128:Be the leader in your practice

128 Transcript Be the Leader in Your Practice

Chiropractors, are you being true to yourself? Welcome everybody to the KC CHIROpulse podcast, brought to you by Kats Consultants. I'm Dr. Michael Perusich, and I'm joined in the studio today with Dr. Troy Fox, my co-host, and we are just darned excited to be here because we wanna talk to you about being a leader in your practice.

 

Yes. Yeah. Don't be a paper tiger. You gotta know what you want. Right? I like that paper tiger. That's so true. Yeah. You gotta know what you want. You gotta know how to give your staff direction to develop them, to train them, to lead your patient. I mean there's, okay, everybody, here's what I'm gonna suggest.

 

Grab a cup of coffee or some water or something. We're gonna be here for a little bit. Yeah, so snuggle in because there's a lot to unpack here. I'm gonna go ahead and get the G word out of the way right off the bat because 90% of what we talk about goes back to goals. Yeah. Where, where do you wanna be?

 

And so I'm just gonna get it out the way that if, if you don't have goals set, we're gonna somehow try to convince you again that goals are sexy and fun and they're worthwhile because they really are. So, they are, they're fun. Goals are just fun. Yeah. So, okay. So first thing, I'm just gonna dive in here.

 

Yeah. There's no order what to, what's happening in my mind right now? No. This is something that we just talked about like five minutes ago, right? So this is fresh off the cuff. So one of the things that you have to do to be the leader is you have to, you have to create a roadmap. You have to know where you're going, or at least where you're trying to go.

 

You know, it's like an architect. You don't just, somebody didn't just come by and build your house or the building that your practice is in. What, where did it start? It started in an architect's mind. And then he was able to, he or she was able to translate that down onto paper. Mm-hmm. And then from there, a contractor was able to read the paper to build the building.

 

Okay? Mm-hmm. We have to do the same thing. We have to be the architect of our own success. So what do you wanna make? How much do you wanna make a year? And I don't want to hear anybody out there say, well chiropractic, we can't make a lot of money. Yes, you can. Yes, you can. Mm-hmm. You're looking at two people that did Yeah.

 

And yeah, and our clients are shooting the lights out, so I don't want to hear that. You can't, there's no can't in this conversation. The only thing you can't do is not have a roadmap, not have goals. It doesn't happen by you not doing anything other than just opening the door in the morning. Right.

 

That doesn't work. I can tell you right now that you will not be successful. Correct. If you just walk in, open the door and go, let's see what happens. It's not about hanging your shingle outside and then all of a sudden everybody's gonna flood into your practice and you're you. You go in, adjust a bunch of people and then lock the door.

 

At the end of the day, it does not work that way. Yeah. Real success. And I love the setup about being. I love what you said about being the architect because the truth of the matter is the biggest thing that I look at with this is conveying who you are, what you are, and what your goals are to your staff as well.

 

Absolutely. They have to be on board with you. They're your success partners. So they have to be on board with you, and they have to understand what that roadmap looks like and what your expectations are to travel that road to get to where you want to go. Why, why are people afraid to, to create that roadmap or write goals?

 

I have some thoughts on that, but what do you think, why are people, why are people afraid to write those goals down? I think it's two things which are actually bookends to each other. Mm-hmm. One is fear of success. And the other is fear of failure. Exactly. And if I, and if I don't write it down, then I'll experience neither.

 

I'm not responsible for it then at that point. Right. What happens, happens, right? Yeah. It's kinda like saying I'm gonna drive to Oklahoma City and then I don't pull out a map and I go, well, if I get there, I get there and you may take a straight shot at it and just hit it. But you may drive around for the rest of your life trying to find it right.

 

You know, it just doesn't make any sense. And here's the other, within your bookends right in the middle of this, here's the other one that I see. The other one I see is that sometimes people believe that when they set goals that... There's no way for them to achieve it. And in my opinion, that means that you're not adept enough at writing goals.

 

In other words, you need to spend more time writing small goals. Mm-hmm. With even smaller steps, because every single day you have to get outta your chair and you have to go into the office. And you have to take a step forward to make things happen. Every little tiny goal that you want to achieve, you have to know clearly what that goal is, number one.

 

Two, you have to know what the steps are to get there. And they have to be bite sized chunks. Yep. They can't be so big that it's something that takes eight hours to complete and you've got 15 hours or 15 minutes in your whole day to complete it. And you go, well, that one's out the window because I can't do it.

