Learning to better manage your practice

Being able to successfully manage your dental practice is the Holy Grail of every dentist and this much maligned subject has noticeably been off the curriculum at most dental schools in times gone by.

While magazines such as this one devote countless pages on the subject, it often reinforces the learning process to hear information first hand from people who have cut their teeth on helping dentists worldwide better deal with the increasingly important business side of dentistry.

Attending a continuing education programme on practice management has a number of advantages: it allows you to be away from the dental practice and focus on learning something new with no interruptions, it allows you to bring your staff along so that you learn together and each hear the information first hand and most of all, the process is interactive.

If you are reading an article and you suddenly go "huh, what does that mean?", then usually you will never investigate further. At a practice management CE programme, the speaker is right there to ask, either in question time or on one of the breaks. You are also alongside your professional peers who you can discuss and interact with... and generally realise share the same problems as you do trying to cope with the business side of dentistry.

The team at Dental Education Seminars realise the difficulty in acquiring skills in practice management and continue to refine their Practice Management for the 21st Century programme to ensure attendees will gain the most from the experience.

The evening and a day format with world renowned practice management guru Jennifer de St Georges is viewed as an ideal way to transfer knowledge and skills to participants that will ensure maximum retention of information and subsequent implementation in your practice.

Joining Ms de St Georges are Drs Phillip Palmer and Michael Sernik, who work with Australian dentists every day through the Prime Practice management consultancy. Drs Palmer and Sernik have been in discussion with Ms de St Georges for several months to ensure the programme delivered will provide information on worlds best practice in dental management while at the same time, be tailored to uniquely reflect the Australian market.

"We're dentists and we spend a lot of time with other dentists," said Dr Palmer. "One of the big issues with practice management CE to date has been that speakers flit in from America, deliver a presentation for a couple of hours and then leave. And leave you wondering to boot.

"We wanted to work with Jennifer because she has a worldwide perspective on practice management. She literally lectures globally – not just in the USA. Jennifer is also intimate with the Australian market through her previous work here and we have ensured that she is up-to-date with the current issues facing dental practices. We are understandably quite excited to be able to deliver a very unique and different program."

A packed house of 800 plus dentists, practice managers and auxiliaries greeted Jennifer de St Georges at FDI Sydney 2003, who had the enviable position of being the one and only practice management speaker for the entire event.

Based on this demand, conference organisers, Dental Education Seminars (DES), is bringing Jennifer back for a four-city tour of Australia and New Zealand in May and June 2004.