Thank you for joining us today, for part one of this two part webinar series, so do not forget to sign up for the second part. This is going to be a bonus at the right in the beginning of December when we all need all of the information we can to get through that last crazy month of December. So doctor Shamardi will also be joining us and giving us additional information on what we call the future fit dentist, leading with confidence, technology, and vision.

We're thrilled to have all of you here, like I said earlier, to dive into this mindset and these strategies that are gonna help you not only adapt but thrive in this fast changing dental landscape. I know this is my thirty fourth year, but nothing has really changed, in my opinion, more so than a lack of staff. Right? And how do we really think about how do we operate our same day with, less chaos, more changes coming our way, and navigating through that with with grace?

So before we begin, let me ask you this. When you think about change in your practice, right, do you feel excited, overwhelmed?

Probably a little bit of both. That's kinda why we're here today. So this session designed to help you cut through that chaos that comes with new technologies, shifting workflows, and really the pressure to keep your team aligned. You'll leave today with some practical strategies and mindset tools to lead change with confidence and compassion. I think that's a key point right now when we're all trying to do the best we can every day. And don't forget this is part one. So on December tenth, doctor Shamardi will join us for part two, and we'll continue building on today's foundation.

Without further ado, let me introduce our speaker, Alison Lacruciere, an internationally recognized coach, dental strategist, overall great human. I can tell you that. She's the founder of Clear Coaching, an ICF certified professional coach, and has over a decade of dental experience. She specializes in leadership, high performance, and communication, and she has a unique gift for turning overwhelming transitions, which we all face every day, into opportunities for for growth, excuse me, and clarity. She's also a faculty member at Align Technology, Upgrade Dental, and a dental speaker institute, just to name a few.

So today, without further ado, Allison, thank you so much for joining us. I'll turn it over to you. We're really excited to learn from you, and, thanks again for spending your time with us today.

Oh my gosh. It is my absolute pleasure. It is so great to be here tonight, and truly, this is one of my favorite topics, and you will soon learn why. So we'd love to keep this interactive because that is actually how we learn the best when we are communicating, when we're having a dialogue, a conversation about a specific topic. That's actually how our brain learns and integrates the best. So I would love we have Gianna who has shared where she's coming from, but no one else. So I would love for everyone to just type in the chat where you're coming from tonight.

And, also, if you could be so bold, what are you most excited to learn? And we're gonna dive into change. We are gonna dive into the stress of change. We're gonna talk about what is happening in your brain and in your team's brain when we go through change.

And so I have been in dentistry since I very very began my career. I started off as a dental assistant. And when I was nineteen years old, I got a job. I certified as an ortho assistant first, and then I got a job on the island of Bermuda.

So I kicked off my career with a massive change, moving from small town Southern Alberta. I see that we have Leslie here from Calgary.

Small town Southern Alberta to the island of Bermuda where I started my career. And I went through a very massive change in that period of time, which I think allowed me to really get good at it. So from there, I became the dental office manager at age twenty four, another massive change going from team member to manager.

I became a certified professional coach through IPEC. I went back to UPenn to learn about positive psychology because I felt like having a positive team member was actually really, really important. And so I learned the science of positivity, went back to UC Davis, learned how to coach as a manager, founded my company during the pandemic, another big change, and founded Women in Digital Dentistry. And so I have spent my career learning, growing, and changing. And so with that, I have become a bit of an expert in helping teams really learn how to cultivate change first within themselves and, second, within the practice.

Most recently, I went to MIT, and I got a certification in AI for business and entrepreneurship. So I am very, very excited to talk about AI tonight and how that is changing the landscape of dentistry. But most importantly, I'm here excited here and excited to talk about you because that is the most complex portion of change.

So I had a business mentor come to me, and he has, you know, sold big companies and has has done a lot in his career and somebody I deeply respect. And he said, Allison, you need to sell your marketing agency. And I, at the time, owned a pretty successful marketing agency that I felt like it was doing pretty well. And I'm like, no.

Why? And he said, because AI is coming, and you're not gonna be able to adapt as quickly as you're gonna want to within the marketing changes of the world. So I think you should sell that, and I think you should focus on your coaching. Because human experience is gonna be so critical as these incredible workflows kind of take the place of these more, like, menial tasks.

And at the time, I was like, I don't want to. But I listened to him because he said, there are two businesses right now. There are businesses that are not adopting AI, and there are businesses that are adopting AI. And in five years from now, there's gonna be one business, the business that has adopted AI.

So we realize that our dental landscape, our world is changing at the speed of light right now, and change is no longer optional. It is inevitable. And I don't say this to bring any fear or scarcity to it. I say this because it's one of the most exciting times in our lives and in history to see this technology change. And so when we look at businesses that are kind of digging their heels in and not wanting to adapt and wanting things to stay the same, they really they really aren't going to be the ones in five years from now that are thriving.

And so when I was in the dental office and I was a manager, one of my favorite things to do was look at the opportunities for change. How do we get to change? How do we get to navigate different ways to make our practices better? And I I had an appetite for it. And I'm gonna teach you how to have that appetite strategically and systematically so that in any phase of change that we're all going through, you feel more confident and you feel ready to adapt.

And so I would love to kick this off just, like, being a little bit vulnerable. Type in the chat, how do you feel about change? How do you feel about it? Just give me one word.

Excited, expensive. Some people are like, let's go. Some people are like, I don't know. Just one word in the chat.

How do you feel about change?

Excited. I love it. So good. Excited. I feel like the people that were, like, signing up for this webinar, they're like, I'm really wanting to learn more.

I'm really wanting to understand this. I love it. Okay. So we have excited, excited, scary, yep, ready, beautiful, amazing.

