Physical Therapy Private Practice: Secrets Of The Top 10%

A lot has been said about what it takes to be a great executive. Too often, the most important key element gets overlooked. I believe this is the element of having some expertise in the area that you oversee. In order to execute effectively, you must have an equal balance between knowledge and experience. Expertise in any field or area has been said to be made up from one’s knowledge and experiences in that field or area. Think about it, Tiger Woods has a coach to enhance his skills, he doesn’t just read about golf. It takes repetition and consistent training to enhance your skills as a professional athlete OR as a leader and executive. In the fourth episode of our series on how to be the best private practice owner, we’re talking this week about the doingness of being an executive. Check out our NEW Packages & Pricing in MEG Academy!   Download our CEO Toolkit for a clear and organized breakdown of the hat and responsibilities of a CEO  

Leadership skills are not something that I believe most of us a born with. Therefore, I truly believe that they need to be developed.  Some of us may have been fortunate to grow up with a parent or grandparent who exhibited leadership skills for us to model, thus giving some a more natural ability to lead groups than others. Either way, true leadership comes from training and experience. Drilling down to develop these five leadership skills will prove to be effective for private practice owners who want to build a company culture with high morale and a well-organized structure for people to follow. Are you ready for growth? Request your free private practice expansion evaluation  

Every physical therapy practice owner has most likely been lead to this point in their career by a burning passion to own their own practice because it is part of their vision to treat patients in the manner in which they agree with professionally. Unfortunately, not all practice owners I’ve met can say that. Some owners went into private practice because of an offer they couldn’t refuse. Others sought to make more money. Or, they opened a clinic because they were darn good therapists and got talked into opening a clinic, or they went in with a partner who they felt complimented what they brought to the table.  Whatever that spark was that triggered the next step in your professional career toward ownership, it doesn’t really matter since you are now trying to figure it all out to be successful in private practice. Listen for the second in our series on ownership and leadership and how to win at both.  What's missing from your private practice? Check out our Physical Therapy Guide to Optimizing your Private P

Being the best at anything takes commitment to one’s purpose, the ability to confront what is in front of you, and the toughness to remain dedicated regardless of the obstacles you will have to face. For many of us, failure in these areas is self-induced and the rest are simply other considerations that we went along with. In this episode, I want to address YOU as the key element in this equation – you are by far the most important and all the other identifying elements of you as the physical therapy owner, leader, and executive are all built off of: the real YOU, the true YOU, and the once uninhibited YOU (hopefully some of you still are).  The real YOU has NO self-doubt. The real YOU makes decisions without public opinion. The real YOU knows what’s right and what’s wrong in your HEART. Remember this: having self-confidence is built on keeping small promises to yourself and not breaking them.   Once upon a time, I was that owner. I thought it was a good idea to run my practice as a democracy and took popular

As I started planning out this week’s episode, I wondered if in my 28 years of physical therapy and Practice Management experience, have I ever specifically targeted trying to hire a veteran physical therapist for any of my offices? After thinking about this for a while, not once did I actively recruit a veteran therapist. Here I am, a veteran therapist myself; there’s nothing wrong with me nor do I think there’s anything wrong with ANY veteran therapist I’ve ever met. I just never intentionally went out on the recruiting lines to attract a veteran therapist. I’m sure many of you have, in which case I would love to hear about your experience doing so. I’ve always just taken the approach of seeking to teach or train somebody something new as opposed to having to retrain somebody and something old.  Grab one of our top resources, the Physical Therapy Personnel Toolkit  

I believe that if you’re a high-quality practice owner, one of the priority areas of your concern will be how to create that ideal company culture, much like a baker who is constantly focusing on how to make that ideal pie by working with only the best ingredients. The same thing goes for the physical therapy practice owner who is only looking to hire, train, and retain the best most highly motivated personnel available. Unlike baking, where you can purchase the best ingredients; when it comes to the personnel, they need to be homegrown in order to be the best. In today’s labor market, it is unlikely that you will hire somebody “off the shelf” who comes in with the attitude, skills, and motivation that will complement your company culture. Therefore, the burden falls on you the owner/manager to understand the science of personnel development and have the professional skills to effectively communicate and enhance the ability of those around you.  This means that before you can go out looking for your next adva

