Tag Archives: chiropractic

Anthem Chiropractic Network Reductions

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(Wisconsin, April 4) Chiropractors in WI received certified letters from Anthem BCBS announcing that they are initiating a sweeping reduction of their chiropractic provider network to supposedly “right size their provider network as a result of the ACA”.

According to Mr. Dave Michel of Petty, Michel & Associates, if you have one of these letters, you’ll be removed from the BX network on Sept 30 “without cause”, as allowed under your provider agreement.

He says that it looks like they may be targeting larger clinics in each city with higher utilization and also possibly those with a focus towards wellness,and that this doesn’t bode well for their customer base.

Dave mentioned that a similar tactic was used by insurance companies in Massachusetts with the introduction of “Romney-Care” in 2006 and after the hue and cry, chiropractic offices continued to grow. This has also been the case with offices that we have worked with when the doctor was booted from a network – stats go up!

In many cases, the out of network benefits are close to those in network.

Dave has written a letter that you can customize and send to your patients should you get hit by an insurance company claiming they need to “right size.” You can download a copy of this letter as a Word file with the link provided below.

A key to survival is patient education, not only on chiropractic, but also on chiropractic benefits. This is why we stress the Patient Financial Consultation, or the Post Report of Findings.

Lastly,  Dave recommended working together as a group with your state associations and respectfully confronting any insurance company that discriminates against chiropractic services with the facts.  And the facts are that chiropractic care doesn’t cost… it pays.

While you may not practice in Wisconsin, there may be a time when you receive such a letter and if you  do,  these suggestions  can help.

For PM&A clients, if you have received a letter like this, let us know and we’ll work with you on your options.

Sincerely,

Ed

Dave Michel’s Letter to patients: Anthem Termination Letter

Your Biggest Chiropractic Bill Each Month

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You may be overlooking your biggest bill. Most chiropractors do.

What is it? If you are in the upper Midwest or Eastern part of the US in the winter of 2014, it might be your heating bill.  It has been pretty cold.

How about personnel or marketing? Your lease? Staff benefits? How about your pay? (Probably not, I would guess.)

In running a chiropractic business, many doctors try to maximize the profit of their business by reducing expenses. They often get this idea from their accountants, and, from a certain perspective, it is a good idea. But accountants are trained such that their primary function is reporting income for tax purposes and not managing business finances.

You definitely need to review your Profit and Loss and Balance sheets regularly. Sometimes you can get carried away with expenses, not noticing that things are getting out of balance when you have 4 x-ray units, 15 computers and only 1 staff member.

But what your financial statements don’t show you, and what your accountant isn’t trained to see, is your ROI – your return on your investment.

And what is your biggest investment? (Pause while you consider this question….)

It is YOU.

And what is your biggest bill? What is your biggest expense?

It is the income that you could and should be making that you aren’t.

Your biggest bill is the amount of money you could be making if you were operating at your full capacity but aren’t.

Here is an example: Let’s say you are relatively healthy and are capably of seeing  200 patient visits per week comfortably. This excludes new patient visits.  This averages out to about 860 visits per month.  Let’s drop it down to 820 visits for vacation days, etc.  Now, let’s say you collect only $40 per visit, average. This would mean you would be collecting $32,800 per month.

Let’s leave aside the possibility you could collect more per visit and imagine that you are seeing 150 visits per week, or 645 visits per month, or 605 if we take out a few visits for vacation days (40 visits per month).  At $40 per visit, this leaves you with $24,200 per month, or $8,600 LESS than you should be making each month.

In other words, if you could and should be making $32,800 per month and you are only making $24,200 per month, you are essentially writing a check for $8,600 EACH MONTH, payable to “Inefficiency, Inc.”

You are wasting that much each month as a negative return on your investment on yourself.

This is so brutal to face that most doctors would rather look the other way.  But whether you squint at it, or not, the reality is there: you are wasting your hard earned cash each month that you are not operating at full capacity. You are throwing away a portion of the time, training, and sacrifices you have made to get to where you are now.

It is as if you are writing a check, each month, for the amount of money you should be making, but aren’t.

Savvy CEO’s and large corporations understand this.  They need to get the full measure out of their investments. As a result, they invest heavily into solutions that improve production and services so their business can achieve full capacity.

One investment that shows the greatest return is corporate training and coaching. This is a huge industry: corporate training grosses $138 billion yearly in North America and executive and business coaching is at $9 billion a year and growing.

Various studies show that executive coaching brings back a return of 5 to 8 times the investment.

Obviously this speaks to our services, but beyond us, coaching and team training help you get the most out of your biggest investment – you.

Read a book, go to a seminar, watch a webinar, participate in 4 Mastermind groups, and get an executive coach to help train and guide you. Invest in yourself so that you can take the necessary actions to reach your full capacity.

In today’s economy, you need to get more out of what you have.

Quit wasting money. Invest in yourself. You can afford it.

Ed Petty

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References

Chiropractic Team Tryouts: Tips on Interviewing Potential New Team Members

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tryout
 Tryout: a test of someone’s ability to do something that is used to see if he or she should join a team, perform in a play, etc. (Merriam-Webster)

 

We routinely help our chiropractic teams with the hiring process.

Getting the right players can make all the difference in whether you are a winning team or just a mediocre one.

 It is often difficult to find the right candidate for the job. The prospective employee is trained to be sweet at the interview and have an impressive resume and you are expected to ask her just the right questions that will evoke her true character. This is usually not adequate.

In addition to interviews, practical tests that challenge candidates for the job position can be included as part of the hiring process. Much like a “tryout” for any sport team, musical group, or an audition for a play, we want to see how the prospective new employee performs.

A good management motto is: “Look, don’t listen.” This definitely applies to hiring.

After the first interview, if you are still interested in the person, have them come in again for a practical interview. This is the “tryout” or audition. For the front desk position, present them with some challenging but common situations and have them demonstrate how they would handle each. Have them demonstrate as in role playing, not just tell you how they would do it.

 In the examples below, the doctor can be in the role of the patient, or prospective patient, or have another team member in that role.

For the Front Desk position, you can have the candidate take on the following situations:

  •  Appointment book is full. Patient calls in and wants to see the doctor.
  • Patient calls in and is in pain.
  • Calls but is skeptical of chiropractic
  • Calls, asks how much for an adjustment, and then says it costs too much
  • Patient is leaving after an adjustment, needs to be scheduled, and the phone is ringing.
  • Patient owes $37.67. Collect it.
  • Promoting upcoming talk, next Tuesday at 6:30 on “Spinal Fitness.”

Someone applying for Patient Accounts could role-play the following:

  • Perform a patient financial consultation on a new Medicare patient who also has a secondary.
  • Call for chiropractic benefits.
  • Receive a letter “not medically necessary.” What actions to take?
  • Promoting upcoming talk, next Tuesday at 6:30 on Spinal Fitness.

