I have done the job I am now advising on.
Karen Harris, Practice Management Consultant. Twenty three years in dental, most of it in Adelaide, most of it running the business side of practices while the clinicians got on with dentistry.
How I got here
I started in dental in 2000 as a dental assistant and receptionist. I learned the industry from the chair side out, which is the part a lot of consultants skip.
From there I moved into practice management. In 2014 I took on a group practice manager role across a two site Adelaide dental group. I held that role for eight years. Everything that touched the business ran through my desk: recruitment and training, rosters, accreditation, policy, budgets, KPIs, patient finance, the software, the website, the difficult conversations.
During that time I took a paper based practice fully digital across both sites. If you have ever lived through a practice management system migration you will know that is not a software project. It is a people project with a software deadline attached.
In 2023 I started consulting properly. Same work, more practices.
The part that makes me useful
Plenty of people can tell you what good looks like. Fewer have had to build it on a Tuesday with two staff off sick and a full diary.
Career
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2014 to 2023
Group Practice ManagerTwo site Adelaide dental group. Operations, people, compliance, budgets and systems across both locations.
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2013 to 2014
Business Practice ManagerAdelaide dental practice. Day to day management of the business side of the practice.
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2011 to 2013
Acting Practice ManagerKurralta Park, South Australia. Stepped in to hold a practice together and stayed two years.
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2002 to 2007
Practice ManagerAdelaide dental emergency services, teeth whitening and regional practice work including Ceduna.
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2000 to 2001
Dental Assistant and ReceptionistAdelaide practices. Where the whole thing started.
Systems I have actually worked in
Software is where most practice problems either get solved or get buried. I have used these hands on, not sat through a demo of them.
Compliance I have worked to
Accreditation is a lot easier when the policies were written to be used rather than written to pass.
Training
Want to talk it through?
A conversation costs nothing and it is completely confidential. If I am not the right person for your situation I will say so.
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