do personally and professionally. The only way anything works for you personally in a relationship is a values matchup. Your favorite people care about the same things that you care about. The same thing happens in business. When you get what you care about right — which are your behaviors, how we treat each other, how we act and respond — you start attracting the first person that fits your values. Then, they bring another person. Then, they bring another person. Each person stays, and the flag that you put in the ground gets bigger and it gets stronger.” (9:31—10:15) -Kirk
“You spend 30% of your life at one place. It's called work. The bottom line is you’ve got to enjoy what you do. The biggest piece of that is you actually enjoy the people around you.” (11:58—12:07) -Kirk
“I don't know who said this, but one of my favorite quotes is always receive without forgetting and always give without remembering. Find joy in the give.” (14:20—14:32) -Kirk
“When you give to people, people will start to trust you.” (16:18—16:21) -Kirk
“You don't have to get something back to give to someone else.” (18:34—18:37) -Miranda
“I'll give you the quote that I love the most that has been the genesis behind Walk the Talk: the easiest life you can live is when three selves are lined up. Number one, it's who you think you are, who others think you are, and who you really want to be.” (22:16—22:38) -Kirk
“What we say a lot is, as goes the leader goes the team. I feel like that plays a lot into Walk the Talk. We even have it written out in this core value that I'm not going to ask of you something I'm not willing to do myself. So, it's really that same concept and we layer that forward in that line of, as goes the leader goes the team. I think that fits a lot. I'm not going to ask you to do something that I'm not willing to do myself. I'm not going to ask you to have productive conflict conversations or confront a team member if I'm not willing to do that myself.” (23:44—24:17) -Miranda
“We Before Me is a family concept. It's the herd concept. [Our practice coach] taught me this. He's like, ‘Be very aware of people that go I, I, I, I. They use the words I, me, me, me, me, me, I, I, I. You want to stay away from them. But the people that are into the “we” concept really, truly do care about the “us” first.’ So, We Before Me speaks to like, let's take care of us so we all benefit, not so just I benefit.” (27:09—27:37) -Kirk
“Being a team sport person, I can't agree more that there is no one job or one person that can really carry it over to the finish line. When you layer that into the practice, there is no hierarchy. There is no one person that's better than another. The doctor cannot do this on their own. You need the assistants, you need the hygienists, and you need the administrative team. So, this concept of team and this concept of We Before Me is, I think, incredibly strong especially within a dental practice.” (28:20—28:49) -Miranda
“When we talk about Results Driven in a dental practice, a lot of times, we're looking at numbers. We are measuring data. Like, even with you talking about the way that we help perform for our clients, we want them to see an ROI. We're looking at metrics to know if that's happening. It might be metrics measuring the health of their culture. From start to finish, it might be metrics in terms of production and dollar amounts, but we're looking at metrics. So, what I talk to teams about a lot of times is it's hard sometimes to look at metrics if you're not a practice who has, because results driven or metrics or data can feel a little bit cold. But ultimately, I like for people to think of this mindset of when our metrics are improving, when the results and the data are showing gain, we know — and I love the word responsibility . . . because we also have a responsibility to our patients. They're coming and choosing our practice, to come see us and be with us. Our responsibility is to take care of them in the best way possible, and we start to see them receiving a higher level of care in parallel with those data or results going up in practice.” (32:44—33:52) -Miranda
“Always Be Growing. Again, I'll give credit out to our coach. That's the value of having a great coach, because I could have spent a year to two years and gotten this wrong. But again, doing this with hundreds of companies, I was describing what kind of team member I'm looking for. I like a team member who likes to take courses, likes to read books, that likes learning, and takes all of this on their own. He goes, ‘ABG.’ I go, ‘What?’ He goes, ‘Always Be Growing, ABG. Done.’ I'm like, ‘No, I'm not even done telling you what I want.’ He's like, ‘You're describing ABG, Always Be growing. You want people that'll always be growing.’ And I'm like, ‘Okay.’ I'm not kidding, that's how simple it was.” (37:21—38:03) -Kirk