Well, first and foremost, I want to acknowledge you for being here tonight because this could be some of the most important work you ever do for yourself and your business and your practice. Because when we manage our internal barriers to success, it will always get us to our goals and increase our confidence the fastest. I'm sure many of have heard this before that if we want to change something in our external world, we must first change it internally. And as a professional coach who has coached thousands of people to achieve their goals, to step into new and different and exciting things, this is one of the most important things you can do is first look at yourself.

How do you think about this? How are you managing your own emotions around this? And learning the skill set specifically that will allow you to change with ease and confidence.

And I want you to know that ninety six to ninety eight percent of our success will come from your mindset, not your skill set. If you're in dentistry, you are skilled. You have passed the, you know, designation, whether you're a dental assistant, you're an administrator, you're an office manager, you're a hygienist, you're a dentist. Whatever role you're in, you're skilled. The way that we get to that next level is when we dial up our mindset.

So this is my family. This is in Southern Alberta, a very smoky summer. As you can see, there are fires up there in the summertime sometimes. But we did this beautiful photoshoot. I have three brothers, and we, as we were growing up when we were kids, we moved around a lot because my dad kept getting promoted and promoted and promoted in these different roles. And one of the things that my brothers and I have noted is that we're really adaptable to change because it's something we have gotten used to, and we see it as a skill set of ours. Now I don't know about any of you, but I have a favorite brother.

And this is my favorite brother, and he is a neuroscientist. And so when I started becoming an executive coach, teaching practices, teaching teams, teaching leaders how to change, we got together and we figured out what happens in the brain specifically when we're going through change. So I wanna teach you that tonight and show you what's actually going on in your brain when you change.

The other thing that I wanna share with you is as a volleyball player who played for the island of Bermuda, we were able to consistently iterate change and be prepared for what was coming next through some of these techniques. So some of these techniques I'm gonna teach you were from being a national athlete for many years for the island of Bermuda, from moving from different places, different countries, from moving different positions in my life. All of this has come together to help me be supportive to you to make a change. So I would love to hear in the chat right now what change are you trying to make in your practice. What are you looking to do? Implement technology, integrate new team members, grow your production?

Type in the chat what is the change that you're wanting to make.

And what we're gonna learn tonight, what we're gonna spend our time on is really how to lead change with confidence. We are going to change anyways. Change is inevitable. But how do we lead with confidence instead of fear? How do we effectively take our team to go through change and transition using neuroscience, understanding what's happening in the brain? I wanna help you reduce the stress and the friction in your practice.

This is something I see practices that are incredible in their patient care. And when it comes to different systems or processes, they experience more stress and friction than they need to. So I wanna teach you how to calm the chaos, create clarity, and communicate compassionately so we can smooth out that implementation process.

We're gonna talk about AI. I love AI. I have been having so much fun with it. There's gonna be some prompts I'm gonna share with you later just as a bonus.

I'm gonna talk about some of the really cool things that I see Pearl doing each and every day for practices to make their lives easier. And then finally, we're gonna talk about a team culture that embraces innovation. When I was managing my practice, I was the youngest person in the practice, twenty four years old. Everyone was older than me.

And I was really at a point where I'm like, how do I help everyone understand that we're going to change? We're gonna change software. We're gonna change technology. And what we did through everything I'm gonna teach you tonight is we actually created a culture that embraced innovation.

So anytime we got to implement something new, change a process or system, my team, at first, they were like, woah. Woah. Woah. But as we moved along with these implementation techniques and this cultural change, they were excited about it.

So just type a yes in the chat if you would be pumped, if you would be excited for your whole team to be excited for change. I'm just gonna check on in the chat. I see we have some integration of new tech and increased production. I love that.

Technology, grow production, efficiencies, educate patients. Oh my gosh. I've got a hygiene manager with twenty one offices. Holy smokes.

I love this so much, Gianna. You are so cool. Okay. We're gonna dive in.

So let's first talk about why change is hard for your brain. So one of my favorite things to share with with all of the practices that I teach and lead is that we can't not honor our human being.

We are human beings first. We are professionals second. We can't outhuman ourselves, and our body is hardwired to stay safe. That is our number one priority with our body, with our biology.

We are looking for risks at all times, and we are hardwired to stay safe. And so when we look at change, the fear center of our brain will be triggered when we face unfamiliar situations. This is why somebody could achieve their wildest dreams. They truly could have everything that they want happen to them.

You hear this, like, when people win the lottery or, you know, when everything great happens for them, it's actually really stressful because their whole life changes.

So even when the change is good, it is necessary, it is amazing, it's still really stressful because your body is saying, woah. This is unfamiliar. I don't know if this is safe, and we have these beautiful natural responses that come forward to protect ourselves.

So I want you to know this, and I want you to understand from your team's perspective anytime we're doing something new. Whether it's the most amazing thing in the world, there is a part of their subconscious mind, the part of our brain and body that's meant to keep us safe and alive is gonna come forward and be like, woah. I'm scared. So I want you to know it's normal when it comes to unfamiliar situations.

So our old patterns, even though we know, we're like, this isn't working. We could probably do better. We want to implement technology. We would love for our life to be easier. The the ones that you have are safe.

The new ones feel clunky, and it's not failure. It's normal. So I wanna validate each and every one of you for anybody that's gone through a change in their life, and they made it through on the other side, and it was better and and faster and more amazing, and maybe you're more efficient. I know there's a messy middle in there. And that messy middle is your body's biology trying to keep you safe. It's so normal. So let's figure out how do we overcome that.

So we're wired for safety, not growth. And I want you to know if your team has resistance, it is not defiance, even though it feels like it sometimes. And trust me, when I was rolling out new things as a millennial in my practice and my team members who had been there literally since the day I was born, they're like, Allison, I don't like this. It felt like defiance to me. It did. It definitely felt like defiance at first. But when I learned that they were just scared and they were just uncertain and it was their body's response kicking up to keep them safe, then I knew how to communicate differently.