Other situations can be presented that are appropriate for your office, depending on the position, such as therapy, external marketing, etc. Be creative and keep it fun, but challenging.

You can give the candidate a few lines to help them, but tell them you want them to improvise to the best of their ability. It doesn’t have to be perfect and probably won’t be that smooth as they are new to your office.

What you are looking for is their ability to be genuinely interested in the patient. You want to see how much in command they are of the situation, their friendliness, compassion, and general quality of their communication.

If you want a winning team, when hiring, use “Tryouts.”

GOOD TO GREAT: The 1st Step in Taking Your Chiropractic Office to Greatness

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Jim Collins, author of Good to Great, after researching many successful companies, noted that great companies “confronted the brutal facts.”

Cover_Good_2_Gr8

“All good-to-great companies began the process of finding a path to greatness by confronting the brutal facts of their current reality.”

If you want to take your chiropractic business to the next level —the 1st thing you need is an exact and honest picture of where you are now.

You see, you can’t get to “THERE” if you aren’t exactly clear on where “HERE” is.

You may be looking at where you want to go — visualizing your goals — and you should. But before you head out on your path you should really look at where you are now and review your strengths and weaknesses.

It is goal setting season now. If you don’t clearly assess your current practice condition, a year from now you may be right back where you started.

In a hurry to get THERE, we often don’t spend enough time really LOOKING at and assessing what is honestly going on HERE.  In fact, it has been our experience that most doctors do not face the blunt facts right in front of them but instead try to “solve” their practice challenges with a new solution.   It is similar to a patient embarking on a new treatment program without first receiving a thorough examination.

We have often seen a doctor set goals designed to fix a challenging practice situation in one area when the problem was really emanating from another.  For example, your external new patient difficulty may really be coming from messes in your office management.

How is your front desk team member doing (really) after her husband lost his job? What is going on with that therapy procedure you wanted to implement three months ago? Is my billing coordinator writing off too much? How many new procedures has the front desk been given over the last 6 months? How much money am I spending/not spending on marketing? What’s going on with our newsletter program? Where’s my blue coffee mug?

Sometimes we just can’t see the forest for the trees. We become so accustomed to what we do each day that we can overlook what can be choking off our growth – or potentially fueling it to the next level. Plus, we are busy.

Half the battle of growing your business is in squarely observing what is in the way, as well as recognizing what are your greatest resources.  Only then can you effectively set your goals.

To help with this, we have developed a practice assessment specifically for chiropractic businesses. It digs into your office and measures 11 different dimensions of your operation.  Our first version of this was created nearly 14 years ago and has been used successfully since. This new version is even better.

Much like a functional assessment for your patients, this survey inspects vital areas of your practice and gives each a score. From this, we make a chart that gives you a portrait of what areas are strong and what may need immediate attention.  We also provide a written interpretation of the assessment.

Originally, this assessment was used with our active clients as part of their service. Using this assessment tool as well as practice statistics, we could uncover what areas of their business needed the most correction. We also discovered untapped or underutilized strengths that could help energize the office. At regular intervals, we could reassess and note the improvements and what to work on again.

We are now offering this assessment again as a special service which includes:

  1. The assessment
  2. Graded and plotted assessment
  3. Statistical analysis with charts
  4. Phone consultation
  5. Written report with practical action steps.

Each question will provoke a greater understanding of your practice. With the results of the assessment charted and the consultation, you will obtain a new perspective of how your office operates. You will also see more clearly what needs to be done to bring it to the level of success that you desire.

Practice Statistics. Of course, you can’t evaluate a business without also analyzing its performance monitors. Most offices keep practice numbers – somewhere.  Unfortunately, they are rarely reviewed properly.  We know how to analyze them and show you your ratios and the trends that they reveal. If we do not have your current practice statistics already, we will request them on a separate form. After interpreting your statistics, we plot them on charts and correlate them with the results of your Practice Development Assessment.  Together, this will allow us to give you an excellent overall analysis of your business and what needs to be done to take it to the next level.

 

Send in when Completed.  When you have completed this assessment, you can fax or email it back to us at Services @ pmaworks.com or Fax: 877-868-0909.   We will score and chart each section of your assessment and set up a time to discuss the outcomes with you. We will also send you the results with our written observations and recommendations.

The standard fee for this for non active clients is $250.  

NOTE: As of January, 2014, for a limited time promotion, we will be charging only $25. This is almost free, but I don’t want to take up our team’s time with people who aren’t seriously interested in this service. If you take us up on this assessment, I will assume you are hard core about improving your business. As hard core as we are!  🙂 Use the promo code  CPDAPROMO to get the discount when you click the link below.

Ed Petty

To purchase: LINK

 

 

Using Checklists to Improve Your Chiropractic Practice

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We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.  ~Aristotle

Don’t overlook the humble checklist as an important tool in developing your business. Simple and low tech, the checklist is yet so powerful and vital that everyone from pilots to surgeons use them.

Here at Petty, Michel and Associates, we have been promoting the use of checklists as a simple tool in chiropractic practice development since the early 1990’s.  All successful businesses use them, and certainly all professionals, from airplane pilots to cowboys.

Are they just more paperwork? Or can they really make things faster, simpler, and actually improve the quantity and quality of your services?

It really is just a simple matter of helping to ensure that your office continues to do the things that work.

Let’s be honest: sooner or later, we all get bored.  When we start something new, we are fully engaged. But after a few weeks, months, let alone years, continuing to do the same thing can be painfully tedious. So much so that we are tempted to follow other diversions.

Excellence does require creativity and innovation. But it also requires doing the same thing that worked yesterday – today and tomorrow. Improve upon it; add a new service or product or communication channel.  But don’t let your feelings of monotony dictate your management planning or procedures.

At PM&A, we advocate management by the numbers and by your own proven procedures.  Execute your procedures routinely with care and interest. Don’t manage by emotions or chase other people’s bright ideas or change everything to follow the current management flavor of the day.

The fundamentals ALWAYS apply.

This is the meaning of what Aristotle spoke of as recorded in his talk on ethics:

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.

Practically, a checklist is a reminder of a what should be a habit: “Don’t forget to:____. ”  We are all busy and sometimes can take things for granted or take necessary shortcuts.  There is a tendency for any activity to atrophy to its minimal functions. For example, at the beginning of the year you got up early, had a cup of freshly ground coffee, and went to the gym for 40 minutes. By July, you were settling for instant coffee and a walk to and from your car.

A simple list of duties, such as how to open and “start” the office in the morning, “closing” the office in the evening, or “10 things to do on a patient financial consultation” can act to help train and as well as review excellence in performance. A list of duties for each position in the office is also very useful for training and just reminding.

Atul Gawande, an endocrine surgeon, saw the need for checklists in surgery.  He surveyed  fellow surgeons who said that they did not want to do checklists before surgery. But when asked if they wanted their surgeons to use a checklist if and when they went under the knife, almost all said they wanted their surgeons to use a checklist.

