April 27, 2016
Danny Clarke, OD, who owns Clarke EyeCare Center in Wichita Falls, Texas, employs open book management to increase staff engagement and improve patient care. When employees know and track basic practice expenses and revenues, he says, performance improvements and increased profits are clear and measurable.
Establish Open Book Management |
Give Staff a Sense of Ownership |
| DEVELOP YOUR WORKFORCE. Focus on developing your employees, not just managing them.
SHARE INFORMATION. Use a system like the Great Game of Business to give employees a sense of ownership in the business by making them responsible for tracking, and reaching goals, for specific areas of the business. Dr. Clarke, who has gone through the Great Game training program, developed Modus: Practice in Motion, which offers open book management training tailored to the optometric practice. DRIVE PROFITABILITY. Engaging employees in the business builds practice culture, but it also helps drive profitability. Practices who participate in the Great Game of Business have seen their collections improve by 20-25 percent, and their profitability go up by 130-170 percent in the first year, doubling their income. INVOLVE OFFICE MANAGER. Take the office manager with you to a seminar like the Great Game of Business that teaches open-book management. The manager can put the lessons of the program in terms employees relate to better than they would if it were coming solely from the doctor-owner. CREATE SUSTAINABILITY. Emphasize the importance to employees of creating a sustainable business that will be around for a long time, enhancing long-term job security. INCENTIVIZE STAFF. Money isn’t always the driver of the incentive, but it is the marker for how much progress is being made.
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ASSIGN STAFF LINE ITEMS in P+L. Give each staff member a specific metric to track on a weekly and monthly basis and to record on a white board and discuss. TRACK & DISCUSS WEEKLY. Play monthly mini-games in which staff members report how the metric they are tracking is doing each week, and what the forecast for the metric is for the month. DISPLAY FINANCIALS. Show practice financials on a white board in a place where all staff can see them. Seeing the practice performance metrics each week gives a sense of practice expenses and profitability. ADJUST AS NEEDED. Make changes to practice spending and sales approaches based on weekly and monthly projections, rather than waiting to year’s end to make changes for the new year. .
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Danny Clarke, OD, owns Clarke EyeCare Center in Wichita Falls, Texas. He also heads Modus: Practice in Motion, which offers open book management training to ODs and staff. To contact him: dbc@clarkeeye.com