There are three types of clinicians. These clinicians are categorized based on experience: New grad, the advanced therapist, and the veteran therapist. Today we’re focusing on the new grad. The new grad is defined as a physical therapist who is 1-3 years out of school. They come out of school still high on the learning and high on the mentoring curve and are really focused on wanting to become the best therapist they can be. They’re seeking professional growth through continuing education outside the office and professional enhancement inside the office, therefore, a continuing education program is simply not enough these days. The top private practices across the country already know this and have solved this by creating internal mentorship programs for their new grad hires. This week we’re talking about how to best hire, train and retain the new grad therapists. But, this is only part one of a three-part series of podcasts in which we’ll be discussing all three of these different types of therapists and how

There is a lot of noise in the digital marketing space. It’s going to take 7 touches from your physical therapy practice for people to remember your brand. While many practice owners we talk to know the importance of marketing and know the concept of marketing is important, they lack the management of marketing to really be successful. Meaning, the lack of accountability and management over this area is going to hold your practice back and hold YOU back from the living the life you dreamed of when you opened your practice. So what can YOU do about this? How can you differentiate your practice? We’re talking with MEG Marketing Director, Heidi Schmidt and MEG Regional Marketing Manager Scott McCutcheon about some marketing strategies that will help your practice get found and win in the digital marketing space that will benefit both your internal and external marketing efforts. Here's your guide to acquire, retain and manage patients effectively - Marketing Strategies Toolkit  

Have you ever felt like you were walking on eggshells around your staff? Or, maybe you felt like you needed to think twice about what you wanted to say to a staff member for fear of upsetting them, or worse that they might quit? These are all symptoms of a bigger problem. They show a lack of leadership and lack of confront. There are only two ways you can be and only one of them can exist at any one time. You can either be in control and be at cause over what is going on and what is being done by you. Or, you can be the effect of others and what is going on to you.    Check out our NEW Packages & Pricing in MEG Academy!   Grab one of our top resources, the Physical Therapy Personnel Toolkit  

Fact: it doesn’t take more money to build a better physical therapy practice. All it takes is better people. When I say better people, I mean you and me as owners and leaders of our groups. When asked, just about everyone will say that he or she can be better than what they are today. If this is true, then they would immediately understand that they have deficiencies and lack of capabilities.   More significantly, I want to bring your attention to the fact that real success in any business is dependent on one’s abilities to bring about understanding amongst your team. The keyword here is “ability.” The only way your skills are going to grow in the field of private practice management is if you realize that you have deficiencies. If you acknowledge that you don’t know all there is to know about this field of practice. Let’s face it; physical therapy school did not sufficiently train us for the challenges that we face every day in the world of private practice. So, before we go criticizing the shortcomings of o

My daughter is about to graduate college. She’s moving on into the field of acting out in California and I have every confidence that she’ll be a big success. However, as we learn about this industry – there’s so much criticism and counter intentions out there causing headwind to her success. As a result, I can understand now why aspiring actors and actresses need an agent before anything else when they are coming out of school. The agent is there to help protect them against making bad decisions and going astray down a path of unlikely success. Yet, an agent is still not enough. She will still need an acting coach to further enhance her skills and push her to learn new things and operate outside of her comfort zone. Looking back on when I was a new practice owner, I realize that that was exactly what I wanted and I would have paid anything to get. To have someone who had the knowledge and experience to help me stay away from making foolish mistakes and coach me on all that I needed to know but never got whil

I’ve been working with both new and existing owners now for almost two decades. When I think back to what I went through when I opened my first office in 1999, it’s a world of difference. I actually recall putting my head in my hands saying to myself: “I would pay anyone anything they wanted if they would just sit down with me and show me what it is that I needed to do first, second and third in order to build a successful practice.” Unfortunately, at the time, all that was available were business consultants who either didn’t know physical therapy or were more interested in selling me stuff rather than actually helping me. I knew then that someday I would create a company that physical therapy owners could trust would have their best interest in mind and provide them with the knowledge and support necessary to their success.   A private practice’s success begins with the owner knowing what they need to do and when they need to do it. There is no time in business where your actions as an owner are more critic

Our employees are people and as we all know; people, in general, are resistant to change. I read an article last week about how more now than ever before people are being labeled with having Neophobia. Defined as “the fear of anything new, and it can be an especially persistent and abnormal fear. In its milder form, it can manifest as the unwillingness to try new things or break from routine.” How do you get your staff on board to make necessary changes in your private practice when they’re afraid of change?  Grab one of our top resources, the Physical Therapy Personnel Toolkit  