“What is needed… is discipline.

Discipline is hard — harder than trustworthiness and skill and perhaps even than selflessness.  

We are by nature flawed and inconstant creatures. We can’t even keep from snacking between meals.  We are not built for discipline. We are built for novelty and excitement, not for careful attention to detail. Discipline is something we have to work at.

Good checklists, on the other hand are precise. They are efficient, to the point, and easy to use even in the most difficult situations. They do not try to spell out everything–a checklist cannot fly a plane. Instead, they provide reminders of only the most critical and important steps–the ones that even the highly skilled professional using them could miss.

Good checklists are, above all, practical.

                                     -Atul Gawande, M.D., Endocrine Surgeon, Associate Professor at Harvard. (author of The Checklist Manifesto)

Managing the work you do as a chiropractor or chiropractic team member in your office may not be as complicated as surgery, but your patients are just as important.   Maybe even more important.  Why? Because your chiropractic care may help keep your patients from ever needing surgery.

The Checklist: a simple and humble tool to improve the quality and quantity of your chiropractic services.

————

Links to Atul Gawande: Quotes, TED

The Fundamentals Apply…As Time Goes By

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I want to pass on some tips and ideas about chiropractic marketing and so the title above may seem a little misleading. It is a taken from a classic movie, a romance actually.  I will get to that in a moment.

To start off with, I have pulled out some promotional ideas from our chiropractic Marketing Toolkit on our Petty, Michel and Associates Members Site and in the Chiropractic Marketing Manager System program that you might want to use for this month, November, or December.  You can find them here on our web site.

There are many variations of each, and thousands of different promotions, but those listed have worked and at least can help prompt you and your team to come up with your own customized programs.

I wanted to send these out and draw your attention to the importance of marketing because you may have been distracted lately. I know I have. There has been a great deal of noise over the last several months, some of it frantic, about new HIPAA regulations (watch out for the HIPAA Police!), ICD 10,  PQRS and other Medicare measures, and now the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). And now we also have the government gridlock and debt and so on and so on.

The environment in which we do business is always changing.  And the rate of change is increasing.  It is like a sea that sometimes has big waves and sometimes little waves. At times it storms and at other times there is a dead calm. And we are the sailors and we have our ships and come what may, we sail our vessels and deliver our goods.

But the fundamentals of our businesses do not change.  And marketing is a basic fundamental of business.  In fact, it IS business.

As a doctor, your focus is on patient care, on quality clinical procedures and outcomes. And, as a doctor, it should be.

But your other role is “business person,” and business is all about the market place.  Like the summer Farmer’s Market, it is where you put something of value on display that others want.

Peter Drucker, the father of modern management theory, looked at marketing as the entire purpose of an organization.  In his book, Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices (811 pages!), he says:

There is only one valid definition of business purpose: to create a customer.  Because its purpose is to create a customer, the business enterprise has two – and only two basic functions — marketing and innovation. All the rest are costs. Marketing is the unique distinguishing function of business.

He goes on to say:

Marketing is so basic that it cannot be considered a separate function (i.e., a separate skill or work) within the business, on par with others such as manufacturing or personnel. Marketing requires separate work, and a distinct group of activities. But it is, first, a central dimension of the entire business. It is the whole business seen from the point of view of its final result, that is, from the customer’s point of view. Concern and responsibility for marketing must, therefore, permeate all areas of the enterprise. (Page 63)

In other words, your entire office is the marketing department.

The top 3 reasons your marketing does not work adequately are:

  1. It isn’t done. (It is done, but only now and then, irregularly and half-vast.)
  2. No one is assigned and responsible for doing it.
  3. Those assigned to do the marketing are not given the time to get it done.

There are other reasons, of course, but these are the top three and formed the basis of our Marketing Manager System, developed in 2001.

You know all this, but it helps to be reminded now and then.

And I am reminded of the theme song in the movie, “Casablanca.”   The movie stars Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman and is a classic romance from 1942.  You may wonder what a romantic movie has to do with business and marketing, but who says that business and marketing can’t also be romantic?  (I have been accused of being unromantic before, but perhaps I have just been misunderstood!)  Shouldn’t you be in love with the work you do in chiropractic?  Shouldn’t you love your patients and be passionate about the story your office has to tell?

With apologies to Herman Hupfeld, the composer of “As Time Goes By”:

You must remember this
Promotions must not be missed
On you they do rely
The fundamentals things apply
As time goes by

It’s still the same old story
A fight for market share and glory
A case of do or die.
The world will always welcome your loving care
As time goes by.

Chiropractic Marketing Ideas for Fall Promotions

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Here are a few ideas for promoting your chiropractic services during the end of the year.  There are many more, of course, but these can get you and your team thinking of what you might like to do over the next several months. (For a PDF version of this article.  REVISED AND UPDATED- 9/2014)

Schedule the special promotions first – the big events. Get these on a large Marketing Calendar and plan them out. Promote them before the event.  Ideally, you should promote the event four weeks before it occurs, but people often forget and make spur of the moment decisions. Therefore, promoting even a week before the event has worked.

You can find customizable posters and detailed information on how to do many of these projects on your chiropractic Marketing Manager System Toolkit and on your PM&A Member’s site. Depending on the level of your program, we can also put together simple posters to help promote your particular project.

Then, look at the more basic marketing procedures, those that are recurring. These should be on a list which you review every few months.

You can also sprinkle in some minor but fun promotions, such as having a Crazee Dayz.

General Marketing

  •  Recurring Procedures. The most important marketing procedures are your usual, recurring procedures that you do on a daily and weekly basis. Many of these are already embedded in your routine procedures.  These should be on a list that your review every three months.
  • Calendar. Make sure you have a large calendar to post all of your scheduled upcoming promotions.
  • Assignment. Assign a staff member to be in charge of each promotion. Each team member has a marketing responsibility.
  • Communication. In the end, marketing is all about communication. Therefore, promote your events with your newsletters (electronic and hard copy), fliers, Facebook, Internet updates, bulletin boards, web site and most of all,  through friendly one on one personal communication in the office.
  • Motivation.  All procedures work to some degree, depending on how well they are organized and on the intention behind them. If you and your team are not motivated to make these procedures work, they won’t.  Keep your purpose strong and your energy high.

Crazee Dayz
Select a day and make it special for your patients. Only one day a week is necessary otherwise it’s not special.  It can be once per month or every week. Serve extra treats.  You can have the staff dress out of uniform coordinated to the day.  These can add some extra fun to the office and help with retention and long term referrals.

  • Muffin Mondays – Serve up a selection of health bran, banana, blueberry, etc muffins
    Two for Tuesday – Bring a friend for a complimentary spinal exam and offer the patient a free adjustment.  “Two Fer Tuesday.”
    Whacky Wednesdays – gag gifts for patients,  “adjust-a-mints”, etc. (http://www.bannermints.com/)
    Thirsty Thursdays  — Organic apple juice served in plastic wine glasses with a sliced green apple on the rim. NA margaritas.
    Fruity Fridays  – Bowl of local fruit.

