Being a private practice owner involves wearing many hats in the business, BUT it shouldn’t involve wearing ALL the hats. Otherwise, you run the risk of making mistakes, performing poorly, or becoming burned out and overworked.
Even though you may have a variety of skills, your business will be better served if you focus your time and energy on just a few things and do your best work rather than doing everything and just doing the bare minimum.
Delegating can be scary. What if your staff members make mistakes? What if they don’t do a good job? You know what, these things might happen! You know what else might happen? They might surprise you and do a great job and help you grow your business! Delegation takes trust, so you will have to dive right in!
You’re not the only person in your practice that may have a variety of skills. Talk to your team members and find out their interests or past experience that may help you in your practice.
If you want to continue treating most of the day, but you also want to manage the billing – continue to do so. Then designate a staff member that may be great at marketing and social media and work with them on a plan for this role. This team member may spend an hour or two each day in this role, or maybe one or two days out of the work week. Figure out what works best for your practice.
The same goes for office management, recruiting, facility management, etc. Designate the appropriate team members to oversee these roles as well as their existing roles and make a plan. Get these team members up to speed, set actionable goals and a timeline to accomplish those goals starting out. After 30 days, meet with these team members to see if they are meeting your requests, or where additional guidance may be required.
If a team member isn’t succeeding in a certain role, consider whether additional training or hiring another staff member to fill the role is necessary. You can either change the person or change the person. You may decide you can work with them to make improvements, but don’t take on that role to fill the gap or you will end up losing time in the areas of your business you enjoy.
Delegating in your private practice is a great way to give your employees more responsibility and recognition, while freeing up your time to spend doing what you truly want to do. Effective leaders are great delegators!
Growing and nurturing your employees is essential to growing your business and ultimately taking better care of your patients. To learn more about effective management, download this free tip sheet!