So I'm gonna teach you that. The change triggers the uncertainty, the stress, and the overwhelm automatically. It is not anybody's fault. It is natural. It is our body's response to behavior to change.

So how do we change this? Like, what do we do with that? We have to first understand our thoughts. So there's this beautiful term in neuroscience called metacognition.

It really just means understanding what you're thinking. So I would just love for you, anybody that's here on their keyboards, they're not driving, type in the chat yes if you are aware of the thoughts that you're having every single day. If you're aware of them. If you're aware that, woah.

That was probably a pretty negative thought, or, oh, that was a helpful thought, or I know I'm thinking thoughts that are serving me, or I know I'm thinking thoughts that are not serving me. The first time someone asked me this, I honestly didn't connect the dots. I really didn't. And it took me a little bit of time to recognize that our thoughts, we can be aware of.

So you want to be aware of your own thinking, and you want to understand and pull out your repetitive beliefs.

The other thing I wanna tell you is that there is a very cool term called neuroplasticity where our brain can actually change. So if you have a resistance to change, if you have a fear of change, if you're recognizing, I feel worried or I feel scared by this, you can actually change your thoughts to say, I feel excited. This is gonna be fun. I am super capable.

So you can change your brain.

And there's a lot of new science around this to show how malleable our brain really is. Old science said, at twenty one years old, we are the personality we're gonna be forever. New science says, we get to consistently and continuously evolve and adapt. No matter how old you are, no matter what you've been through, no matter if you haven't changed a lot in your life, you still can.

So the good news is we all can change our brains. They are not hardwired. They are actually softwired. And the other cool thing is if you repeat it, your brain will believe it.

So if you consistently repeat certain affirmations, certain statements, certain thoughts, your brain will automatically subconsciously believe them.

So this is the power of language. This is the power of intention. This is the power of being aware, metacognition, understanding what you're thinking.

So when we look at change, if you want to change intentionally, you have to think intentionally. You have to think intentionally. So when we look at the power of our thoughts, we have sixty to seventy thousand thoughts per day. Ninety to ninety five percent of those thoughts are repetitive from the day before, and eighty percent of those thoughts are negative.

One of my favorite neuroscientists calls these ants, automatic negative thoughts. It is part of our human condition. Again, we are hardwired to survive, not thrive, and so the negative thoughts are the ones we pay attention to more because they are at they're causing us to be at risk, whereas good things, they're fine. They're positive, but they don't cause us to have any survival instinct kick in. And, again, our survival instinct is the strongest instinct we have. We are hardwired to survive.

So eighty percent of those thoughts are negative, and our internal narrative is mostly automated unless you consciously choose to change it. And this is what the leaders, the best leaders in the world, are consciously choosing to change their internal narrative. The best leaders in the world are definitely not allowing their automatic negative thoughts to run the show. So we're gonna talk about specifically what you can do with this, but just recognize your thoughts will create your feelings, and your feelings will create your actions or inactions.

So I love to say what you think about, you bring about. When we look at cognitive behavioral coaching, your thoughts will lead to those feelings, which will lead to actions or inactions. So a lot of people come to me and say, Allison, I want to achieve, you know, this much in production this year, or I want my team to show up with this intensity, or I want to have a trip to Italy, or I want to lose twenty pounds. Whatever they want, they come to me as their coach, and they ask for it.

And the problem that most people have when they're wanting to change something is they'll look specifically at their actions or their inactions. I can't do it. I can't get to the gym. I can't speak positively to my team. I can't get this process to work. I can't get this system to function.

Or I keep doing this. I keep doing the same thing over and over again. Give me a yes in the chat if this resonates. If you've been doing some of the same things over and over again and you just can't get yourself to change.

Be honest. It's okay. This is a vulnerable exercise here. It's happened to me. Of course, it has.

Why? Because we are hard barred to stay the same because it is the safest. So how do we change that? We go to our thoughts.

What are we thinking about this? How is it making us feel? And then you will automatically take an action or stop doing something when the thoughts and feelings line up. So, specifically, we have to get aware as leaders especially, and in my opinion, every single person in the practice is a leader.

Every single person. You are leading in your position. You are leading with your patients. It doesn't matter if you don't have a title. You are a leader because you are there. You are leading your own life. So for leaders specifically, we have to start to, metacognition, become aware of our thoughts.

What are you saying to yourself that is actually supporting your goal or hurting your goal? Now let's look through some examples.

A limiting or opposite thought, I'm not sure what I'm doing. I'm gonna mess this up. This change won't matter. Patients won't even notice.

They won't follow through. Nobody's gonna care. This is hard. I'm not cut out for this.

I'll stay quiet. Better not rock the boat. They'll never follow through. I'm too tired or overwhelmed to stay positive.

So these limiting thoughts will cause us to feel a sense of fear, a sense of dread, a a sense of scary. This doesn't feel good. So when you go to actually do the change, it's going to feel really, really hard. Not fun.

It's probably gonna be like, you're you're not gonna be able to learn as quickly as you'd want. Now if you consciously choose a different thought, I lead with clarity.

Every change we make today is gonna elevate our care. I trust my team. I embrace change. I commit to following through. We're gonna create excellence every single patient, and I bring positivity. If you could feed yourself these thoughts every single day, you will feel way better, and you're going to be able to change faster.

So what actually happens to our brain when we think thoughts of negativity? Again, type a yes in the chat. I love Gianna here. Just, like, given a lot of interaction, you're amazing.

When we think thoughts that cause us to be scared, type a yes in the chat if you've ever thought a thought that caused you to be physically scared. Like, you've you taste the fear in your mouth. Your heart starts to race. You feel anxiety. Maybe you're thinking, like, I'm gonna fail this test or what happens you know, what's gonna happen when I do this? You think a thought that actually makes you scared.

