Finances

Peer Business Groups Can Serve as Your Ground Crew

By Marc B. Nelson, OD

Being a solo practitioner can be lonely—but joining a peer business group gives you a team of experts who help you make informed business decisions about growing and managing your practice.Connecting online makes it convenient.

According to recent surveys by the AOA, just under half of the optometrists in the US are owner/operators of their practice, and half of these practices are comprised of solo practitioners. So, the quarter of all ODs who are solo practitioners are challenged to be clinical, business and retail experts in order to support and sustain all aspects of our practices.

I know this story well. I am a solo practitioner. Operating more or less in isolation, as we solo practitioners often do, can lead us to making poor, short-sighted or ill-informed business decisions. One of the best solutions to this, I have found, is joining an online peer business group called ECPinteract. I now share the challenges I face in growing and managing my practice with colleagues who face the same challenges. And together, we forge common solutions to those challenges. Our group meets online, once a month for two hours. With ECPinteract, there are no other ODs from your local area, so I don’t have to worry about a direct competitor hearing what I’m up to.

Marc B. Nelson, OD
Vision Center 2
West Berlin, NJ

1 location
(Second location recently acquired, with planstoinclude fulloptometric services)

1 OD, 11 staff
Suburban strip mall location

Revenues >$1 million
Exams per year 5,000

Facing Challenges with Support
Recently, I faced a challenge. I acquired an optical shop, with plans to add full optometric services there. I had intended to hire an associate OD to help out there. I planned to pay that doctor on an hourly basis.

When I raised this issue with our ECPinteract group, the other ODs suggested a variety of ways of structuring compensation. The associate could be paid a percentage of total revenues, or a percentage of the revenues that he or she specifically generated.

In the end, I chose the simplest solution, paying the OD on an hourly basis, but I had a lot more confidence, having heard about other options and after considering and discussing them. I hadn’t made a rash decision; I had really talked it out.

The Virtual Advantage
There are business groups in our area that meet and discuss problems. But I don’t have the time to meet for breakfast and then spend an hour talking to other business people. Our group meets online once a month for two hours. I connect with my iPad, and it couldn’t be easier. There are eight ODs in our group, all practice owners, and the group generates issues for discussion.

At the end of each session, we come up with a new problem and have a month to think about it. We have individual coaching sessions, as well.

About ECPinteract…
ECPinteract is a virtual peer learning community providing ODs with access to the best minds in the eyecare field–their peers. The program is designed to help ODs to learn from their peers’ experiences, past mistakes and successes, and to help ODs achieve their full potential and grow their practice.
To learn more: http://www.ecpinteract.com/

DOWNLOAD:
“ECPinteract Challenge” Ask yourself 20 questions to assess if you will benefit from a peer group—and achieve a “work/life balance.”

Register: Attend a group session at no cost and no commitment to see if it is right for you.

Having spent some time with ECPinteract, I realize there are many areas where my business skills fall short. Coming out of school, I was challenged by the banking, finance and accounting side of the business. I felt like I had no one to talk to about it. I trusted the idea that if others had been able to make it work, my practice would also be successful. And like many ODs, I also was challenged with hiring, HR procedures and policy development, payroll and benefits issues and how to best market my practice. The benefit of “being my own boss” started to be outweighed by the reality that I was also “my own coach, advisor, mentor and friend.” It was a lot for me to bear.

I spoke with a consultant who told me that he saw other optometric practices making many simple business errors–poor marketing practices, lack of knowledge of ROI for the purchases they made, under- or over-capacity issues and much more. The consultant advised me to have a variety of support systems surrounding my practice. However, these supports proved varied, changed over time and were very expensive for a small business person such as myself.

Personally, I found it impossible to grow my practice like I would like without the ability to gain insight and direction outside of my box. I want my practice to be bigger than me, and I invite others to listen to my ideas and to learn from theirs. Through ECPinteract, I have been able to meet other OD-owners and realize that sharing information with another person in the same situation is priceless.

Related ROB Articles

Get Involved: The Payoffs from Learning and Networking in Associations

The Power of Peer-to-Peer Learning

Peer Advisory Groups: You Can Learn from Non-ODs, Too

Related ROB Video

“The Value of Peer-to-Peer Business Groups” with Penn Moody, OD

Marc B. Nelson, OD, practices at Vision Center 2 in West Berlin, NJ. To contact him: Eyedocnel@comcast.net or (856)767-5033.

To Top
Subscribe Today for Free...
And join more than 35,000 optometric colleagues who have made Review of Optometric Business their daily business advisor.