1 Email That Transforms Communication Between Principals and Associates

Just a simple weekly email  

If you’re an associate, there’s one email that can help you develop your career and build a continuing rapport with your principal.

At the end of the week, send your principal an email and sum up what you’ve accomplished, sticking points and knowledge gaps.

Your principal probably has no idea what you’ve gone through. They’re busy treating their patients and have their own responsibilities and problems.

For your principal, this lets them know what you’ve been up to, your weekly wins, feelings, barriers and struggles without having to ask and saves them from wondering and worrying. They’ll find it refreshing, helpful and maybe come to rely on it.

Sending this weekly summary email means you’re proactive and shows off your efforts in your clinical, professional and personal development, which Stanford professor Jeffrey Pfeffer says is the key to success in any organisation:

…you should make sure that your performance is visible to your boss and your accomplishments are visible. Your principal have their own jobs, are managing their own careers, are busy human beings. And you should not assume that they’re spending all their time thinking about you and worrying about you and your career.

Why principals love this idea

If you’re a principal and anything like the fantastic clinic owners who we’ve helped through our coaching, we know that while there’s all the good intention in the world to check-in on how the team’s going, time often gets away.

You’ll quickly realise a few major benefits:

• The potential to create deeper professional connection with your associates
• The chance to celebrate and offer help with your associates ups and downs
• The opportunity to organise CPD to make your team stronger, which in-turn provides a better patient experience
• The ability to feel more in-touch with daily goings on in the clinic and strengthen culture
• The time to appreciate and acknowledge associates who are integral to your practice
• The possibility of uncovering leaders within your business to then offer more responsibility
• The proficiency to nip issues in the bud
• The feeling of keeping your best associates by developing an aspiring and communicative work environment.

The last point is more powerful than you think as a strong work culture is what drives long term employees to stick around.

So, what are you waiting for?