Most people do this almost every day. You activate your limbic brain. So your body goes into protection mode. Protect, run away, freeze.

This is why if you ever get into a difficult or challenging conversation, you might totally lose your words. You go into foggy cortisol induced thinking because you're using the part of your brain that is purposely putting blood to your extremities so you can run away, fight someone, or just stay as still as possible to avoid being eaten or killed. That's effectively a very old, very important response in our body. It's still happening even when we're talking about technology.

So how do we keep ourselves in the prefrontal cortex? This is where all of our best thinking happens, our collaboration, our co create our cocreation, and our creativity. So you can tell when you've had a team meeting that goes really, really well. Everyone's vibing.

They're giving ideas. They're working together. You're getting best thinking. That is because the team is using this part of their brain.

If you have team members doing this, looking away, hiding, not saying anything, it's because they are in a fear response using this part of their brain. They're really not even understanding what's happening in their body, and this happens, unfortunately, so often in the dental office.

So we as a team, as a leader, as a conscious human being, want to keep our team in their prefrontal cortex so they can actually bring their best ideas forward.

And this is this when I learned this, I remember being like, that's why I forget what I'm gonna say every time I'm in, like, a disagreement or an argument because my body is literally preparing me to run away, to fight, to freeze. And it's a beautiful body response, but we don't need it. We don't need it in our corporate world. We don't need it in our dental world.

So how do we get out of it? If you feel or notice, which I want you to do after this lecture, when you notice you're in that response This happens when we have a disagreement with our significant other, if we get cut off in traffic. Like, it happens all the time during our day. You need to get out of this this negative response. You need to get out of it so you can get back to your best thinking.

So one of my mantras is if if it feels heavy, put it down. When it feels like, pick it back up, especially when we're integrating new systems. If you're feeling like you're butting your head against a wall, learning something, trying something, take a walk. Come back.

Your brain will be in a different position. So use somatic exercises, deep breathing, take a walk. You can journal, talk to someone in a positive way. Don't talk to someone in a negative way.

This is gonna help you get the cortisol out of your system, and it's gonna move you forward. So in every single team meeting I'm hosting, in every single lecture I host, in every single time that I want people to be optimized, I get them to laugh. I get them to breathe. I get them to take a walk because I know it's gonna get them into the best brain.

So whenever you're implementing technology, start here.

So let's move into the most powerful perspective we can have about change. Now I like to liken perspective to a pair of glasses. If I was gonna put on a pair of glasses with a blue lens, I would see the world as blue. If I was going to put on a lens or a pair of glasses as red, the world would look red to me. We can change our perspective.

If someone has a negative like, let's say they put their negative glasses on and they're looking at everything in their practice with negativity, with pessimism, with, like, skepticism, that is a lens. That is a perspective. They can change it. And so I always share with team members and with leaders and practice owners, you are responsible for your perspective.

You are responsible for it. You can change your perspective, and you can choose a perspective that will lead you to success, or you can choose a perspective that will lead you to challenge and resistance and and hardship. You get to decide. So let's talk about what the most powerful perspective we have.

The first one is acknowledging that we are human beings first, human beings first, professionals second.

Just know what natural responses you're gonna have when it comes to change. Recognize that we are human beings. Oh, I'm going through an amygdala hijack. You know, I'm in my limbic brain.

I'm just afraid of this. That's okay. Let me breathe through it and recognize what's happening in my body. Choose a different thought and move forward.

We're human beings and professionals second. Honor that. The second thing is to create the best conditions for your brain to function. You gotta take care of yourself.

If you're not sleeping, drinking water, eating, exercising, your brain will not be in the best condition to function. You're just gonna feel bad.

And then we have to make it easy and make it consistent. So break down any change into small daily habits that you're going to move forward incrementally. If you want to I don't know who made this statement, but I'm gonna say it. If you wanna eat an element, you do it one bite at a time. If you want to implement technology or make any changes in your practice, you implement small daily habits that equal massive success. So if Gianna leaves this lecture today and she goes in and implements one small thing a day for the next year, her practice will be completely different in a year from now.

And that small incremental change over time causes the team to feel safer. So we don't wanna rip the rug out. We don't want to say, let's try everything all at once immediately. We wanna say, let's try this.

Let's see how it goes. Let's experiment. Let's see how it goes. Let's make this easy and make it consistent.

And I love to tell my teams, everything is an iteration. Everything is an iteration. The world we live in, the only constant is change, so let's get really good at it, and let's have fun with it.

So when we look at your perspective, it changes your reality. You can have two team members in the practice. One is pumped and excited to implement AI, and they can't wait, and then the other one's like, nope. This is scary.

I don't think I can do it. Their realities are very different based on their lens. So how do we consciously cultivate a lens that really supports this change? Now if you've ever had this victim perspective, there's no judgment.

Don't make yourself wrong for it. Everyone can have it at points in their life. But I like to kind of categorize this, and I want you to know there's a difference between a victim perspective and an actual victim. We're not talking about actual victims.

We're talking about the lens, the glasses of a victim. And we put these glasses on when we feel like it. So if you have someone in your practice or you have been this way, these are the things that you'd say to yourself. I have no choice.

I never get a break. It always happens to me. You feel guilty all the time. Maybe you are stuck in the past.

Well, the last time we would try to make this change, it didn't work. You replay events in your mind wishing you'd acted different. I wish I would have done that different. I wish they would have done it different.

Effectively, the victim perspective, if you can resonate with any of these, again, no judgment, but just know that this is the lowest energetic perspective. This is a perspective of no agency. This is a perspective of giving your power away to someone else, and everyone can choose a different one. So if you if you've resonated with this and you're like, oh, shit. It's like she's calling me out.

