Hi, it's Tina. I'm here with your one-minute management tip.

Today I'm going talk about solving problems with perspective. Now, perspective of everyone in the practice to focus on what the problem is. So that means all doctors and all staff.

This is what you can do. Sit everyone down and discuss the problem.

Here's a common one. Patient flow. It looks great on the schedule. And yeah, we can do all of this, but then guess what? Somebody arrives early, somebody arrives late, somebody forgot their new paperwork, somebody didn't have a referral. Somebody's MRI wasn't gotten before the patient was arriving.

You know it, it happens all the time.

Alright, so now set aside some time. Set everyone together, explain the problem.

We're always running late. Patients are getting upset, staff is getting burned out. These are the items, are the things that we have identified that cause these problems.

And then give them the list.

Okay? Tell everyone to look over the list. Give them 10 minutes of quiet. They need to come up with some sort of a solution.

Okay.

At the end of 10 minutes, have everyone share their ideas. You might be amazed at the perspective that they have that is different from the positions that they work.

Then write the ideas down. Take some time. Let everyone look them over and come up with a plan.

What could they do? Or what could you all do to fix this problem?

What happens is that the group is more likely to want to work together as their opinions are taken into consideration. They all want to solve the problem because it is a problem.

And even if you can't fix every single item, if you could fix 50% of them, that would be enough encouragement for everybody to want to keep working on it.

So, I've got a book for you. It's an oldie but a goodie, The Power of Ethical Management. It's by Ken Blanchard and Norman Vincent Peale.

This book was written in 1988. It's got so many gold nuggets in it that you can use in your practice. And that's where this one came from.

I read this book many, many years ago and remembered, "Wow, this was a great way to start working on problems together".

If you have any questions, all you have to do is email me at Tina@TopPractices.com.

Take care, and I hope you start solving some of those problems. Bye now.