Catchy title wouldn’t you say?  If there was a way to milk out a few extra hours in a day or even one hour for that matter, would you want to know how?  I thought so.

I find it astounding how many clients do not implement the training in full because there isn’t enough time to do so however if you were able to properly implement the training you’ve received you would have more time.  Catch 22 you’d say and you’d be right.

The trick is, “How do you eat an elephant?”  The simple answer is one bite at a time. (I heard they taste like chicken)  How do you implement this information you’ve been taught when you haven’t had time and again the simple answer is “one bite at a time.”

My advice to you if you have recently returned home and are about to get started applying this technology or if you have done some training and returned home only to be overwhelmed is that you got the cart before the horse.  You tried to implement BEFORE you were prepared to implement.

If you don’t allocate a portion of your day or week to something no matter what it is, it seldom gets done.  There are other things that appear to be more urgent that capture your attention and your day ends and nothing you wanted to do got done.

If you are a clinician you know what a schedule is and how almost magically you can complete a patient’s treatment right in time for your next patient’s appointment.  Perhaps you were always behind when you were a new practitioner but eventually you figured it out.  You realized that if you didn’t stay on schedule you were buried with paperwork and disgruntled patients.

Many times you may have run into a lighter schedule that permitted a hour or two break in the day and you may have wasted it away because you didn’t PUT SOMETHING ON YOUR SCHEDULE DURING THAT TIME.  When you have a break like I mention here it seems to be a green light for other staff, who have been waiting patiently for this break unbeknownst to you, to tackle you and hit you with problems and there goes the rest of your day or that break when you could have been doing something to expand the business. 

You didn’t, in advance, put something down that YOU wanted to get done so you became the solution for some other staff member’s problem.

Here is how I’d recommend you create time to implement:

1.                  Find 5 hours a week. 

Note:         Preferably this is a singular 5-hour block of time.  Do not do anything else as far as implementing until you pull off this primary target.  You might have to get pretty creative depending upon how many staff you have to spread the workload around but if you can’t figure out how to find 5 hours you will need to speak to your consultant to get their help on figuring this out without crashing the stats.

                  If you start trying to implement and you have a staff greater that 3 or 4 and you haven’t figured out this time block you will likely generate more confusion with your staff than order and they will not be able to get those confusions cleared up because you are treating patients and don’t have time.

2.                  During the 5-hour block you simply implement.

Note:         Start with your implementation programs, the first one and go on from there.  Make sure that you simply follow the program and DO NOT skip any step.  If you take those 5 hours and decide to “catch up on your notes” or some other PT responsibility you are in Treason as the executive for not wearing your hat and could end up spending the 5-hour block writing up a Treason formula.  (Not really kidding here.)

3.                  Don’t become backed-off in confronting those staff members that seem to get you to feel that they need to be handled differently than the rest of the group.

Note:         Too often we can’t confront certain staff and when we begin to implement it really can push a few buttons on people so some staff can begin to push your buttons in return to get you to back off.  If you really are certain in your application of the technology you are on sure footing here.  If you back down when another pushes back you are sending a message to the rest of the staff that all they have to do to disagree is to be like ________ and you will back off.  They won and your organization will likely emerge smaller and with more internal turmoil.  I’ve got at least 20 clients that could attest to you on this point as being the greatest reason for their difficulties.

I do hope that this helps you.  I believe that if you start with the 5-hour block and apply correctly and confront situations are they arise you will soon be able to increase that 5-hour block to 10 or 20 or more hours a week to wear your executive hat and get some freedom and distance from the practice.