7 Signs Your Practice Is Running You!

Most doctors I talk to are not tired of chiropractic. You may be tired of carrying everything on your shoulders, running the business. No wonder you may have back pain. Adjusting is the part you may love. Or you run the business and have others working, yet there is always some challenge you are handling, since your team is not seasoned like you.

The other forty things in the day, the calls, the questions, handling patient and team objections, the time and money talks, the missed visits, team members who make mistakes, managing everyone, is what is wearing you down.

Basically, if you feel you are not on top of it, systems may not be followed, and the emotional energy to keep things moving is exhausting.

What I have found to be most common, and the biggest problem leading to more stress and chaos in over 20 years of coaching chiropractors: doctors create more steps to handle problems. Rather than changing the system that caused the problem, they try to fix the result of a faulty system with MORE SYSTEMS. You can obviously see how that strategy would COMPLICATE everything for the team. Then team members quit, and once again, you start over, doing the same thing.

Let's look at the signs you are working FAR TOO HARD. Read these honestly. If three or more apply to you, the practice is running you, not the other way around.

1. Purpose-Driven Teams DON'T Make Mistakes

There is a well-known mantra, “If they don't know WHY, they won't comply.” What does this mean? Behind EVERY system in your office needs to be a purpose that leads to team members understanding their responsibility to perform at their best, or it will cause a patient to quit. If a patient quits, they WON'T live a chiropractic lifestyle, we WON'T see their kids, and we LOSE a whole family tree. Teach WHY the Principle of chiropractic is in EVERY system. If you don't know it, I, Dr. Fred, will show you definite, purpose-driven systems that inspire higher standards in your team.

This Week

Start from the beginning and role-play in your team meetings, beginning with the first phone call, giving the purpose of the “WOW!” first impression, and how they answer the phone. We have a 4-step process to capture the attention of ANY shopper, patient, or referral so they choose your clinic, just by HOW you answer the phone and the words you say. It also eliminates initial objections in the potential new patient.

If they don't know WHY, they won't comply.

2. Blaming the Front Desk CA for Missed Appointments

Most doctors want the front desk CA to keep the patients on track, making ALL their appointments. The truth is, the front desk CA doesn't have the authority to make patients stay on track. Now you have given a task to the front desk CA that will have partial success, frustrate them, and set them up for failure on some level. Now, as you grow, more volume equals more partial success, and more failure. They will quit. You can't give a task and set them up for failure. Even if they are great, the level of work is too much, and you burn them out. EVERY front desk CA in this situation would agree.

This Week

The doctor is responsible for patients making their appointments. When you make the initial Health Recovery Plan (Recommendations), tell the patient the best days they should be there, and have the patient choose the time of day they can make it very consistently. Then ask them WHY that time will be uninterrupted. “Healing happens in a rhythm. Consistency counts.” The doctor gives them the reason for consistency and reinforces it at the re-exam and the daily visit. After a while, patients make their appointments automatically, which carries over into lifestyle care. Now keeping appointments is effortless.

3. You Have to Work More to Grow

The truth is, if you keep doing the same thing and expect to grow, you WILL have to work more. The reality is, if you create a different type of patient, one who understands lifestyle, who is not complaining and asking pain questions, it is easier to see more people in the same amount of time. From my experience, most doctors and teams don't know how to do this, so you may disagree right now. However, if you are tired at the end of the day, it is because of the emotional energy of talking too much, answering questions, and selling the next visit. Now growing seems impossible, and if you keep doing the same thing, you're right.

This Week

Talk about “Jumpstarting” their healing energy with their adjustment. When you are done adjusting them, tell them their energy is turned on, and now they can heal the rest of the day. All conditions will subside as their body heals throughout the day. You will find this is exactly true. Now they come in for the healing energy in their body for the rest of the day, NOT just the 2-minute adjustment. It's “The EFFECT of the adjustment,” the next 24 to 36 hours, they come for. If they come for the adjustment only, without knowing the healing and energy effect for the rest of the day and tomorrow, they will complain. If they come for the healing effect, adjustment time is short, and so is conversation. They will make their appointments and bring their family. Now, each person requires less energy and brings more joy. That's growth in the same hours, and it becomes automatic and easy. You will have record-breaking days and think you weren't even busy.