OCTOBER
October is National Spinal Health Month (Now called National Chiropractic Health Month) This can give a you a reason to do many different promotions.  (Read about it at the American Chiropractic Association web site here.)

  • A banner in your office for patients to bring in family members for a free “Check-up.”
  • Reactivation Month – send postcards to all inactive patients who have not been in for at least one year or more for free spinal checkup.

Chiropractic Opportunity Week  (“The doctor is having a COW.”) (patient referrals and advertising new patients)

  • Free consultation, exam, and x-ray if needed.cow

 Hair Dresser/Beauty Salons/Spas (new patients and business referrals)

  • Offer a workshop on “How to Stay Fit While You Clip.”
  • Free massages (and screenings) for customers
  • Set up a customer appreciation program with the business owner and provide the massage and or food and screenings

 Local Health Fairs (new patients and business referrals)

  • Contact all the locations you have held events in the past year and schedule events for the New Year.
  • Contact local businesses for health fairs in the New Year and get them scheduled
  • ghost

 Kids and Halloween Party (patient retention and referrals)

With Casper as inspiration, a kid’s Halloween party with a friendly ghost theme has the right mix of tricks and treats. Invite the young ghouls to come dressed up, but you can also have them make ghastly masks as part of the fun. Other ideas include spooky decorations, scary snacks and a friendly ghost hunt.   Free spinal and scoliosis checks for all guests.

 

 NOVEMBERturkey

Thanksgiving Turkey Drawing Poster(patient referrals)

  • Refer a friend and enter the drawing for a free turkey
  • Special for Organic Turkeys – announce in your newsletter
  • Make arrangements now with your local supplier

Donation Drives (patient referrals, advertising new patients)

Holiday time always brings an increased demand for helping those less fortunate.  Within your office set up a collection area for any of the following programs and promote it in your newsletter.

  • Coats for Kids
  • Food for Families
  • Toys for Tots
  • Blood Drive

$25 in exchange for first day services.

  • Also, you can support drives at local church or gyms. E.G. “Free first day services for every donation a member of YMCA makes to the homeless fund.”

Deer Widows Week (patient referrals)

During hunting season or first week of December  offer  complimentary massage for  your patients who refer in a new patient.

 Girl’s Night Out  (screenings)

Christmas shopping/gift exchange

Enlist the help of massage therapist, local spas and direct marketing consultants, Tupperware distributors, etc. Everyone has to bring at least 3 guests. Buy presents from each other rather than at the mall.  In November or first week of December.gifts

Or

  Movie & Margarita (bring a guest for a movie screening and a spinal screening)

Sample movies: The Love Letter, Steel Magnolias, Little Women. Fried Green Tomatoes When Harry Met Sally, anything with Brad Pitt.

 

DECEMBER

Holiday Coupons – Gifts Certificates(patient referrals)

  • Good for Massage, consultation, exam, x-ray
  • Denominations: Free, $25, $25 or food donation to charity.

poinsettiaPoinsettia Give Away (patient retention)

Give away free poinsettias, one per family.  Include in the cards a gift certificate for family members or friends.  (see Member’s site for gift card)

 Saturday with Santa(patient referrals)

  • santa lapSet up Santa in your reception room corner
  • Treats for the kids
  • Pictures with Santa
  • Free spinal check with Doc

Appreciation to External Referral Sources.  

Deliver a fruit basket or other present personally during December with a card of thanks and mention how you are looking forward to another year working together.  This would go to any location where you had an external community services type of event, such as a screening or workshop.  Include: “Looking forward to working with you next year.”

Motivational Tent Poster – Secret to Success – Jiro Ono

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Shaw

“Once you decide on your occupation… you must immerse yourself in your work.

You have to fall in love with your work. Never complain about your job. You must dedicate your life to mastering your skill.  That’s the secret of success……

Even though I’m eighty-five years old, I don’t feel like retiring.”

    Jiro Ono – Sushi Master, Japan

Pilot of the Wheelchair: The Girl and Her Passenger

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This short story may not seem at first to pertain to your chiropractic office, but it does.

In the hot afternoon Sunday traffic, in the right lane waiting to turn right, our lane had stop moving.

Crossing the busy six lane intersection heading toward us was a man in a motorized wheelchair.  His face was full but motionless and looked worn. I couldn’t be sure, but he had that straight-ahead look of someone who was blind. He was maybe upper thirties or mid forties with short hair, perhaps a wounded veteran who paid no mind to the antsy cars that waited for him and his wheelchair.

Sitting on his lap was a thin little girl. Maybe eight years old.  She was curled up, cuddled with one of her shoulders against one of his. As they were crossing the last three lanes, she stretched out her arm with an open hand as if to say “halt, please let us cross.”

She had the look of a girl who had not had an easy life but was happy to be with this person whose immobile legs she rested on.

Once they made it to the other side our lane started to move. The pair moved closer as I moved forward. It appeared as if she was acting as the man’s eyes and told him when to go. I had the sense that he was a family member, perhaps her father, by the bond they seemed to share.

As I passed them in my nice air conditioned car, I looked closely at the girl and waved to her and smiled. She looked at me directly as I drove by. She gave me a wave and beamed a big smile as if to say “Thanks. We just made it across a busy road and me and my pa are having a Sunday outing.”

In my mind, her face reminded me of pictures of Anne Frank, the girl in Amsterdam that kept a diary before being taken by the Nazis to her death in 1945.

I would have liked to stop and help her in some way. Or say “hi” to the man in the wheelchair who looked so stoic. Maybe there was something I could do for them.

But the fact is – they did something for me.

They set an example – of courage, caring and love. They had heart: For each other, for their goals, and seemingly for their adventure.

Not everything can be put into a mission statement or measured by statistics.  No “boot camp” can teach this, and even if all your policies and procedures were followed perfectly, you could still miss it.

Heart.

One office I know has so MUCH heart the whole town loves the office and the office loves the town. The fact that there is a 2-3 week waiting list of new patients is the biggest challenge the office has.

By training and professional experience, I have a bias towards procedures, organizational structure and production.  No doubt, without these, offices would experience anarchy or insolvency. But I have also learned that heart is more important.

We can all become discouraged at times. Emotions and confusions can affect your patients as they do you and this can put a barrier around our capacity to care.  This may be affecting you or your office now.

But this is only temporary and not the real you.

This is what the little girl gave me. Her wave to me was a “thank you for stopping to let us cross the road”, but also, “we are all in this together.”

That is the lesson I am left with.

There is heroism all around us. Simple and quiet examples of selfless caring and love pass us by daily if we were to notice.  People want to help others and want help as well. Why? Because we are all in this together. Because we care. Because we have heart.

