Archive for September, 2010

It’s Not About the Enchiladas

Having had time to reflect on a recent practice assessment in Pocatello, Idaho, I now know that I did learn something very valuable while working with Jason and Nicole……the cream cheese and crab enchiladas at Mama Inez are as good as I remember!

Actually, what I learned was much more important than that…see if you can guess:

What do accountability, discipline problems, self-motivation, employees spread too thin, process improvement, and financial analysis all have in common?

You’re right if you guessed that these are all issues that medical practice administrators deal with every day. But what if we didn’t have administrators or managers?  Think about the structure at your current organization and, if your position was not available, who would perform these tasks? Would they get done at all?  It is so important that you know clearly who you report to, and who reports to you, allowing you to define roles, maintain expectations, and hold others accountable in your organization.  Without good managers leading organizations, things tend to fall apart.

Similarly, in a restaurant everyone knows their roles and expectations.  The waitress, cook, and dishwashers all made those enchiladas an unforgettable experience.

Each person in the process is important, and what you do every day is invaluable.  The need for quality practice managers is more important in today’s healthcare environment than ever.

Getting Things Done

It occurred to me today how much I have accomplished this week on the road.  By ‘on the road’, I don’t mean work that occurs from a location remote from my primary residence in Boise.  I literally mean ‘on the road’.  I left Boise on Tuesday morning for the Tri Cities and have burned up the highway between Kennewick and Prosser all week.  I’ve had more things to accomplish this week than hours available and so I’ve maximized my road time with a little GTD tip that I learned from our own Brad Turpen.

Each morning, I have taken an inventory of the priorities on my @Calls list in Outlook.  That’s where I store the tasks that I am responsible for completing that require me to use a phone, but not necessarily a computer.  Brad taught me to put the telephone number in the subject line of the task so that as I pull it up, I need only click on the 10 digit number (which Outlook recognizes as a telephone number) and it automatically asks me to confirm that I want to call.  My Bluetooth allows me to keep my hands on the wheel while I conduct business from behind a windshield instead of a desk.

So this week I’ve initiated a special meeting of our Board, conducted a reference check on one of our recruitment candidates, done a screening interview with another potential candidate, negotiated details of the compensation package that our client is offering one of our candidates, and more.  As a matter of fact, I didn’t get in to my car one time this week without the name and number of my next call already prepared on my smart phone.  As I arrived at my hotel room each night, I could at least feel good that the work before me was work requiring me to use a computer – the person to person stuff was already out of the way.

Technology isn’t making my workload any lighter but it sure is helping me to get stuff done.


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