Is there a patient referral system that you could implement? Not only one, there are many, and all may have a degree of success. The interesting thing is that the success is not consistent within any given system. Why? Because there is a fundamental administrative principle that supports the success of a patient referral system, or any system for that matter!
So, what is this principle that is so important? Allow me to illustrate by having you imagine you have a sports car with the most powerful engine in the world. It is sleek, beautiful custom paint job, has the best tires; in all – a dream. One detail though: the driver’s front tire is turned to the left, the passenger front tire is turned to the right, one of the rear tires is perpendicular to the car and the remaining tire is in the direction most rear tires should be. Now you get in and press the gas pedal expecting it to go… Will it go? Maybe a little bit. Will it be efficient? No, it will burn a lot of gas to trying to move just a little. And the tires will probably burn out in the first few blocks.
The same thing will happen with your practice. You get a patient referral system that worked wonders for a colleague and you expect the world from it. Only to realize that your staff are like the tires of the car in the example above: one does not agree that you should have such a system and is doing something else, another one thinks that you should give it a slight twist and proceeds to do so, another one did not get the memo and continues to do things the old way, and another one agrees with you and is doing the system by the letter.
As you see, the key fundamental principle is alignment – that’s the one thing that allows the power you have under your hood to manifest.
Have you ever noticed that when you don’t know how to do something or you don’t think of yourself as being good at it, you tend to foist the activity off onto someone else and avoid it like the plague from then on?
I have had many clients who (one way or another) tried to get me, as their consultant, to do things that they should be doing as business owners. And when I clarified for them that it’s their job, they would say something like, “I thought that is why I’m paying out the big bucks!!” And all I could say was, “nice try!”
See, if you keep that mentality of trying to get others to do what you are not adroit at, thus successfully avoiding it, you are always going to be where you are in regards that specific activity. The business owner’s job description is probably the longest of all job descriptions in your business. And in most cases, it’s most likely completely missing from your job descriptions file! Hey, this is what keeps me in business, but I would be remiss in my duties if I did not ensure YOU are learning how to do your job as a business owner and learn how to do all those activities as a real pro. Doing otherwise creates the infamous “consultant dependency” which can be as bad as any other non-optimum dependency, because it limits your freedom as an individual.
So, be suspect of the consultant who offers to do your P & L for you, or who wants to reconstruct your statistics from the pile of paperwork you’ve left, or wants to handle one of your employees for you, or who accepts to work directly with your employees without you needing to be present. You should always demand that you be present in any business dealings /handlings so you learn how to do it. If he tells you how to compile the statistics, you learn it and do it, and so on. It is in your job description!