 

Right. So let's do a little exercise. So I've got my calculator here. Yeah, let's just, let's just say you set a goal to make $200,000 more this year. Mm-hmm. In, in, in the next 12 months. Okay. Everybody would like that, wouldn't they? Sure. But it's a big number. Yeah. It, it, it's a huge number. So let's do this, let's divide it by 12 and it comes out to be $16,650.

 

I'm rounding off. Mm-hmm. Per month. Okay. Yeah, that sounds a little better. But if you're right now, if you're making. 18,000 a month in collections. 16,650 more. That's double your practice pretty much. Mm-hmm. Okay. So that still sounds like a lot. So let's do this. Let's divide it into how much extra that is a week.

 

Mm-hmm. And again, I'm rounding off, it's about $4,200 a week. Mm-hmm. Okay. That sounds a little better. Mm-hmm. A little better, but still it's kind of a big number. So let's do this. How many days per week do does the average chiropractor work? It's four. Mm-hmm. So let's divide that by four. Okay. So now it's $1,050 extra a day.

 

Mm-hmm. That sounds better. It's still kind of a big number because it's got a comma in it. Yeah. So let's divide it. Let's do this. So that's per day. Let's divide that in half and look at per day part. So a morning, an afternoon, those are day parts. Now we're at $500. $520. Okay. That's, that sounds a whole lot better.

 

Mm-hmm Now an average day part is 3.5 hours. That's $149 more per hour, you guys. Mm-hmm. That's nothing. That's nothing. Let, let, let's just divide that by three. That's, that's three extra adjustments an hour. Yeah. Okay. If you can't find three extra patient visits or three extra pillows that you're gonna sell, or.

 

Everybody's gonna go home with the TENS unit. I'm just making stuff up, whatever. If you can't find that, write this down. Cats consultants.com. Mm-hmm. Get a business advisor. Let us help you figure out how to do that. because it's that simple. It's that simple. I look at the number that you just gave me and here's how I see it.

 

I look at it as this. Is there not somebody else that needs care that I wasn't able to get into my schedule? So can we can, can we get another patient into our schedule? Yeah. Is there not somebody that didn't need a durable good, like a pillow that's, you know, $50 item? Okay, am I gonna make $50 on that? No, I'm not.

 

So maybe I need four at that. But from a standpoint of looking at where we can do things in our practice, I look at it as if. I have probably failed a patient here and there. Mm-hmm. I got a little bit too busy and I didn't make a proper recommendation mm-hmm. For the patient that came in with, with neck pain and headaches.

 

And we didn't talk about magnesium. We didn't talk about a pillow, we didn't talk about a gel ice pack even to take home. Right? What are some of the things that I can add in and, and if I start looking at that, I'm gonna look at more than three patients. I'm looking at my existing patient base. Two going, I've done a bad job, gosh.

 

I should really be probably recommending more nutrition, because I know it helps my patients. So what it does is it, it starts the wheel turning. Yep. And you really don't have to worry much about it, because you're gonna take it in such tiny little pieces over an hour's time that at the end of the day, you'll probably have actually made more than the, than even the number was that we suggested.

 

Because you're actually focused on improving patient's health. And that's really where it's at. It's not about. Let me figure out a way to add 50 more dollars here or there. It's what can I do for my patients that I'm not doing now? Because literally probably I'm running with my head down. Yeah. Yeah. And, and Doc, you don't have to do this on your own either.

 

If you have staff, develop your staff into these amazing revenue generating machines. My staff was crazy good at doing this stuff, but I set the expectation of, Hey, if you hear something, if you hear this, let me know. Or if you see an opportunity to do this and it's good for the patient, then do it. But they, they have to have your, this is where you have to be a leader.

 

They have to have your permission to do those things. And I'll give you some great examples. Marisa was always really good at listening to patients. So one time we had this gentleman. For three visits in a row. He was late. No big deal. So Marisa one day said, oh my gosh, bill, you're late again. You know, just teasing him, he said, Marisa, I get outta bed every morning and it takes me a half hour to get around because my heel hurts so bad.

 

Gosh, bill, you should talk to Dr. Perusich about that because that may be a condition called plantar fasciitis, and we do great things for that. Hey, how, Hey, let me pause you for a sec. How did Marissa know anything about plantar fasciitis? I taught her exactly. Oh my gosh. Good job. I taught her thank you. And so you know what Bill's response was?