Training on procedures such as the report of findings is fine, but your patients aren’t adversaries and neither is your community. They want to get better and they want to help others to get better.   Really care for them, really love them, be honest with them, and have the courage to always do this, and they will never leave you.

Whatever your office mission statement says, if you have one, it should say what is in your heart. And if you follow that, I am sure you can successfully pilot your team on its adventure.

#  #  #

Ed Petty

Upcoming Medicare and Reimbursement Changes: To Survive and Thrive – You Need to Study and Train

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“The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.”  Alvin Toffler

 

I don’t see this discussed much – at least not enough.

It’s called: STUDY.  Study is similar to training, which includes practice, and both require real personal effort and engagement to be effective.

You may want to study more but just don’t feel like you have the time to do so.  It does take time away from other activities. It can be confusing, tedious, and even seem belittling – sitting down and grinding over information, trying to figure out how something works. Practicing and roll playing can seem even worse.

But the return on your investment is worth it.   And nowadays, you have to constantly study just to stay up to date, let alone get ahead.    For example, for those of you in the insurance departments – patient accounts – you have probably had to learn many new things lately. You may have had to upgrade your computer programs for electronic health records. You have had to learn about “meaningful use” and other new terms.

But wait, there’s more!
INSURANCE
I checked in with our resident billing expert, Mr. Dave Michel, and he informs me you have the following headed your way:
  • June: new CMS 1500 claim form
  • July: PQRS implementation
  • Sept 7: WPS to NGS (Medicare administrator change in several Midwest states.)
  • Oct: new ICD 10
  • January major provisions of the PPACA and required EFT and ERA

For those of you in charge of patient reimbursement, you will have to learn about these new programs, train and then get them correctly implemented.  You have many resources from which to learn, including: association seminars and webinars, the CMS website, Chirocode.com, NGS web site for those of you in the Midwest, the PM&A Members website and Facebook page.  There are other resources as well, but the point is that you will have to study, learn, and work it out and get it implemented.

FRONT DESK AND OTHER CLINIC DEPARTMENTS
This also applies to every other job in your office. Each team member should be able to write a book about their department and job within five years and be capable of presenting a full day seminar on what they do to other chiropractic staff.

The front desk should be experts in customer service, sales for scheduling, and excellent in many other skills.  Therapy and rehab staff should know the physiological affect their machines and protocols produce for their patients. They too need to be exceptional at patient education, customer service, and as compassionate as the patient’s mother.

YOU ARE PROFESSIONALS
These are high standards, but you are professionals. You don’t work on an assembly line at the Ford plant. We now live in a networked economy. We have long since passed the Industrial Age, even though most of our management techniques still seem tied back to when “Father Knows Best.”

There is no getting around it, this is a new age. Alvin Toffler, quoted above, wrote about post the Industrial age for business in his book, The Third Wave. The second wave was the Industrial Age – and the third was and is the Information Age.

It is 2013 and your patients are smarter than patients have ever been and expect more.  They know about you before they call you and report on you after they see you so the whole world knows how you treated them.

You have to be better.  You have to study, learn, train.  In a tough economy, patients will go to the best and  bypass the rest. You have to be the best.

A NOTE TO DOCTORS
This apples to you doubly. Beyond the continuing education credits, I suggest you consider challenging yourself to constantly work on improving any and every aspect of your clinical craft like a true artisan. Like a scientist. And like a philosopher.

But you are also a CEO, which includes an entirely different set of skills. As the owner and manager of your business, you need to perfect your skills as a leader, manager, and marketer.  This is so horribly omitted (or perverted) in many programs as to be either laughable or criminal.   Once you do learn these subjects, you can delegate most of them and we can show you how, but you need to learn them nevertheless.

ONE HOUR PER WEEK
Stephen Covey talks about how you have to “sharpen the saw.”  You can cut a tree much faster if the saw is sharp and that sharpening is called training and study.  According to the American Society for Training and Development, since 1991, annual training budgets in the U.S. have grown from $43.2 billion in 1991 to $156 billion in 2011. Obviously, business sees an ever increasing need for training.

Encourage your team to take at least one hour each week to study some aspect relating to their job.   Encourage them to attend seminars and webinars and tele-classes, and have them give a presentation for the entire team at the next team meeting about what they learned.  You can give them a bonus if they give a book report about a book they read in the Lending Library.

YOUR PATIENTS
Lastly, this also applies to your patients. One of the primary functions of your office should be the training and education of your patients.  They need to take responsibility for their own health and in order to do this – they need to know what you know.  Regular care classes, a “lending library” and of course, warm “table talk” by doctor and staff help.

***SPECIAL TEAM TRAINING TELECLASS WITH PHYLLIS FRASE AND DANA PITTNER TUESDAY, MAY 21, 

12:30pm – 1:30pm CDT – “Dialogues and Dilemmas”

Take time this Tuesday to listen to these dynamic ladies discuss solutions to the 10 most common conversations staff often gets stuck on with patients.

Learn how your staff can share and educate your patients on the chiropractic lifestyle.  What you can say at the front desk, in therapy, financials, etc.

There is no charge for this teleclass. For active PM&A members, you will find it on you Members site in a few days just in case you missed it.

April Teleclass: Affordable Care Act:How Will it Affect Your Chiropractic Practice?

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“2014 will bring the greatest changes to the health insurance industry in our lifetime. This is not bull or scare tactics. The face of health insurance – already vastly different than it was ten years ago – is about to undergo a dramatic and seismic change.” -David Michel

Join us this Thursday April 18th, 12:30 CST to listen to Mr. Dave Michel of Petty, Michel & Associates discuss the Affordable Care Act.

Mr. Michel will discuss:

  •  Are your financial plans set for further limits on care?
  •  Can you continue to treat your patients based on your philosophy?
  •  Are you ready for mandatory changes to your Dx, your EOBs, the HCFA CMS 1500 claim form, and HIPAA? All coming in 2014?

If you can catch this class as it happens, it is free! Otherwise they will be in our vault for those of you who are active members with us.

To Register visit: Surviving, Striving and Thriving Through the Affordable Care Act

Finding the Right Mix for Your Chiropractic Promotions

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THE PROMOTIONAL RIVER

I sometimes receive emails and calls from chiropractors requesting a quick fix for their lack of new patients.   I often wonder if they ever got the idea of symptomatic care versus corrective and wellness care.

Effective marketing requires more than just a killer advertisement or long copy reactivation letter or a spinal screening.   It has been said that good marketing doesn’t depend on one promotion to get 50 new patients, but rather 50 promotions each generating one new patient.

Generating a high volume of new patients in your chiropractic office requires multiple channels of communication.   Consider how a river grows – through lots of tributaries. The Mississippi starts out like a creek, but then other creeks run into it and it grows and grows.

We call this the promotional mix – the blend of different approaches you use to communicate the benefits of your services.