No judgment. But I want you to know that this is not the truth. This is the perspective or the lens you're looking at. You can change this by choosing different thoughts, by knowing that you are accountable and responsible to yourself, and that you can make a different choice and you can have a different perspective, which ultimately feels a whole lot better.

If you have someone in your practice like this, which, I mean, sometimes they do, sometimes they don't, with these people, we don't resist them. We just help them see they do actually have choice. They do get a break. Things are happening for them, not to them. And this is where we have really powerful coaching conversations that I'm gonna share with you, some prompts, some statements that will help somebody like this in this lens, in this perspective move past it.

So that is the the least powerful perspective you can have. This is the most powerful perspective you can have, having your growth mindset.

What does a growth mindset mean? It means that you cannot fail. You can only try. You can only try. There is a beautiful book called mindset by Carol Dweck. Highly recommend it if you're a reader.

Growth mindset means the only way you fail is if you give up.

So when you go into trying something new, you know, I'm not gonna be perfect, but I'm just gonna try. I cannot fail. The only way I fail is if by not trying. Growth mindset. Very powerful.

The second thing is being kind to yourself.

Being kind to yourself. I have implemented technology that the first time I tested out, I was literally sweating because I was nervous. I was nervous that it wasn't gonna work. I was nervous of all these things, but I was kind to myself.

That was the most important part. Allison, you're gonna do it. You're gonna do great. Let's try it out.

Let's make this happen. Let's see how good we can get at this. Be kind to yourself when you're going through change because, again, your body is trying to survive in this moment.

The third thing, have a one percent difference.

Choose to be better one percent every day. And I say this to my teams, one percent every day. If we can just one percent better. This didn't work yesterday, that's okay.

One percent. Let's try it again and have fun with it. Again, so many of our team members, including ourselves, want more validation for the work that they're doing. Give it to them.

Try to find ways to uplift your team members going, one percent today. You did it. You tried this new thing.

Break it down. And then finally, let yourself be a beginner. I see so many super smart people, incredibly brilliant people, not even wanna try something because they're afraid of failing at something they've never done. Let me say that again.

We can be afraid of not being an expert at something we've never done. When you've when you're trying something new, you are a beginner. So I say to myself, I'm gonna be the best beginner there ever was. I'm gonna begin this, and I'm gonna be the best there ever was.

Say that to yourself. Say that to your team. Be the best beginner you can. You're gonna be amazing.

I trust you. I believe in you. Let's do this.

So this is the opposite of a victim perspective. This is the most powerful perspective you can have. You can cultivate this into your culture with the words you say.

So one of my things that I love to bring forward for teams and and to help them ask themselves this question is when something feels sticky or hard or challenging, I get them to ask themselves this question. How is this for me? How is it for you? We're making a change in the practice. How is it actually for you? And get them to think about the responses. The other thing I love to ask is what is the opportunity here?

So let's say in the practice, something goes wrong. There's a mistake. There is a patient that's unhappy, and we talk about it at the end of the day. My question for everyone is, what is the opportunity here?

Is there a system we can fix? Can we learn something different? Is there a boundary we need to hold to the patient? Is there a scheduling adjustment we can make?

We can always learn from this. And when we ask these questions to our team members, instead of blaming someone, we say, what did we learn? What was the opportunity? How are we getting better from this?

And that creates a culture of trust and safety.

So how is this for me?

What is the opportunity here? Two really powerful questions you can ask yourself.

So when I see teams that are dysfunctional, that are scared, that are resistant to change, I often see there is just a gap in leadership. Now there's two different kinds of gaps. There is a personal leadership gap.

This could be team members not owning their role and not stepping into the leadership that they really can. And then there's the gap of leadership of how are we really implementing this? So often teams don't resist systems or changes in technology. They usually resist poorly led transitions.

What is a poorly led transition? Lack of communication, trying to do everything all at once, not being very clear on the why behind it, and this leads to just stories that are that are coming in. If we come into the practice and say, we're implementing new AI software, by Monday, we're doing it.

What happens with the team is fear immediately because we're hardwired to survive, and then we have everyone just kind of making stories up in their our mind of what this change really means. And, usually, those stories are less accurate and less positive than the truth. The truth is we're gonna implement this. It's gonna be better for our patients.

It's gonna make your life a whole lot easier, so you get to focus on the things that are really important in the practice. That's the truth. Most people don't explain it that way. So if you're noticing resistance, and, again, I learned this at age twenty four trying to lead my team through a software change, new team change, all sorts of change.

I learned this the hard way. So I got really good at communication because I was really bad at it at one point. So if you're like, this sounds all foreign to me, test it out. Try it out.

Just experiment with it. Try out the terms that I'm gonna say in your own voice and just see how it flows. There's no risk to this.

The other thing is leadership isn't about control. It is about creating safety and clarity.

So safety comes from awareness, from transparency, from clarity of what the expectations are, how this is gonna benefit them. We want to create a sense of safety for the team by providing a clear direction that everyone gets to contribute to.

We don't wanna micromanage. We don't want to not trust that they're gonna do well. We wanna trust that they're gonna do a great job, and then we wanna verify that it's being done the way that we want. So it's it really is about creating that safety and that clarity. And then the other thing is great leaders will tell a story or explain something in a way that gets everyone excited about it. So this is where you get to practice standing in front of your team, explaining something in a way that's going to be able to make it nonthreatening.

So the good news is we're gonna implement new technology that's gonna make our lives easier and help us focus on the things that really matter, which is patient relationships.

And I'm so excited for each and every one of you to become masters at this technology so that you can enjoy your job more.

Because who enjoys insurance verification? These are the things that get me excited, is that we can communicate to our team to help take things off their plate. That is what technology is for. It's here to make things faster, easier, and safer.