 

This is really funny. He was a low back pain patient. Mm-hmm. He said, I didn't know you did anything but low backs. So…huge opportunity. Boom. Brand new treatment plan. Now I've got him in, uh, extremity adjustments and some laser therapy. I just added more services and it was good for the clinic. The litmus test, good for the clinic, good for the patient, so we did it.

 

He was happy. Yeah, he was super happy. I was gonna say, this guy's gonna go out and tell everybody now Dr. Perus helped my, my plantar fasciitis because somebody else is gonna say, I've been going to, you know, get injections or whatever and this guy flooded our practice with plantar fasciitis basically. It was great.

 

Yeah, I mean it's, it's absolutely phenomenal. And even as something as simple as what I love hearing sometimes is, Just the little training stuff that we've done about icing on acute injuries and you know, even sub-acute injuries and talking about what patients need to do when they get their first adjustments.

 

And we start talking about maybe utilizing that ice pack to keep inflammation down so when you come in for your next visit, you're more mobile, you're easier to adjust. You know, we talk about some of those things. Nothing warms my heart more than me being busy and not getting to that topic with a patient.

 

So I drop the ball. My staff picks it right up, picks it right up, right back up. By the time I get up front, that patient has a bag with, with a gel ice pack in their hand and. The staff at that point reengages me by saying, Hey Doc, we gave Joe an ice pack for his low back as he gets home, because we knew you were gonna want to tell him to do that.

 

But, uh, do you have one of the slips that actually identifies how long he should utilize that? Which brings me back into the conversation. Yeah. And then I can just sit there and actually be the beneficiary of something that's gonna be really good for the patient. It's really good for the practice and what I say for the practice, I'm not even talking about financially.

 

What I'm talking about is good for the practice from the standpoint that we are gonna create a, a patient that is gonna be more compliant in their care and they're gonna get better results because we did a more complete job because I dropped the ball. But you are enough of a leader. Prior to that, that you developed your staff to be able to take over in those situations, because I knew it was gonna happen.

 

Yeah. And so, yeah, and, and so it, it flows downhill, then your staff leads the patient to an opportunity for better outcome, and it comes right back around to you to be the leader back to the patient as well, to reinforce it. You see how we did that, folks? Yeah. That works pretty well. That's kinda cool. And it, and it, it doesn't diminish your capacity or capability as a doctor.

 

It doesn't take away from you. And all of a sudden they go, well, that guy doesn't know what he's doing, but his staff sure does. Actually. It just looks like everybody's trying to help the patient. Yeah. When in reality we're all gonna forget something here and there. We're gonna miss a step, even though we do it all day every day.

 

Right. Sometimes we get distracted and we all help each other, which is great. That's why you train staff. Yep. And, and you, I say this all the time, so I, I'm broken record on this, but don't teach your staff stuff. Train. Yeah. I say, I say teach, but Yeah. You said train. You said train. Oh, did I say train?

 

Okay. Yeah. I'm a teacher, so a lot of times I say teach as well, but Yeah. Yeah. So teaching is just showing somebody. Some little nugget of information. Mm-hmm. Training is here's the information, let's practice. So practice, rehearse, and drill. We say that all the time. Mm-hmm. So that's being a leader.

 

That's being a leader. But you've gotta get in, you've gotta lead your staff, you've gotta set expectations, you've gotta share with them the goals and how you're gonna get to the goals. And I'll give you a great example of that. Many years ago we were stuck at 44 patient visits a day. Mm-hmm. This was fairly early on in practice.

 

44 patient visits a day and I walked in one day, we were having a staff meeting. I walked in and I'd written on a piece of paper 88 and I laid it down in front of my staff and I said, what does that say? And one of 'em at the end of the table said, well, it looks like two infinity symbols, because it was sideways for them.

 

Mm-hmm. And then somebody else said, no, it's 88. And I said, that's where we're going. Mm-hmm. And they all looked at me like, I had three heads. How are we gonna go from 44 to 88? And I said, here's how we're gonna do it. And we stair stepped the process. So in the next 30 days, we're gonna see, I don't remember the numbers off the top of my head now, but we're gonna see 10 more patients a week.

 

And then mm-hmm. The month after that, we're gonna add 10 more patients a week, and then the month after that. And so we developed this whole plan and. The goal was over four months. We were gonna go from 44 to 88. And you did two things when you did that. Number one, you took it in bite size chunks. Yep.

 

Which are digestible. That's number one. Number two, you gave your practice the opportunity to stretch and grow. Because as you grow, you may find that the physical plant, the way that you have your practice set up right now, won't support 88 patient visits in a day. Right. You may have to move things around in your practice.

