Make Your Practice Work Like a Well-Oiled Machine

Picture this: you walk through the door of your practice as the rest of your staff arrives. Everyone gathers for a quick and efficient meeting to cover any important details, then goes to their places to prepare for patients. Throughout the day, all the phones are answered, plenty of new appointments are scheduled, everything is accounted for, and nothing falls through the cracks. Your patients are ready by the time you step into the exam room to see them. When a problem arises, your team quickly follows established protocols to solve the issue.

Does this sound like your office, or more like some fantasy practice?

An efficient, organized, well-functioning office isn’t something out of fiction. It’s definitely possible to get your practice running like a well-oiled machine, so you never have to worry about whether or not things will get done. Getting to that point, however, means investing heavily in your practice management. How you lead your staff and the training and protocols you have in place can mean the difference between feeling frazzled during the day and being at peace, knowing your staff can handle anything that comes their way.

Your staff is the key to your office running like a well-oiled machine. When they are on top of things, your practice will be, too. In order for your staff to be able to do everything they need to do, fulfill their roles, and solve problems as they come, they need to be well-trained and have organized systems and protocols to follow in place. This is where your leadership, doctor, comes into play.

You need to spell out—specifically—the systems you use and the protocols your team needs to follow to get through the day. This includes everything from answering phones to checking patients in and out to recording notes in patient files to performing basic tests and procedures. Anything your staff does or helps with needs to have the exact protocols to follow laid out. This goes for common problems that could arise as well. That way, when your team goes about performing tasks or are faced with an issue, you know no steps will be missed and your staff will be able to handle it.

Once these systems are in place, regular training is up to you. Your whole team needs that training. This isn’t just a once-and-done event, either. Your whole team needs regular training for problem-solving and using your systems and protocols. The more you invest into their ability to do things and take care of issues without involving you directly, the more and more your office will begin to run like a well-oiled machine.

Practice management can seem overwhelming when you’re looking at it from the outside and feeling like you’ll never be able to fix your problems. The good news is that you don’t have to learn better management on your own. Top Practices has our own incredible Virtual Practice Management Institute to help you “oil” your practice so it runs more smoothly. Learn from experts to craft and put those systems and protocols into place, as well as how to train your team efficiently, and much more.