“[All-In Attitude means] you're giving it all you’ve got. You give 100%, 110%, every opportunity that you get. You're not phoning it in. To me, All-In encompasses all of the other values in a way because I think you have to be all-in in order to really feel and believe all of the other ones that exist. When you talk about it eliminates the crazy, if I bring it down to the ground level a little bit more, when you have a team of people that are all-in, there's no back channeling, there's no water cooler gossip talk, and there's no happy hour after work because everybody is fully here, fully engaged for this vision, this mission, and this purpose that we're all driving towards. We're going to give it 110% every single day. It kind of layers in to Give > Get. I don't know what I'm going to get in return on the other end of it, but I'm here and I'm all-in, and I'm going to do this with my team in mind, encompassing that We Before Me. I'm going to give it all I've got and make sure that I show you that I'm going to lead by example and that there's nothing that I'm going to ask of you that I wouldn't do myself, and we're going to get the results. To me, everything else within our values feeds directly into this space of All-In.” (45:48—47:09) -Miranda
“I've had so many team members come to me and say, ‘This is not a job for me. This is what I was meant to do.’ That's the all-in-ness of it. Part of it is on the leader to create that safety, that consistency. But one of the challenges you have in any business is when you bring in very talented people and you don't challenge them and you don't keep them engaged, they can be poached. They can leave. People are always like, ‘Aren't you afraid?’ I did lose team members early in ACT to other companies, but we didn't have this value in place. It wasn't demonstrated by me. It wasn't stated by me. We didn't cultivate that. So, when people were looking for another salary, they went somewhere else. They were looking for something better. I tell people, ‘If you find something better, I'm going to be the first person to high-five you. But I challenge you — you won't. I hope you won't.’ If they do, shame on me. So, All-In Attitude is I have a responsibility to create an environment where people don't want to go. They want to give their heart and soul to this.” (48:10—49:09) -Kirk
“All-In doesn't mean that you're willing to sacrifice your well-being, or burn out, or you're taking work home and it's compromising your family life. It's the opposite of that. For me, I can speak to this, I am so fulfilled through the work that we do here, and what we create for clients, and what we create for each other. It's one of the healthiest, most wonderful groups of colleagues I've ever worked with. I think it goes to show that you can be all-in. I mean, I am all-in all the time. But what I love is that you also support that work-life balance and knowing that family comes first. A core value of mine at home, my “king value” is Family First. So, knowing that I work for an organization where I can be all-in, and I can encompass all of these values, and still be able to live fully within the values that I have for myself and for my family means a lot to me. So, I'll thank you for that.” (49:33—50:33) -Miranda
“One of the biggest challenges I have is when people say patients come first. Patients don't come first — they come second. It's easy to say your team members should come first. Here at ACT Dental, clients do not come first. Team members come first. We tell team members you don't need to explain. When your daughter has something, go. If you need to get home, go. We've got your back. That starts with thinking at the top. So, you have to take care of your most important asset, which is not your billboard. It's not your resources, it's not your technology, it's not your patients, it's not your credit — it's your people. Your people are your secret sauce.” (50:36—51:15) -Kirk
“When you love what you do, with people you love, for people you love, that's the trifecta. You don't get that. You have to work your ass off for that.” (51:20—51:32) -Kirk
Snippets:
0:00 Introduction.
1:52 Kirk and Miranda’s journeys with core values.
13:39 Core values: Give > Get.
19:27 Core values: Walk the Talk.
25:38 Core values: We Before Me.
29:58 Core values: Results Driven.
37:07 Core values: Always Be Growing.
41:53 Core values: All-In Attitude.
50:33 Your people are the secret sauce.
51:35 Final thoughts.
Miranda Beeson, MS, BSDH Bio:
Miranda Beeson has over 25 years of clinical dental hygiene, front office, practice administration, and speaking experience. She is enthusiastic about communication and loves helping others find the power that words can bring to their patient interactions and practice dynamics. As a Lead Practice Coach, she is driven to create opportunities to find value in experiences and cultivate new approaches.
Miranda graduated from Old Dominion University, and enjoys spending time with her husband, Chuck, and her children, Trent, Mallory, and Cassidy. Family time is the best time, and is often spent on a golf course, a volleyball court, or spending the day boating at the beach.