By Walt West, OD, FAAO
Increase efficiency and profitability with strategic multitasking. By planning ahead, you can make rewarding use of idle moments.
Like it or not, time is a finite asset just like money, and to manage it well we need to budget our time just as we do our money. Think about the way you budget your time and consider the way you allocate your time clinically. Making the most of your time in the office from an earnings standpoint is critical to the success and profitability of your practice and also has a lot to do with whether you and your staff enjoy what you’re doing as opposed to dreading it everyday, all day long.
Master Multitasking
Many people, and even businesses, believe in and encourage multitasking. The belief is that multitasking improves their efficiency and productivity, as well as the productivity of their employees. I’ve said before, and I’ll say again, multitasking is a form of self-inflicted attention deficit disorder (ADD). You just can’t do two things at once. You can do one thing well, or try to do two things at once and do neither very well, or leave something completely or partially undone.
Organize andPrioritize
Time management isa function of how you organize, prioritize and delegate tasks. One of the mistakes many optometrists make isn’t about multitasking butthe belief that anything they were trained to do in optometry school must be their sole responsibility in a practice. As a result, many optometrists regularly perform tasks in a clinical setting that can easily, efficiently and responsibly be delegated to appropriately trained technicians.
Delegate
In today’s optometric practice it’s critical that the optometrist recognizes what can be delegated as opposed to what things can be accomplished by only the optometrist. In addition, it’s important that the optometrist focus on what’s important as opposed to allowing themselves to be distracted by things that are urgent, easy or fun to do.
When you as the optometrist believe that you are the only one who can perform all the testing involved with an eye examination, you are letting many tasks that can easily be delegated steal your valuable time. As a result you may find that your practice production is severely limited, practice growth is stunted, there’s no time for other people or things in your life, and you begin to spend a lot of time worrying about what’s not getting done. You begin to be distracted by what’s not getting done rather than focusing on what there is to do.
Conduct a Time Analysis
You won’t know how much time you are using wisely or wasting until you measure it. Here’s something simple you and your staff can do; for the next full week you are in the office make note of how long each task takes you—you may be surprised at how much longer it takes to complete a patient visit than you thought. Before you and your staff can improve your office efficiency and better manage your time, you must establish a baseline for your performance, and in this case it’s measured in time.
Get your staff involved, as well. Have your staff time every step as your patients move through your examination process. Where are patients waiting on you and how long? Where are you waiting on patients and why? Once you and your staff are aware of the time it takes to complete every step of the examination process, you can work together to streamline the process and make it more profitable, and at the same time increase your capacity for seeing more patients per hour of clinic time.
Delegate and Work on Strategies with Staff
Most doctors know that their staff can perform many of the tasks that doctors have traditionally been responsible for, such as refraction and contact lens training. In fact your staff may recognize areas of inefficiency that you are not aware of. For example, when patients come in the office for their appointment and are waiting in your reception area, is your staff missing an opportunity to show them around your optical department and point out new frame lines and special pricing?
In most cases, the doctor’s time is the limiting variable in practice capacity and efficiency. One of the greatest improvements in efficiency is a result of the doctor delegating clinical data gathering to staff that are appropriately trained for the job.
Admittedly there are some things that only you as the optometrist can do. One of the guidelines I used to improve productivity and profitability in my practice was to delegate anything that didn’t require an optometry license or training. The efficiencies you gain through delegation of clinical responsibilities will pay great dividends early, as well as throughout your career.
Make Time to Get to Know and Educate Your Patient
Using the first two or three minutes of patient interactions to learn about your patient as opposed to aimless small talk can often reveal information about health conditions that could affect their sight or impact their lifestyle. Your patients will appreciate that you took the time to ask and listen to them while they talk about their life, and the insight you gain will assist you to more efficiently diagnose and manage your patient.
Resources
Click below to listen to a radio show broadcast with Walt West, OD.
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Walt West, OD, FAAO, is vice-president of practice development for optometric alliance Vision Source. To contact him: wwest@visionsource.com