On the following page, we have listed just a few important categories of effective promotions for your office.  Of course, there are others, but we have found that these work well and can act as a good foundation.

Mississippi

FOUNDATIONS OF PROMOTION

Effective promotion starts with individual and team motivation. It then should be entwined with all of your basic routines each day, from the way the phone is answered to the consultation and patient examination.

Beyond this, you can schedule specific health topics months in advance and offer them as workshops or “Awareness Weeks” where you provide a free screening exam and info.

Occasional special promotions should be scheduled, such as “Kid’s Day”, and community services should also be scheduled, such as screenings, relationship building with external referrals sources, and workshops.

Your presence on the Internet has to be constantly added to.

These are some of the main categories of your promotions, though advertising and public relations events can also occur now and then.

PromoMix(larger image)

KEY PROMOTIONS   

1.   Motivation.  You and your team’s desire to promote the benefits of your services create the energy to make your marketing work. Constantly nurture this.  Start with WHY?

2.   Basic Service and Chiropractic Care Procedures.   This is your foundation. Marketing is embedded in the heart of all the basic duties you do every day.  You should constantly review and try to improve on the marketing aspect of your procedures.  Be ever more cheerful, more genuine, more caring, and giving of extra-ordinary care and service.  Have “Present Time Consciousness.” It is helpful to have a checklist of these procedures to review.  Little things can slip aside and go unnoticed and a checklist helps flush everything out for inspection.  Work on a procedure or two every month so that you are constantly improving.

3.   Special Promotions. These are promotional events that can be internal, external, or both. For example, flowers to women on Mother’s Day, a Kid’s Day, Community Appreciation Day, Anniversary Day, etc.  They can be tied in with holidays, community days, parades, donation drives, etc. Most have an offer for a free service, but not all. These are IN ADDITION to the monthly education themes. Schedule these every other month or so. Promote these on the Internet and in newsletters.

4.   Community Education Program  (Monthly Health Themes) We have found that this program gradually builds momentum and if managed well, brings in more patient referrals, external new patients, and returning patients directly and indirectly. Here are some steps to make it successful.

a.    Select monthly themes around a condition or healthful topic. Can include headaches, kid’s health, motherhood, nutrition, cooking class, exercise, golf clinic, etc.
b.    Schedule a workshop time or “Awareness Week” (free screening exam last week of the month)  at the end of each month.
c.    Customize a poster. Samples on our Members site or make up your own.
d.    Do a YouTube video on the subject the month before. Post on Facebook, web site, YouTube channel and embed in your email
e.    Send out an email notice promoting the event, with a link to the video Health Tip, testimonial, etc.
f.    Send a hard copy newsletter with testimonials mailed to some of your patient files now and then (3 months) and all files every 6 months.
g.    Posters distributed locally and as statement stuffers.
h.    Press releases can be sent to local papers/electronic calendars.
i.    Ads are an option.

5.   Community Services. These are scheduled each month and include screenings, workshops and external referrals source development (MDs, businesses, DDS, auto body shops, etc.)

6.    Keep The Conversation Going: Internet And Newsletter.  Update your Internet presence and post new info regularly. Set a goal of how many hours it gets worked on each month, eg.  1 hr a week.  You could also use a checklist (we have one on our PM&A Members site). This would include Facebook postings, YouTube, directory sites (Yelp, Healthgrades.com. etc.), and search engines (Google, Bing, etc.).  And, of course, your website/blog.  Add patient testimonials, photos, and health tips. Keep posting – but keep most of the info local and “newsy,” just short of gossipy.  Also, send out electronic and hard copy newsletters with similar newsy content and notices for upcoming promotions, talks.

7.   Public Relations and Advertising.  Radio ads and print ads promoting specials events can be helpful now and then. Public relations such as press releases and donation drives can add long term good will and should be done a few times a year

3 Month Marketing Planner [Link]

2013 – Teleclass Schedule – Poster

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phone

We are excited about our upcoming teleclass schedule for 2013 which will start this Tuesday, March 19th.

We have an awesome line-up of teleclasses for you and your staff in the areas of chiropractic philosophy, office procedures and reimbursement.

Class description and registration can be found on the calendar on this site.

We have also prepared a poster you can print and post on the wall in your staff commons area for an easy view of upcoming class.  [Link]

If you can catch these classes live, they are free! Otherwise they will be in our vault for those of you who are active with us.  Hope to “hear” you in class.

6 Reasons Why CalJam is Important for Chiropractic

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grandpaskater

1. It is fun and promotes that chiropractic is and should be fun.

2. It’s founder and promoter is in practice, adjusting people of all ages, just like you.

3. It focuses on the purpose of chiropractic and the chiropractic lifestyle.

4. It defines and promotes the unique role chiropractic has in the market place – as a HEALTH profession that works, is not owned or used by pharmaceutical companies or other corporate monopolies, is vitalistic while also being scientific.

5. It promotes the idea that helping people to get healthier does not have to be a grave, stuffy, or serious activity.

6. And just like Dr. Billy DeMoss demonstrates, we all can work on higher purposes – professionally and personally —  while at the same time adjust people daily (APD) and run a business.

There are other reasons, but the ones above should be included.  Please add others below.

I hope you an make it to CalJam this year.

Some of us from PM&A are going and if I see you, let me treat you to the nearest greenest, anti-inflamatory drink nearby, or a piece of buffalo jerky, whichever is handier.

And if you can’t make it, you can always follow Billy on YouTube.

And either way, in your own way, you can always follow your own higher purposes and keep jammin in your corner of the world.

 

Chiro-jamming in an office near you..

Ed, and all of us at PM&A

===

CalJam.org

Dead Chiropractors Society

Monthly Goal Setting for the Chiropractic Team

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Chiropractic Team Goal Setting

At the beginning of each month you want to see that your team sets new TEAM GOALS.  You can also set individual goals privately at a different time, but TEAM goals are most immediate and important.

Each goal setting session always begins with a REVIEW of the past month. This gives the opportunity for the group (or individual in individual goal setting) to explain how they did and how they did it. And it gives you the opportunity to listen and then give some feedback. The feedback could be praise, or otherwise.

After the review, set the goals.   Group goals should be simple, usually just Office Visits and New Patients, though Collections can also be included. IMPORTANT: Let the group set the goals. You should negotiate the goals, but it has to be theirs.  Once these goals are set, ask the group (or individual) how they/we plan to achieve these goals? Get at least 3 action steps.

The last goal should include a “greater purpose” goal or two. This could be a party at your house next Thursday night, Betty, the Front Desk Coordinator will give a book report on one of the books in the Lending Library at next month’s Team Goal Setting meeting, and a check to see who is going to volunteer for working at the food bank next Saturday evening.

Why? You should also spend some time discussing why you have these goals. This takes you back to your MISSION.  Numbers for numbers sake is a soulless and goalless pursuit.