So great leaders are going to explain this as an opportunity for growth, for progression, for development. Your job is about to get better. If I came into your practice and said that, even if you had some skepticism, you'd be like, okay. I can buy into what she's saying. Let's try it.

So when I hear sometimes, my team isn't open to change. We're too busy for system. AI feels impersonal. No. I've tried this before. It didn't work. Let's look at the neuroscience backed approach to each of these objections.

So my team isn't open to change. Have you tried using neuroscience to help your team move through that change with safety? So create safety, create buy in, and use compassionate communication. Now that you know your team has no choice because they're humans to feel a sense of fear as soon as you say the word change, as soon as you even suggest it, it's not their fault. We're human beings.

You have to have compassionate language, especially for the team members that maybe didn't grow up with a ton of technology.

The reality is they just don't have as much experience as people who grew up working with iPads. So focus on creating safety, gaining buy in, helping them know we're gonna walk you through this. You're gonna be amazing. Let's do this together.

And then moving into systems. I my favorite quote is if you want to accomplish something once, you set a goal.

If you want to accomplish something multiple times with ease, you set a system. Systems make your life easier.

AI systems make your life extra easy. So leverage AI and use smart systems so that we get to work on the things that we love and we get to work smarter and not harder. Let's do this together.

And then the AI feels impersonal. Of course, there are certain things that don't need a personality. Insurance verification is not something that needs a whole lot of personality. But me helping a patient understand that it's not going to be scary to get this implant and it really is going to be incredible to get these clear aligners, that's what takes human connection. That's what we get to focus on when these administrative tasks or things are off our plate. So AI enhances the human connection on the important things and removes those repetitive tasks that really they they don't take a whole lot of personality.

So we want to be able to focus on the human things that really, really matter, patient relationships, patient communication, connecting with people.

I remember working at my front desk and being on the phone with an insurance company or doing something with a schedule, and a patient walk in, and I'm kinda like, hey.

I don't know if anybody's ever resonated with that, but you don't get to look at someone in the face and say, oh my gosh. I'm so happy you're here. We're so excited to start today.

That's what happens when you can take these things that can be on someone else's plate, AI's plate, and do it do the things that really matter.

And then I've tried it before it doesn't work is my favorite line to shift the mindset on. Yeah. So the science behind change management, when someone says, I've tried this before. It didn't work. Validate it.

That makes total sense. I can imagine that would be frustrating for you.

Why don't we try this in a different way? Why don't we try it in a way that is different maybe than the last time you tried it? Let's try a different approach. So tell me more about why it didn't work.

Tell me more about what happened last time. I wanna hear it. So what you're doing is you're instead of resisting that person, you're saying, tell me more. That sounds hard.

I'm so sorry that happened. Okay. Now I understand. Are you open to trying this in a different way?

Let's experiment together.

Tell me your thoughts on this. You're pulling them along as a partner rather than dragging them in in in forward. So anytime someone has an experience, a resistance, something that's been hard for them, you wanna validate that. But you don't have to validate that we're not gonna try again. That makes total sense. That would be frustrating. I can imagine that would be really hard with all the work that you put in and it didn't work.

Why don't we figure out what specifically didn't work and see how we can try this again together in a different way? I'm here to support you. Let's try it. Let's test it out. So it's removing the risk. People are so afraid to fail. People are so afraid to look bad.

And so when we can help them understand there's no risk in trying, that we're gonna try this in a different way. We're gonna do this together. I'm on your team. It keeps them in their prefrontal cortex, and they don't get scared. If you see someone in resistance, they are afraid.

That's it. Period. So how do we help them lean forward and take these little risks, these little steps forward where they can't fail? So it's so much about the language and so much about understanding that we're incrementally stepping forward.

So I've tried this before. It didn't work. That makes total sense. I can imagine that would be really hard.

Why don't we try it a different way? Let's let's work on this together. Use the words let, we, ours, together. That's keeping them in their prefrontal cortex by partnering with them.

So when we look at the neuroscience reframe, before you get strategic, get safe.

Prioritize helping everyone know they can't fail. We're gonna do this together. We're gonna do this slowly. We're gonna test it out.

Emotion before execution. Acknowledge and address the emotional responses. When we have team members who've been in the practice for a long time who don't feel comfy with technology, they are going to have an emotional response. Acknowledge it.

How are you feeling about this, Sandra?

Alyssa, tell me tell me your thoughts on this. Tell me what you're gonna think about day to day. What's gonna come up for you? Have these conversations. And this does not need to be the doctor. This doesn't even need to be the office manager. This can be anyone in the practice validating another person's experience.

And then stories before systems. So share the story of why this matters.

Inspire them. Engage the team rather than just saying, boom. This is what we're doing. Implement this technology.

Create a story. This is for you to help you and your job. Make this easier and better and faster. This is for our patients so that they can understand what we're saying to them.

One of my favorite things to say is save your words. Look at the photos instead. I can't read radiographs the same way my doctor can. Certainly, our patients can.

Save your words. Look at the graphics.

We don't have to talk as much. So we wanna create stories around the why.

And then, really, how you communicate will determine if the change sticks. So it will impact the change and your team's willingness to embrace it.

We have great leaders that they could say, let's, you know, jump on the moon, and you'd say, let's do it because you're inspired. So become that kind of leader that helps inspire your team.

So here's a framework.

First, calm the chaos in your own self. Even if you're the leader, especially if you're the leader, and you've made a decision, we're implementing Pearl, we're implementing this in the practice, there can be your own dysregulation automatically. You have to calm that first, and you do that by the thoughts you're thinking. I'm gonna be great.

This is gonna work. We're gonna implement it slowly but surely, one step at a time. Beginner's mindset, I'm gonna be the best beginner there ever was. One percent difference.

