In a large group practice it is vital to have Weekly Management Meetings which I will call Level 10 Meetings with your leadership team. Your leadership team usually consists of the Visionary of the Group, the Integrator or COO of the group, the head of Marketing, Operations and Finance. Now, depending on size, you might have the Integrator and Head of Operations in the same role. Usually, you will have 5-7 people on your leadership team. Weekly 90 minute leadership meetings are essential to develop a cadence, pulse and routine to keep everyone informed on what the right hand and left hand are doing in your practice.

There are 5 key points of a solid meeting pulse,  that must be adhered to every week: 1. Meetings must be on same day every week. 2. Same time every week. 3. Same agenda format every week. 4. Must start at same time every week. 5. End on time every week. I am going to take you through an agenda that will change your meetings from a hassle to one that becomes effective, productive and helps your organization progress and gain traction.

The key to an effective Level 10 meeting is START ON TIME! I am going to give you a sample agenda with some definitions:

Segue (Good News): Go around the room and have each person highlight one personal and one professional achievement that week. This gets the group transitioned to start working on the business rather than in the business (5 Minutes)

Scorecard: Your practice should have 10-15 weekly numbers that are reported and each person should go through these weekly numbers, such as new patient visits, total patient visits, total patient collections, etc.. This information is reported weekly and will give team a good idea of pulse of company (10 Minutes). If there is an issue with one of the stats, you should drop them down to the issues list at end of agenda.

Rocks: Rocks were originally termed by Stephen Covey and they are big to do’s. Each person will have company and personal rocks. You will go around the room and review these items. This exercise will make sure all your priorities are on track. Again, don’t discuss them just drop them to issues list if Rocks are not accomplished (10 Minutes).

Patient/Employee Headlines: Here you will discuss very brief good and bad reports, no dissertations. You want to make find out if your patients and staff are happy? Again, off tracks and bad reports drop to the issues list under IDS section of Agenda. (5 Minutes)

To-Do List :You must establish weekly accountability tasks for each member of team. 9 out of 10 should be dropping off the list or something is wrong. These are usually 7 day to do items. To-Do List review are from last meeting (done or not done) and incomplete tasks stay on the To-do List for next week (10 Minutes).

IDS(Issues List): You are attacking issues forever on a weekly basis and making them go away forever. Most practices spend hours on discussing issues and never get to resolutions. The real magic is having a tool to solve issues in a very quick and efficient manner. You start and document every issue that your team is having and put them on board. You go ahead and prioritize your issues, 1, 2 and 3 and this shouldn’t take more than 30 seconds. When tackling issues you use something called the Issues Solving Track or IDS all your issues. Identify, Discuss and Solve. It’s vital for everyone to be open and honest and fighting for greater good, so solving process becomes easier. Solutions will include things to do and they go on the To-Do List. Unresolved issues carry over to the next meeting. (45 Minutes)

Conclude Meeting: You will now Recap To-Do List, Identify Cascading Messages- Who needs to know, when and how and get feedback on your meeting (1-10) You must have your team rate each of your meetings, with 10 being best and 1 being worst. You will get better over time.

The key to effective meetings is to End on Time and take these very seriously. Valid absence: vacation or death (your death)! I hope you find this agenda very effective. I promise you that if you do this every week you will see amazing changes in your organization. We have seen it with Village Podiatry Centers and if you would like a copy of our agenda format, please e-mail me.