Blog - Page 139 of 310 - The McAnally Selling System

Patient Trust Erosion Factors in Modern Dentistry

james2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Why has patient trust eroded in dentistry and other healthcare fields over the past few decades? Decades of high-profile professional scandals have lowered the baseline trust patients bring into any healthcare setting. The news cycle delivers regular stories of fraud, unnecessary procedures, over-prescription, harmful product exposure, manufacturer kickback arrangements, and outright criminal behavior across medical and dental practices. Patients have absorbed enough of this to arrive at every new professional encounter with a layer of guardedness that did not exist a generation ago. Their own prior bad dental experiences, or those of family members and friends, add to it. The burden [...]

Patient Trust Erosion Factors in Modern Dentistryjames2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Dentist Adult State Interactions With Patients

james2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Why must a dentist stay in the adult interaction state regardless of what state the patient is in? Because the dentist is the professional in the room and the patient came in expecting an adult conversation about their health, even when their own anxiety pushes them into child mode or controlling parent mode. The doctor cannot dictate which state the patient occupies. The doctor can absolutely control their own state. Staying in adult mode means responding to the patient's actual concern rather than to the emotional surface of how it was expressed. A scared, short-tempered patient triggers parent or child reactions [...]

Dentist Adult State Interactions With Patientsjames2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Parent Adult Child Interactions in Patient Conversations

james2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

What do the parent, adult, and child interaction states look like in a dental conversation? Parent mode is when one person tries to take care of, control, or direct the other as if they need parenting. The doctor lecturing a patient about why they should have done their dentistry years ago is in parent mode. Child mode is when someone makes demands, expresses without self-control, or refuses responsibility for their own situation. A patient who insists the practice should just do whatever the insurance covers, regardless of what they actually need, is in child mode. Adult mode is the highest level. [...]

Parent Adult Child Interactions in Patient Conversationsjames2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Transactional Analysis Dental Practice Application

james2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

What is Transactional Analysis and how does it apply to a dental practice? Transactional Analysis is a psychology framework developed by Dr. Eric Berne in the 1950s. It focuses on day-to-day interactions, or transactions, between people rather than on deep psychoanalysis of the individual. Berne himself had a dental connection. A painful dental experience early in his life led him to publish a paper in the JADA Journal on how to manage the psychological side of pain in the operatory, in an era before modern local anesthesia was standard. The relevance for modern dental practice is direct. Patients arrive at every [...]

Transactional Analysis Dental Practice Applicationjames2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Dental Career Excuse Pattern Stops Most Growth

james2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

What's the recurring excuse pattern that prevents most dentists from reaching their practice growth goals? External blame. The pattern repeats across the profession with remarkable consistency. The market is bad. The insurance companies are squeezing. The patients are cheaper than they used to be. The associate is unmotivated. The hygienist does not produce. The front office cannot handle phones. Each statement may contain real information, but the orientation behind them is identical: the cause of the practice's results lives outside the doctor. As long as that orientation holds, the practice cannot improve because none of the named causes are inside the [...]

Dental Career Excuse Pattern Stops Most Growthjames2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Dental Practice Strength Inventory Before Big Changes

james2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Why should a dentist inventory their existing strengths before committing to a major practice change? Because change initiatives are most likely to succeed when they build on what the practice already does well, not when they start from a blank slate. A practice with strong long-term patient relationships should design a selling system that leverages those relationships, not one imported wholesale from a practice with totally different dynamics. A practice with deep clinical capability in a specific niche should build marketing around that capability rather than diluting into general dentistry. A practice with a tightly trained front office can roll out [...]

Dental Practice Strength Inventory Before Big Changesjames2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Dental Practice Opportunity Ranking Beats Shiny Distractions

james2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Why does ranking opportunities help a dental practice avoid getting distracted by every new and shiny option? Because unranked opportunities all look equally compelling in the moment, and the human brain reliably overweights whatever showed up most recently. A consultant pitches a new marketing channel. A vendor demos a new piece of technology. A peer mentions a procedure they added. Each one looks like the next obvious move when seen in isolation. Without a written, ranked list of the actual highest-value opportunities for this practice, the doctor chases each shiny option, splits their energy across too many fronts, and finishes the [...]

Dental Practice Opportunity Ranking Beats Shiny Distractionsjames2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Dental Practice Risk Inventory Before Major Change

james2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

How do you separate the obstacles you can handle alone from the ones that need outside help? By being brutally honest about the behaviors and capabilities present in the practice today, not the ones the doctor wishes were present. List every risk that could derail the twelve-month goal. For each, ask: given the current state of the team's skills, the doctor's habits, the time available, and the financial resources, is there a realistic path by which this practice can resolve this risk on its own? Many risks pass that test. Many do not. A doctor who has tried and failed to [...]

Dental Practice Risk Inventory Before Major Changejames2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Team Goal Setting Dentistry Strengthens Practice Culture

james2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

How does running goal-setting exercises with the team strengthen a dental practice's culture? By turning the doctor's plan into a shared one. Goals that live only in the doctor's head produce one person pulling and a team that complies at best. Goals that the team has helped surface, refine, and rank become collective goals, which the team will protect and advance even when the doctor is not watching. The four-part clarity exercise works well as a team activity. Doctors run their own version first, then convene the team to do the exercise as a group. The team's version may surface obstacles [...]

Team Goal Setting Dentistry Strengthens Practice Culturejames2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Selling System Implementation Investment Beyond Reading

james2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

Why does implementing a dental selling system require ongoing investment beyond just reading a book? Because the book ends at the moment the work begins. Reading produces the conceptual framework, the rationale, and the high-level steps. None of that runs a patient consultation on a Tuesday morning. The actual installation requires building the practice-specific checklist, calibrating it to the team's roles and the procedure mix, training each team member through the steps with repeated rehearsal, recording and reviewing real consultations to find the skipped steps, refining the checklist based on what real patients respond to, and protecting the system from drift [...]

Selling System Implementation Investment Beyond Readingjames2026-05-14T00:00:00-04:00

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