After having spoken with hundreds of practice owners over the years, it’s what they don’t know that’s typically holding them back from the success they desire. When you went into physical therapy, you went in to be a clinician, not a lawyer, or an accountant, or a bookkeeper. We tell physical therapy owners time and again to stop wasting time and mental attention on tasks that you can outsource to others. This week, we have a panel discussion with Jon Repka, VP of Sales from Paro – an accounting and bookkeeping service company, and Denise Muncie, COO of MEG Billing Solutions who manage their respective outsourced services to physical therapy practice owners across the country.  These outsourced solutions allow practice owners to stop wasting time and mental energy on tasks that they aren’t trained to do so they can focus on what really matters when it comes to being an executive. Check out our NEW Packages & Pricing in MEG Academy!   Take our Billing Stress Test to check the pulse of your PT private prac

If I had to say what the top three reasons are that people call me it would be: marketing, personnel, and billing related issues. Almost everybody believes that they can do better in business if they have more new patients. Unfortunately, these people don’t know that almost all problems associated with the practice can be traced back to lack of leadership, lack of knowledge in that area, and/or the inability to confront others.  In podcast episode 49, I laid out the four types of owners and made the case that how you approach your practice and the people associated with your practice is what will have the greatest impact on your practice’s success. Every successful practice owner that I’ve ever met understands that they have four main responsibilities and everything else outside of that is simply a distraction.  Consider outsourcing your accounting services, legal services, and billing services so that you have more time and attention to spend on the four key elements to running a successful practice. Gettin

Knowing when it’s time to hire additional physical therapy staff is a challenge we hear about a lot from the practices we work with.  If it’s not well thought out, you could wind up paying more in payroll than you are getting in return for the services being delivered. This is especially true when you are a new startup practice just starting out; you cannot afford to spend more money than you make. To combat this, you need a proven hiring system that tells you when and who you should hire based on the numbers. You should never be guessing or hoping that your new patient numbers will sustain the new physical therapist you just hired. You should be driving those numbers and hiring based off a sequential plan of growth that you are in control of. This week, we’ll dive into the strategy to know when to hire the next therapist that your practice can sustain that will contribute to the growth of your practice.  Grab one of our top resources, the Physical Therapy Personnel Toolkit  

In order to become a private practice among the top 10%, there are several factors that need to be met. These key factors of success cannot be attained without the right mindset.  This week, Brian is talking about the factors that make the top 10% of practices and what YOU as the physical therapy owner can do to reach those goals.   Check out our NEW Packages & Pricing in MEG Academy!   Are you ready for growth? Request your free private practice expansion evaluation  

Regardless of your industry, there are always challenges to overcome. As a Physical Therapy Private Practice owner, there are four common challenges that we see more often than the rest. One in particular is rarely confronted. Unfortunately this is often the root cause of all the other problems. Lack of leadership and what that means to your staff, yourself and your practice. This week on the podcast we’re talking about how to approach and conquer these challenges so that you never fall the effect of them again.  Check out our NEW Packages & Pricing in MEG Academy!   Are you ready for growth? Request your free private practice expansion evaluation  

How many times have you said to yourself: “there just aren’t enough hours in the day.” Or, wondered as 5pm rolls up, “where has the time gone?!” Turning our focus inward to ourselves, allows us to take greater responsibility for our group by first taking more responsibility for our own actions. It’s easy to blame others for missteps and inconveniences, but they are the ones that you chose to work with, trained and allowed their actions to exist. If you place more time on being a better boss and CEO first, and then put forth well-thought out policies and procedures to train others on, then it comes down to holding them accountable. Unfortunately, too many physical therapy practices are so busy running the day to day functions of being productive and getting work done, that they are not proficient at working on their practice policies and procedures or on standardizing systems of operations. This gives your team better clarity and certainty so they can get their jobs done. Giving this direction and confidence t

If you want to be a successful startup, we always recommend starting with an office manager. Front desk is a huge gateway to your practice and the office manager should run that show (consider the front desk and office manager the gate keepers) and be the core of your front desk management system.  This week in our podcast, Brian discusses the benefits of this for your startup, but also how to create a culture of US for your practice, and how the front desk contributes to that.   Grab one of our top resources, the Physical Therapy Personnel Toolkit