Photo Credit: Pond5
By Bethany Fishbein, OD
Sept. 8, 2026
I’ve written before about Loom being one of my top productivity hacks. Two years later, it’s still something I use all the time, enough to get (hopefully good-natured) eye rolls from staff and occasionally clients.
A recent situation in our office has it top of mind again. It’s something I’m using almost daily and recommending for a variety of reasons for practices I work with.
About four months ago, one of our managers had a serious family emergency. She had to leave quite suddenly in the middle of a workday. There was no definite plan on when she’d be able to return.
She had worked with our office for many years and was an efficient, capable and extremely strong part of our team. But, like many practice managers, she took a lot of things on herself instead of showing others how to do them. It was easy for her to just do all the things and she was the only one who had to, so she never documented how she did what she did.
When suddenly she wasn’t there, we realized just how much information was stored in her brain and nowhere else. I don’t love to say this, but for the first weeks she was out, we were calling and texting her frequently. We had questions about payroll, bill paying, how to find login info, how to order supplies, etc., etc. I didn’t like that we were interrupting her leave and adding stress to what I’m sure was already a very stressful time. I really didn’t like that this was largely something that could have been avoided.
What Is Loom
If you haven’t used it, Loom is screen-and-voice recording software. It lets you do a task on your screen while narrating what you’re doing, and then saves a video that serves as a real-time training guide that you (or anyone with the link) can view at any time. It’s extremely simple—you don’t need a ring light, production equipment or any knowledge of video editing. You just need to get over having yourself recorded, and you’re good to go.
It’s really easy and simple, but the impact is huge. Here are some of the things I use Loom for myself and often recommend for others.
Tasks You Only Do Occasionally
Some of my favorite Looms aren’t the ones I’ve made for other people. They’re the ones I’ve made for myself for the things that come up infrequently enough that I forget how to do them each time. These are things like running the payroll audit for our workers comp insurance, pulling the reports the accountant needs at year-end, printing out netted-up payroll checks for a holiday gift, handling a wage garnishment or even submitting an invoice for something I do only occasionally. These kinds of things come up so rarely that before Loom, I would find myself figuring it out from scratch each time. Now I just open the Loom and follow along. It’s an evergreen reference that’s always right there when I need it (which I rarely do, because this also makes it instantly easy to delegate to someone else).
Talking Without Actually Talking
I also use Loom constantly for asynchronous communication with my business partners and clients. If I want to share thoughts on an employee situation or month-end numbers, I don’t need to find a time to meet that works with multiple peoples’ busy schedules—I can record my thoughts as I’m reviewing the numbers, explain what I’m seeing and why it matters and send it. They can watch it whenever they have a moment (on 1.5x speed if they want!) and it makes the communication instantaneous instead of delayed by scheduling.
It also solves the problem that often arises in written communication—tone. An email summary of a bad month can read as cold and alarming, or “not that big a deal” sometimes depending on the mood of the person reading it. Actual voice will always carry context that written communication just doesn’t.
Teaching and Training
The most obvious use of Loom is training. It’s still the one that saves the most time. Show someone how to do a task once in person, and by the time they’re on step five, they’ve usually forgotten step two. They’re scribbling notes, hoping they wrote down enough, and inevitably come back an hour later to ask you something that you know you already told them. Give them a Loom instead. They can rewatch as many times as they need, immediately when they need it, without interrupting anyone.
Staff are sometimes resistant to building these libraries, expecting that new staff members will figure things out on their own, just like they did. But “figuring it out” is a flawed strategy. First of all, it takes infinitely longer than being shown by someone who is already an expert at the task. Secondly, everyone who “figures it out” does it slightly differently. So a few hires later, “the way we do this” can look completely different than the way something should actually be done.
An Excellent Resource for Remote Employees
This has been especially useful with remote employees and virtual assistants. Danielle works with me at Leaders of Vision, and she has been entirely trained through Loom. I started developing a training library before she even started. I sent it to her, and she was off and running. We both work odd hours (she has young children, and I have client calls and a pickleball obsession). Loom means that neither of us ever gets stuck waiting for the other to respond.
The same approach works well for training virtual assistants on tasks, especially those that are generally done the same way each time. Suddenly, time zone and language barely matter. They can watch a video walkthrough as many times as they need, on their own schedule.
And if an employee doesn’t work out or leave for any reason, the next person doesn’t start from zero. The training library is just sitting there waiting for them.
Why It Matters
The beauty of Loom is that it doesn’t require you to learn a new system, overhaul your existing program or have a big budget for training. You (or your staff) just need to hit “record” next time you’re doing something that only you know how to do. Narrate it just like you’re training someone who is looking over your shoulder.
I’m doing it now for the manager’s responsibilities that have fallen on me for now, one Loom at a time. I’ve gotten used to doing these, enough that I don’t worry about how my hair looks or whether I’m wearing the same shirt that I was wearing in the last video. Sometimes I get it in one “take.” Sometimes I realize halfway through that I don’t actually know how to do what I’m doing. The Loom records me fumbling around, clicking something then backtracking. Generally I’ll delete those and record again.
Our manager still doesn’t have a return date, but her job has gotten easier for me and the others who are doing it. That’s because it’s documented and no longer has to live in someone’s head. That’s really the whole case for Loom. It turns “I’ll have to figure out how to do that or ask someone” into “Oh, there’s a Loom for that.”
Every library starts the same way—with one recording. So next time you’re showing someone how to do something, or answering a question for the billionth time, hit “record.” Future you will thank you. And so will the person who doesn’t have to call you on your day off to ask how something is done.
Read more from Dr. Fishbein here.
Read more insights from our editors here.
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Bethany Fishbein, OD, is a practice owner, practice management consultant and certified executive coach. She can be reached at bethany@leadersofvision.com |