 

You may have to move patients around. You may have to change the way that patients interact. With the physical plant of your building as well for it to work better. See, you gave yourself an opportunity to stretch and grow where you could see where things were starting to get tight before they blew up in your face, which is exactly, which is phenomenally intelligent to do it that way.

 

And so we remodeled our procedures every time we'd take those steps and, and everything. And the other thing that we did was we kept talking about it. Mm-hmm. So I kept leading the process and, and bringing the staff more and more into it. And so at, at one point we were about three and a half months in, so we weren't even to the point where we thought we'd, you know, the four months we're, we're still a couple weeks away, and Marissa comes over to me, I'd just gotten done adjusting a patient I'll never forget, and she said, Hey, I just wanted you to know something.

 

We are off our goal. We're not gonna hit 88. Mm-hmm. She said, And I just kind of looked at her like I thought we were doing great. And she said, we have 109 on tomorrow. Yeah, we blew right through 88. And we never looked back. It's because you believed you could. You conveyed that to the staff you had and we led the process literally, you just described what a goal is.

 

You said, here's what we're gonna do, here's how we're gonna get there. You communicated that to everybody. That and the why is important too. Why do we, why do we want to treat 88 rather than 44? I wanna get more bodies on the tables because I want to help more people. There's so many people out there that want our help.

 

And should have the opportunity to feel and function better in this society. So I, I think it's a phenomenal thing to do. So you had a goal, you were able to communicate that, and guess what? Now you became a team that worked through that goal, because you also had well trained staff. That already knew how to do their jobs.

 

And all you had, all you guys had to do was up your game and figure out where the sticking points were, where the tight spots were when you did that, and you adapted as a result, that is an absolute winner for a goal, and it's okay to write in your action steps in your goal that you're gonna reevaluate every three weeks or every two weeks or every week or whatever for.

 

Sticking points and you may add more action steps to your goal. Absolutely. It's a living document. When you write a goal, it's, it's not, it's not just a set thing and that you just showed it right there and, and as a result, you guys blew it out of the water, which is incredible. Yeah. And it was fun.

 

It was totally fun. Yeah. And everybody always asked me, where'd you come up with 88? I wanted to double the practice. I just wanted to see if we could do it. Mm-hmm. I knew we could, but I just wanted to see if we could do it and. You if you join our mastermind program or you may see us on the road with this program too.

 

Um, yeah. Cause we do take this out to, to some cities from time to time. We do a program called Double Your Practice and we actually spend about four hours doing this at Doctor's Retreat. Mm-hmm. But again, we do it, we do it out on the road too and anybody can sign up for those. We walk you through the entire process of how to envision.

 

To double your practice goal, how to set the action steps, how to create the strategies and how to implement it. And it blows people's practices out of the water. It's, yeah, because giant boom. Because now you have a roadmap. Right. Exactly. Goes right back to what we talked about. Now you know how to get from where you're at to Oklahoma City and you, you know how to do it effectively and efficiently and you get there because everybody knows where you're going now.

 

Yep. It's the GPS for your practice. Yep. I love it. I think that's phenomenal and really, we had no idea when we started talking in this segment, kind of where we were going and how it was all gonna play out. But the truth of the matter is, is that's how our minds think and that's how we work with clients, is we try to break things down into their simplest element and get you to take one step forward.

 

Take another step forward. Yep. And just, and keep moving. You know, I like, I've got a phrase and we just, uh, we, we were, we were working on a presentation that we're getting ready to do, and I, I put into this that you need to continue. Despite your achievement. In other words, every time you take a step forward and you have a win, you need to keep pushing forward.

 

Absolutely. Does that mean that you're gonna wear yourself out and you're just gonna burn yourself out? No, we don't want you to do that. Everybody needs…. Everybody's gonna have a little bit of up and down to where you're gonna coast a little bit. We're aware of that already, but what we wanna see.

 

Is that when you are pushing up the hill, that you're not trying to coast up the hill, right. I want you to push up the hill and then coast down. Exactly. That's when you rest. Yeah. That's when you rest. Yep. Hey, that was fun. All right, everybody. If you wanna find out how to become a Path to Mastery client of ours and we have other programs as well.

 

Go check us out on KATSCONSULTANTS.COM. We've got all kinds of free downloads. Subscribe to the podcast. We put these out every week. And, uh, most of all, we appreciate y'all listening to us and joining us each and every week. 

 

So we will see you guys next time. 

 

See you later.