My team's gonna love this. Regulate your own nervous system, and then regulate your teams. Then we create clarity, clear steps, clear expectations. Who is doing what, when, and how?

How do you feel about that?

Align with the team's emotions. Honor them. Pull them out. Having somebody share, I feel scared about this, is a good thing.

Tell me more about that, Alyssa. I wanna hear it. Yes. Okay. That makes total sense that you're not familiar with this technology.

We're gonna work through it together. We're gonna get you the training that you need. Share with me anytime you feel that way.

And then questions to ask your team from a coach approach. What makes you excited about this technology? And wait. Listen to what they say.

How do you self how do you see yourself leading this change in the hygiene department? How do you sell see yourself leading this change with your patient? How do you see yourself helping your team members once you learn this? I'm just curious.

How do you see this helping you focus on higher level tasks? What are you excited now that you don't have to do insurance verification? What are you excited to work on? I love this.

And the most important thing is really think about, like, what's in it for your team? What is in it for your team? Share that because there is big benefit big benefit to implementing technology in the practice. So let's talk a little bit about that technology.

So just type a yes in the chat if you are currently using generative AI. If you are like, ChatGPT is my best friend. We chat daily. I love it.

It's so fun. Type a yes in the chat if you are using ChatGPT, a generative AI, every day. Susan's like, absolutely not. That's totally fine, Susan.

That is totally fine. I'm gonna give you a prompt today to test out. So Gianna says yes. Leslie says yes. I love it.

Yeah. ChatGPT is so fun. Alyssa's like, every day. Yep. It's one of those things that once you start recognizing the power of it, you're like, I can't stop.

I'm gonna do this all the time. I know. One time, it was, like, a little slow on a day, and I was like, oh my gosh. How am I gonna live today?

It's it's so powerful and so fun with the right perspective with the right perspective.

And so ChatGPT, as a owner, leader, administrator, anyone in the practice can use this to assist with brainstorming ideas for marketing, creates charts, tracks employee meetings, translates natural language, I've got a prompt for you.

So this is one of my prompts that I love helping my teams with, is to act as a high level change strategist. Help me design a change activation meeting for my dental practice team.

The change is implementing Pearl AI software.

I want the meeting to break through resistance, anchor powerful mindset, build ownership, clarify roles. You're gonna get a really beautiful team meeting with this prompt.

I have another one. A prompt for empowering language or team change. You are an elite executive communication strategist and human centered change coach. You help leaders craft language.

This is what I'm rolling out. Help me generate empowering statements. If for each statement, include a why it works from neuroscience. So use AI to help you with being the leader that you want.

Now when we look at AI in dentistry, this is where it gets really fun because, again, it's making our lives easier. Just type a yes in the chat if you're already using Pearl, if you're using it already. I got to experience it the other day for the first time as a patient. I had bite wings taken. patient's experience, it was really powerful. I was I was honestly kind of surprised at how much it impacted me even when I knew about it. I was like, I know I know X rays. I know dental terminology.

I'm the clinically trained dental assistant, but, wow, I can see a lot of myself. And it kinda scared me because I've been grinding. So with AI in dentistry, we get to have AI helping us with our scheduling. Diagnostic assistance, it's so, so powerful.

Now insurance verification.

Now daily huddle prep. So these are just some of the ways, again, that we get to free up our time. This honestly, when I learned about this, I'm like, I'm going back to be an office manager because this would make my job so much more fun.

So that those are the things that this can take over inside of a practice and support you as a leader.

And then we have image check. So I'm just gonna show you this. This is where, in real time, it will check to see if there are things that are pointing out. Like, do we need to take more images? Do we need to do something different?

Yeah.

It does help with scheduling and Huddl, and I'll get Sheela to speak to that when we finish.

And then this is one of my favorite things as well because I used to do this manually as a manager. This used to take me hours as a manager reporting undiagnosed in the practice. So it will actually look through the X rays and pull out what opportunities are there for for showing our patients more clearly what's happening, for re presenting treatment.

This used to be things that I did as a manager by myself.

So when we look at Pearl AI from the clinical side, this is the exam preparation, the patient education. This boost case acceptance like crazy because when we look at the data of how patients are paying attention and trusting, patients are paying attention and trusting technology almost more, especially, like, the millennial and younger patients. They're trusting technology more than they're trusting people.

So when we can have this information there to show them, it removes any doubt in their mind that, you know, I can't see it. So what is it? It's right there. This is what the AI is picking up. This is what I'm seeing. And then for the administrative team, AI is helping the administrative team with claim submissions, case presentation, treatment presentation, insurance claims, email response.

So, yes, it it's helping with scheduling and Huddl. This was the most exciting thing for me, though, because I coach a lot of teams, and they're tired because they're literally talking to the insurance company more than they're talking to their patients.

So there's an automation now for insurance verification. Also, just by the way, your insurance companies are using AI to not accept the claims. That's what they're doing now. They're finding out ways to not accept the claims. And so I love that this supports the practices to be able to support the patients in a powerful way. So this is precheck. Again, Sheela can speak to this even more, but it has instant results where it verifies all the patients on your schedule in the next two weeks.

So, yeah, I know. When I found that out, I was like, we need to we need to use the tools. So this achieves a eighty percent plus of verification rate compared to the forty to sixty from competitors, but it is so cool to see this for team members being able to free it up.

And then also for treatment planning, there's a detailed benefit breakdown, shows the coverage, and it has unlimited verification. So this to me, like, when I worked in a practice, this was something my team was, like, just bogged down with. And so this is these are the things that we can help implement in a way that allows the team members to move faster, easier, and and help the patients more.

So it just makes me so, so excited to be able to take some of these tasks that, honestly, like I don't know. I would love to hear in the chat if anybody loves these things. Take them off your plate so you can focus on the things that really matter to you. We get more verified patients, higher case acceptance, smarter treatment planning, more accurate accurate estimates with less work. This is where we get to work smarter and not harder.