 In sum:

  1. Review last month’s numbers. Were they up or down from the prior month?  Ask.
  2. Then, ask why? Get the team to figure it out. Let it be a brainstorming session if possible.
  3. Let them tell you and you listen and question as needed.
  4. Acknowledge. Praise or show disapproval, as appropriate.
  5. Then ask for action steps to achieve goals.
  6. Then, get a few “greater purpose” goals.
  7. Then, continue with the rest of the staff meeting, such as announcing upcoming events, miscellaneous, etc. Include some discussion about WHY these goals are important.
  8. Do the same for individual team member’s right after the Team Goal Setting, or soon after.

 For more information on how this procedure is done, refer to the webinar called the Fast Flow CEO.

Chiropractic Practice Management, Marketing, and Leadership Recorded Training Webinars

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This is a list of our practice development recorded webinars.

Each is a recording of a slide show driven lecture, each filled with an abundance of practice information derived from in the field work – and plenty of slides!

Currently, you have to be active on a PM&A program. By this summer, these will be available on and individual basis for a small fee.

 Chiropractic CEO Webinars

 Creating your Dream Team Summary and VideoA virtual “live” interview with the doctor and staff of a true chiropractic dream team. Find out what they do to achieve high numbers, profit, and fun.

 The Fast Flow Practice CEO  -55 minutes webinar video and summary.
One of the biggest challenges in running and growing your business is the time it takes you away from seeing patients and from your family.  We have solved this with what we call the Fast Flow Practice CEO System.   A new system derived from old principles.
Management by the Numbers: 44 minutes – Summary and Video
Management is a subject that has techniques to help you go from where you are to where you want to be.  Management By the Numbers (MBN)  can be faster and more accurate than other forms of management, and help build staff morale and make it more self directed.

Capacity Constraints : 33 minutes – Summary and Video
Do you work hard but you just don’t get as far as you should? The reason may be that you are running into unseen bottlenecks that are choking off your production and suffocating your growth. This is the subject of Capacity Constraints.

How to Be an Effective Practice CEO  Video
If you are struggling with the ups and downs of a stressful practice, or have finally “settled” into a comfort zone producing much lower than you know you are capable of, this program is for you.

~~

Chiropractic Office Manager Webinars

 Chiropractic Manager Webinar – Roles and Goals  Summary, Video and Study Guide
What Are The Key Roles In Your Office? A hidden barrier in many offices has to do with confusing roles and job duties. Clear these up and see how much smoother patients and paper flow, and happier the team becomes.  Small office or big health business, clarify these 8 roles and the numbers will go up.
 

Chiropractic Manager Webinar – Job and Performance Reviews    Video
Employee reviews are often neglected, or are dreaded by employee and doctor. This webinar covers the basic steps to make them effective and positive for both doctor and employee.  Approx 37 minutes.

Chiropractic Manager Webinar – Motivating Your Staff – Video  Ms. Phyllis Frase shares 5 secrets to keeping yourself and your staff motivated.

 Chiropractic Manager Webinar – Team Meetings   Summary, Video and Study Guide. This is an overview of 8 essential actions to help you improve your meetings and make them faster, more fun, and more effective. Plus, different types of short meetings that your team can grow.

 Chiropractic Manager Webinar –  The Office Manager Job Description  Summary, Video and Study Guide. This class covers 17 essential duties of the office manager. Both the doctor and the office manager should watch and discuss these duties.
 

Chiropractic Manager Webinar-  How to Best to Train Your Staff  Summary, Video and Study Guide This webinar covers eight tips  to improve the performance of your team.  Training plays a big part in team building.
 

Chiropractic Manager Webinar– How to Hire the Right Team Member   Summary, Video and Study Guide.
This webinar  covers eight priniciples for hiring the right team member from knowing when to hire, who to hire and how to hire.
 

Office Manager Webinar – It’s All About the Patient, the Doctor and the MISSION [Summary, Video and Study Guide]
There are procedures to help the patients and procedures that help the doctor help the patient and then there is Everything Else.  Tips on how to deal with Everything Else. (30 minutes)

Office Manager Webinar- Part II – Tips and Tricks to make the office more efficient[Summary, Video]
Part II reveals tips and tricks of what an office manager can actually do in the office on a day to day basis to make things run smoother and  significantly improve the volume and quality of services. (55 minutes)

 Office Manager Webinar- Part I – Fundamentals of Practice Management [Summary, Video]
Part I covers the fundamentals of Practice Management (55 minutes)

 

Chiropractic Marketing Webinars

Innate Marketing  (55 minutes) – Webinar plus Summary.
There are stories that float around every now and then about how some offices can simply “think”  “New Patients” and they come in.
Are these stories an urban legend? A myth, or a fact? Can staff or doctors “concept” new patients in the door. Is this true? If so, how can you do this?  10 steps to help you generate more patient visits through “concepting.”

Chiropractic Special Promotions  (55 minutes) – Webinar plus Summary.
This webinar covers different promotions by month. You will learn 2-4 different practical promotions for each month of the year. More importantly, you will learn how to organize them so that they are time effective and productive.

Patient Retention – Summary and Video
If you understand the underlying basics of patient retention your appointment book should always be full.  Covered in this webinar is: Patient retention should be based on Principles – not gimmicks. Where are we you taking your patients? Why they quit?  The cost of not getting them there.

 Chiropractic Patient Education – Summary and Video (45 min)
We go over 7 basic strategies that cover the entire horizon of patient education and explain why it is so necessary to educate your patients if you want them to be healthier.

 Infomercials. – Summary and Video .
Whatever happened to Infomercials? They’re still around and they still work. And you can do them very inexpensively. You just need to know how. This webinar will give you practical examples and include forms for you to use in producing your own amateur and informational marketing that can help you create more new patients and keep the ones you have.

 Internet Marketing and Social Media. – Summary and Video . This webinar covers some fundamentals regarding social media, Facebook, and general Internet marketing. (35 minutes) (not yet posted)

 The Art of Spinal Screenings. – Summary and Video . Spinal Screenings – The Queen of External Marketing.  Everyone has done at least a few  spinal screenings. You have probably had some success with them. But how much better could you do if you knew the fundamentals of this time tested external marketing activity?  This is a three part series on spinal screenings. This session we will review the most fundamental principles of screenings. Get these, and all else will follow.(45 minutes)

 Scheduling Screenings and other External Events – Summary and Video .  How to Schedule External Events And Create External Referral Sources.  Types of events, Outcomes, Purpose. How to plan the events and get them scheduled.(30 minutes)

Marketing Tips: Earth Day, Spring Promotions, and other Tips – Summary and Video This webinar covers: Powerful internal marketing script, Report of findings referral procedure,  upcoming spring promotions, with special attention to utilizing Earth Day as an opportunity to promote your services.

Short Overview of Chiropractic Marketing Management with Some Marketing Tips – Summary and Video   This is a short version of marketing management and some tips for the upcoming months. What are the three levels of marketing?  What part does communication have in your marketing?  How to engage your patients in your marketing efforts.  Upcoming special promotions. (30 minutes)

Marketing Management, Part I and Part II – This is the longer version of how to manage your marketing, and why.

