Do You Have Your Team's Back When It Counts?
Supporting your dental team — genuinely having their back — is your most durable retention strategy in a hard hiring market. How you respond when a patient mistreats a team member is a defining, closely watched moment: Simon Sinek's idea of “cover from above” means the owner steps in as the shield rather than sacrificing the person to keep the peace. Championing also means absorbing pressure instead of passing it down, giving credit while taking blame (Brené Brown's daring versus armored leadership), and investing in your team's careers even knowing they might leave — which, as Julie Zhuo notes, is what actually makes them stay. Sinek's Circle of Safety explains why: a team that feels protected relaxes, cooperates, and gives its best. This completes The Hanlon Potential Model™ — See, Grow, Back. The weekly move: find one visible way to have a team member's back at a small cost to yourself.
A patient is berating your front-desk coordinator over a billing dispute — loudly, unfairly, right there in the waiting room. Other patients are watching. And so is your entire team, out of the corners of their eyes, waiting to see what you'll do. You have about ten seconds, and the choice is stark: do you step in and protect her, or do you smooth the patient over at her expense to keep the peace?
Whatever you choose, your team will remember it for years. That ten-second decision tells them, more clearly than any staff meeting, whether you actually have their back. This week we've been talking about championing your people, and today it comes chairside — because in a small practice, the moments where you stand up for your team, or fail to, are among the most powerful leadership acts you'll ever make.
Key Takeaways
• How you respond when a patient mistreats your team is one of your most-watched leadership moments.
• Sinek's principle chairside: the owner provides “cover from above,” absorbing pressure instead of passing it down.
• Championing your team's careers — even knowing they might leave — is what makes them stay.
• Give credit generously and take blame readily; your team is always watching which you do.
• In a brutal hiring market, being the practice that has its people's back is your real retention advantage.
• This completes The Hanlon Potential Model™ — See, Grow, Back — in your practice.
The Ten-Second Test
The old retail maxim says the customer is always right. In a dental practice, blindly following it can quietly destroy your team. When a patient crosses the line from frustrated to abusive toward one of your people, the way you respond is a defining moment. Simon Sinek, in Leaders Eat Last, describes the leader's core job as providing “cover from above” — being the shield between your people and the dangers coming at them. There is no more literal version of that than stepping between an abusive patient and your coordinator.
This doesn't mean being rude or losing the patient unnecessarily. It means making it unmistakable, in the moment, that you will not let your team be mistreated — calmly taking over the conversation, moving it out of the waiting room, and standing beside your person rather than hanging them out to dry. Do that once, publicly, and every member of your team learns they're safe with you. Fail to do it once, and they learn the opposite just as fast. Your people will forgive a patient's bad behavior. They will not forget yours.
Leaders Eat Last, in a Practice
Sinek took his title from the military mess hall, where leaders eat after their people, not before. Translated to a practice, it means the owner absorbs the hard parts rather than passing them down. The insurance headache, the angry voicemail, the scheduling disaster, the pressure of a slow month — a championing owner takes the weight of those and hands the team clarity and steadiness instead of raw stress.
The opposite is the owner who transmits every pressure straight to the team: a bad morning becomes everyone's bad morning, a financial worry becomes snapping at the front desk, a personal frustration becomes a tense operatory. Your team feels the difference immediately, because it shapes their every day. Being the buffer is genuinely draining — but it's the job. Leaders eat last because their people's ability to do good work depends on being protected from the very pressures the leader has chosen to carry.
Championing Their Careers
There's a longer-horizon form of having your team's back: investing in their growth even when it means they might one day outgrow your practice. Julie Zhuo, in The Making of a Manager, frames the leader's whole job as “making their people better — creating opportunities, developing them, and championing their advancement.” In a dental practice, that looks like paying for the continuing education, supporting the assistant who wants to become an office manager, and genuinely caring about where your people are headed, not just what they produce this week.
Owners often resist this out of fear: why invest in someone who might leave? Running six practices taught me the answer is exactly backward. The team members who leave fastest are the ones who feel stuck and unseen. The ones who stay for a decade are the ones whose growth someone actively championed. When you invest in your people's careers, most of them reward you with loyalty you could never have bought — and the few who move on become ambassadors who send you their best referrals. Championing careers isn't a retention risk. It's the most reliable retention strategy there is.