4. The TEAM Always Wants Your Direction

Does it ever feel like your team wants to know what you want them to do, or doesn't know how to handle a patient question? This creates energy disruption and disrupts patient flow in your office. Now emotions are running your office, NOT complete systems. The truth is, something in your training is missing, along with purpose, and you have a task-driven team who makes mistakes.

This Week

In Elite, we have very specific systems that are role-played so the team knows exactly what to do on their own. Every system has an exception, so we have systems for the exceptions, because when dealing with people (patients), not everything is 100% all the time. These too are role-played. Therefore, all conditions are handled in advance, so there is NO disruption in energy, time, growth, or team stress.

5. You Are Always Chasing New Patients

We have been taught a model that is a Work-Hard model. You have to grow through new patients. You process more new patients, work hard, then lose the ones you have because your PVA (Patient Visit Average) retention needs work. In the long run, you end up replacing the patients you lost. The more new patients you get, the more you lose over time. Work harder now, just to burn out yourself and your team. This is why you grow, then drop back. Working hard is NOT sustainable.

This Week

Call your corrective plan their “Health Recovery Plan.” They must attain at least 90% correction of their spine, and at least 90% healing of their health conditions from the Day 1 Consultation, or any health improvement is temporary. They are not “healthy” or stable until 90% is reached. Then remind them every 30 days at their next re-exam that it is a “checkpoint to monitor their progress” (NOT an endpoint) toward life-long health. This is what we work on at the chiropractic patient retention bootcamp.

6. You Know Your Bank Balance Better Than You Know Your Numbers

You absolutely need to know your bank balance. And if you don't track your numbers, how can you grow your bank balance? Everyone wants to provide a great life for themselves and their families. That's a great first step. However, if you can't measure it, you can't improve it, or you will just keep doing the same thing, expecting a different result. Why be insane?

This Week

Track your PVA. Look at your office visits per week, new patients per week, and track patient flow as patients progress in their care, so you know where most patients quit. Then FIX it, and your bank account will automatically grow on its own. If you don't know what to do, call me, Dr. Fred.

7. Two Weeks Off Feels Impossible Without Losing People

You may agree or not agree. Here's a question: after the holiday season and new year, how many Januarys have you felt like you had to work hard to get your practice back, or some patients didn't come back? How many times have you taken a vacation and had to build again? When you work HARD to grow and to sustain, it becomes a challenge to leave. You become a prisoner to your purpose.

This Week

When you know you're leaving for at least 2 weeks, set short-term health goals that each patient has an emotional attachment to achieve in advance, and they will stay on track while you are gone. Short-term goals keep the carrot in front of their face, which is crucially important, so they can stay on track and you don't have to keep rebuilding your practice. Again, do you want to stop your “work-hard” model?

These 7 Signs are true barriers to fulfilling your purpose and creating a great life.

Where Do You Start?

Go back through the seven signs and pick the one that stung, the one that grabbed your heart, the most. Just one. Fix that one this month.

If you have a few, or ALL of these 7 Signs, and you want help seeing which one is the most URGENT, take the free assessment. It takes a few minutes and scores the five areas of your practice, then points to the one place to start.

If you want exact direction and guidance, you can talk it through with me, Dr. Fred. Schedule a call NOW! Fifteen minutes, no pitch, because you must qualify for exclusive training. Let's see where you are and your ultimate vision. I not only create life-changing, generationally impactful practices, I help you create a generationally impactful life.

Uniting to Create Global Impact with Chiropractic,
Dr. Fred

More resources from Dr. Fred: Why patients quit care early, and the checkpoint system that keeps them. Day 1 and Day 2: how to run a report of findings that does not sell. How to choose a chiropractic business coach. Back to Health, for your patients. All resources: Resources. Elite Coaching provides business coaching for doctors, not medical care.