Chiropractic Marketing Management – Session I – Summary and Video The Why, What and How of Marketing. Getting your Marketing off the Ground. (55 minutes)

Chiropractic Marketing Management – Session II – Summary and Video  Specific Marketing Manager Duties – Your Job Description.  General Overview of the Most Effective Marketing Procedures in Each of the 11 Marketing Categories (55 minutes)

 

2013 Chiropractic Team Training – Live Teleclasses – at Petty Michel & Associates

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Ms. Phyllis Frase and Ms. Dana Pittner will be presenting 10 special training classes for chiropractic teams in 2013.

Petty Michel & Associates
Phyllis Frase and Dana Pittner
Chiropractic Team Teachers and Coaches

These classes will be offered free of charge when sitting in for the live session. (Fees may apply for viewing the archived edition)

Classes will be held on the third Tuesday of every month from 12:30 to approximately 1:45.

March 19, 2013- What Makes Chiropractic  So Special?
Getting Oriented With Chiropractic Basics: History, Science – Art – Philosophy, Key Terms.

April 16, 2013 – Extra-ordinary Service:
8 basic everyday actions to deliver WOW to your patients.

May 21, 2013- 7  Ways To Educate Your Patients During Your Day – And Why.

June 18, 2013- Over the Counter Collection
Strategies and Tactics.

July 16, 2013 – The Secrets Of Scheduling:
Cluster booking, and multiple scheduling the right way.

August 20, 2013 – Recall Systems that Work.

September 17, 2013- What You Should Be Telling Your Doctor.
What your doctor doesn’t know that you should tell him/her, and why.

October 15, 2013- Leadership Role in Chiropractic

November 19, 2013 – Purpose, Procedures and Checklists: How To Improve Your Skills And Success In Chiropractic.

December 17, 2013- Your Golden Future in Chiropractic

To Register Please Visit the Calendar of Events and follow the instructions.

For all classes register immediately by selecting the class(s) of your choice on the calendar and click the Register Now link below the class description.   You will automatically, via email, receive your special log-in access number where you can participate via computer, or by telephone only.

*** Each class will require a new access number and a new phone number. To attend the conference, all you have to do is call the number from any phone, enter the access number, and you will be in the class.

If you are a PMA client, you will receive  a special email during the week before the talk with the access number and new phone number. You can also find this information on the PMA Member’s web site at www.pmamembers.com.  It will be a posted a few days before the teleconference.

For questions, please give us a call at 1(414) 332-4511.  Or Email!

Faster To Tomorrow

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Road to Your Chiropractic Goals in 2013

It comes at you fast. 

The New Year. Like a fast train, you know it’s coming, and suddenly, it is already whizzing past you.

Actually, each year it comes by faster.  You may not have yet fully had a chance to finish all of last year’s work, or set your chiropractic goals for the New Year.  But nothing slows down the advance of this New Year – and before you know it, it will be spring.

And come summer and fall, what will you have changed in your practice? Probably not as much you would have hoped for.  Why? Because change is coming at you so fast it’s almost too much to keep up.

And it’s not just you that is experiencing change – our whole world is changing. Faster and faster.  The political noise and tumult we hear constantly are just the symptoms of the conventions of the old grating up against the realities of the new.

Ray Kurzweil, whose predictions have been mostly correct over the last 20 years or so, predicts that by 2045 we will have computers that will be able to teach themselves so fast that the speed in which they learn will reach infinity.  This is a very rough description of the Singularity he describes in his book. (The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology)

           “An analysis of the history of technology shows that technological change is exponential…  There’s even exponential growth in the rate of exponential growth…  The twenty-first century will see almost a thousand times greater technological change than its predecessor…”     – Ray KurzweilSingularity

In other words, change is changing exponentially.

This New Year of change is faster than ever before.  But if we move way out beyond all the hue and cry of chiropractic philosophy, “evidence based” chiropractic, “injectables”, politics in and out of the profession, the rah-rah and rock and roll, there is a quiet universe waiting of healing and success which we may only get glimpses of.

In my opinion (IMHO) … it is a world which you, the chiropractor, have always been in. It is not a matter of reaching your goal as a healer. You are already there. Science in fact is catching up to what  D.D. Palmer talked about as the 19th Century rolled naively into the 20th.  Bruce Lipton, a professor in biology who once taught medical students at a medical school here in Wisconsin, after his research and similar epiphany, now teaches chiropractors at a chiropractic college.  He gave a wonderful presentation at Life West Presentation in San Francisco in 2012. I was there and heard him. (Spontaneous Evolution by Bruce Lipton)

Bruce Lipton

Bruce Lipton with Ed Petty
Ed Petty and Bruce Lipton

But the truth is, you, as a chiropractor, are already there. You have already ridden the wave and, to some degree, are on the other side of the Singularly.  You may not  fully realize this, the full power and truth of your profession, and I certainly don’t pretend to.  Well, maybe you do since you are reading this, but probably most doc’s don’t fully appreciate what they have with chiropractic.   But the Innate power defined and used by chiropractors is there. How else do you think it has been able to survive and persist over these 120 years through the teeth of vested interests and vicious and covert attacks – that still persist? (see Doctored, the Movie.) It is certainly not because of the great skill and effectiveness of your national or state organizations (not to discount the good work they have done here and there.)

 And this brings me to the point of this article: you have got to upgrade the architecture and skills of the management of your office.  So, while the healing aspect of your profession is, and has been, way ahead of the times, in many cases your management is not.  Military control of your staff, robotic scripts, referral gimmicks and other relics from the 60’s and 80’s have no place in the future.  Dr. Noope left the building a long time ago.  (Who remembers him?)

For you to succeed, your management and marketing has to be way ahead of the curve. The world is changing so fast that if you are not keeping up, patients will look for chiropractic offices that are.  It is that simple: lead from the future, or perish as an amalgamation of P.T., massage, and G.N.C.

It is now 2013 and by now you may have, or should have set some chiropractic goals for 2013.   The challenge now is getting there. This is also our challenge as Petty Michel & Associates consultants and coaches as well.

This year, our goal is to get you to your goals FASTER.

Faster to the future and faster to your goals. It is a challenge, but we have been developing newer and faster approaches that can help you (and your team) get more done quicker.

We want to help you get to tomorrow’s goals – faster and once there, help you stay there and enjoy the ride.  “Get There Faster and Stay There Happier.”  Yep, them’s our goals!

As the world speeds up and changes faster each day, we can whine about how we are being left behind, stoically assert our principles and pretend everything is just the same, or embrace the changes and in fact drive them forward ourselves.

On February 1st we will be announcing new management technologies to get you to your goals  faster and funner.  Or Funnier.

In either case, please stay tuned.