Give the Credit, Take the Blame
Championing is also built in small daily habits. When a patient compliments their care, redirect the credit to your hygienist by name — “That's all Sarah; she's wonderful.” When something goes wrong in front of a patient, take the responsibility yourself rather than correcting a team member in the open. Brené Brown, in Dare to Lead, calls this daring rather than armored leadership: the armored leader protects their own image and lets others absorb the blame, while the daring leader has the courage to own the mistake and share the spotlight.
These micro-moments compound into a reputation. A team that watches you consistently give away credit and absorb blame learns that you're genuinely on their side — and they respond by giving you their best. A team that watches you claim the wins and deflect the losses learns to protect themselves first, and their discretionary effort quietly disappears. In a practice this small, everyone sees everything. Every credit you give, and every blame you take, is a public lesson in whether you have their back.
The Circle of Safety Keeps Your Best People
Sinek grounds all of this in biology. Inside a Circle of Safety — “a team that trusts its leader to protect it — people relax, cooperate, and give their best. In an environment of distrust, they go into self-protection, and their energy leaks away from patients and into guarding themselves. A practice where the team feels genuinely backed simply runs better, warmer, and more smoothly, and patients feel that difference the moment they walk in.
This closes a loop we opened at the start of the month. Back in the first week, we talked about the dental hiring crisis and how the fastest talent strategy is keeping the good people you already have. Championing is the deepest version of that. In a market where qualified team members are scarce and easily poached, the practice known for having its people's back becomes the one nobody wants to leave. Your competitors can match your pay. They will have a much harder time matching a leader who genuinely protects and champions their team.
The Hanlon Potential Model™, Chairside: The Arc Complete
This is the final movement of The Hanlon Potential Model™ — See, Grow, Back — and the end of a month-long arc. You saw your team's potential. You grew it through coaching. You handed them real ownership. You made it safe for them to speak. And now you stand behind them: taking the hits, giving the credit, protecting them from mistreatment, and championing their growth. That's what it means to bring out the best in the people you already have.
The move for this week is one visible act of having someone's back. Step in for a team member facing an unfair patient. Champion someone's growth by finally approving that course or that stretch into a bigger role. Give a team member public credit for a win in front of the whole team. Choose the moment where standing up for your people costs you a little something, and do it where they can see. That single act tells your team everything — and it's how you turn the people you've built this month into a team that stays, and gives you their very best, for years.
Final Thoughts
This month we set out to bring the best out of the people you already have — and we've traveled the whole path: seeing their potential, growing it, handing them real ownership, making it safe to speak, and now standing behind them when it counts. The practices that thrive aren't the ones with the hardest-driving owner. They're the ones with a team that stays, cares, and gives their best — and that team is built by a leader who has their back.
So this week, find one visible way to champion someone on your team. Step in for them, credit them, or invest in their future at a small cost to yourself. You've spent this month building your people up. Backing them, here, is what makes it all hold — and it's how a good dentist becomes the kind of leader whose team would follow them anywhere.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Difficult and abusive are different lines. You can absorb a lot of difficult behavior gracefully, and should. But when a patient is genuinely mistreating a team member, protecting your person matters more than protecting the revenue — and a patient who abuses your staff is rarely worth what they cost you in the team's trust and morale.
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Some will, but the people who leave fastest are the ones who feel stuck, not the ones you're developing. Championing careers builds loyalty far more often than it accelerates departures — and the ones who do move on tend to send referrals and speak well of you. Undeveloped people leave too; they just do it with less warning.
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It builds it. Patients trust a doctor who takes responsibility, and your team's respect for you deepens every time you protect them instead of exposing them. Correct privately, own publicly — that combination reads as strength and integrity, not weakness.
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Much of championing costs nothing — stepping in for an abused team member, giving public credit, taking the blame, absorbing stress instead of passing it down. Those are free and they matter most. The paid investments in growth can be sequenced over time; the daily acts of having someone's back can start today.