And then there are printouts for claim submissions as well that show the data on the X-ray themselves, which I think is pretty cool. So I built a checklist for each and every one of you. This is a checklist that really helps when we decide is I know that right now is a time of change. Right now is a time of trying the technology that's gonna help support our practices and our patients. I like to have a checklist. So the first thing is regulate your mindset.

Regulate your mindset. Automatically, change is gonna make you feel afraid. How are you handling that? Are you aware of it? Regulate your mindset. Create powerful thought patterns that will help you feel empowered, that will help you feel excited.

Clarify what the three to five clear steps are going to be next.

Communicate to the team in a way that creates safety and excitement and buy in. What is in it for your team to implement this technology? It's not just for fun. This is for our teams to be able to do their work easier, faster, and be able to focus on things that really matter.

I loved communicating with patients. I love building relationships with patients, and I didn't like to be bogged down in menial tasks that, like, if something else can do this, I'm so grateful. And then integrate. Use Pearl AI and team systems to anchor your next level practice.

So we have changes right now in our dental industry.

We have a lot of fast moving things. Prepare your mindset. Prepare your body. Prepare your team, and then incrementally implement these systems so that you can anchor into that next level practice.

What would you do with your time? How would you serve your patients? How would you connect a deeper level? How would you spend time on marketing, connection, whatever it is that you wanna do when there's certain things that are causing you too much time getting in the way?

And then the sustainment.

And so we create those daily habits, those daily rituals, those feedback loops. My favorite mantra for any leader, we trust that it's getting done. We trust that our team is capable. We trust that our team is amazing and awesome, and we verify that everything is being done in the way that we hope for.

And sometimes that verification, hey, Diana. How is everything going? What are you running into? Any trouble I can support you with?

You know what, actually, Allison? I'm glad you asked because I'm not sure about this. Those little micro conversations create a culture of support, a culture of safety. Safety.

And just really remember, the only reason your team is not resist or is resistant is because they're scared, or the only reason you might be resistant to this is because change is scary from a biological level. So for yourself, if you feel afraid, change your mindset. I am capable. I am excited.

I am ready. This is gonna be good. My life is gonna be easier. I can help more people.

For your team, they've got this. They're super smart. They're super capable. I'm gonna help them through it as the best leader I can. That will change your feeling, and it will change your actions or inactions. So I wanna thank you so much for being such an incredible audience tonight.

If you want those chat prompts and my bigger checklist, that's, like, literally, like, I'm about to implement technology in my practice checklist of, like, what to say to your team, how to move forward. Just send me an email and tell me I want the checklist. My email is Allison at Your Clear aligner coach dot com.

You can find me on Instagram, Your Clear aligner coach. You can find me on my personal eve Instagram. And then if you want to book a call with me, wanna chat, wanna talk about any changes that's happening in your practice, please, please, please book a call. I'd love to meet you. Love to chat, especially my Calgary my Calgary team in the group tonight.

So thank you so much. And I would just love in the chat if anybody wants to share their favorite thing about this this webinar tonight.

My favorite was the ants.

Right? We're always I was talking to my son the other day. I'm like, why do we always think about all these weird negative things all the time? Why is that?

You know? So it makes perfect sense. Me, you know, worrying about fear and being in fight and flight. So fight or flight mode.

But, yes, ANS is a good way to remember to stop doing that.

Yes. Exactly. And you're like, wait a second. I don't have to be thinking this. So the metacognition, like, you get to choose.

So I love it. Gianna loves everything in iteration. So good.

Yes. You will get the recording. So that's excellent.

So thankful for everything you shared with us today.

I'm so glad to have you here. I would encourage you to think about as a team what your goal would be, your takeaway from this meeting, and set an appointment with Allison.

She's experienced what we've all experienced. Right? And she has taken teams to the next level. So it's really important to invest in ourselves, but also invest in that time where you have somebody from the outside who has worked with so many different teams to be able to focus on how she can help you and and, you know, get through the next level, if you will.

I also wanna encourage you to, mark December tenth on your calendar. We will have Alison back as well as doctor Shamari for the second part of this, wonderful webinar.

And, also, if you're interested in looking at ways to really save time for your practice so that you can focus on your patients more, let us help you with color coding radiographs for chairside case presentation.

And even, I think, there was was it Diana, you said? I forget her name who has twenty one offices, and that's a lot of hygienists. So let us audit the charts for you. I remember as a hygienist myself going into work early and looking through all my charts.

Right? Who needs X rays? Who needs, probings? Who's who has unscheduled dentistry? And Pearl will do that for you, in addition to that full circle, which is let's verify the insurance.

So I think the important thing here as technology continues to evolve, it's not it's really to embrace it so that we can keep the human aspect in the practice. And I think that's what's viable is we know that to retain and grow, you have to build relationships. That comes with a lot of change management and leaning on technology to do mundane tasks so that you can actually spend time with your patients.

So, again, we wanna thank Allison today so much for being here, and sharing everything with us. We will be sending out this recording. Don't forget to mark it on your calendar while you're here for December tenth to come back and learn a little bit more.

Reach out to Allison if you're interested in getting another opinion for how you can move through change, and reach out to Pearl if you'd like to get a second opinion, which is what we call our radiographic, real time patient facing tool.

Thank you again for being here. Allison, any last minute words you'd like to wrap us up with?

Yeah. I would just say change is the only constant, and so just get really good at adopting and implementing it, and I'd be so happy. I just dropped my link in the chat if anybody wants to hop on a call and chat through any change they're going through with their practice. So thank you so much, Sheela.

Excellent, everyone. Thank you for joining us, and we look forward to seeing you December tenth. Have a great night.

Bye.

Bye.

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