Fortunately, he was able to get the clinic stats back up within a few months. Since I’m always looking for what’s working in the industry right now, I wanted to know: what was his secret sauce? What did he do differently than his associates to generate such success?

After thinking for a minute he said,

“I keep the patients and the staff inspired. I educate every chance I get, and try to keep the enthusiasm and motivation high in the office.”

That’s just it, isn’t it? The most successful clinics that I’ve seen are the ones that have an atmosphere of excitement, purpose, and positive energy. It just feels good to be there.

My friend’s story is one that I find all too common among the doctors that I talk to. When a healthcare professional takes the focus off of running his or her practice, things can go downhill pretty fast. It doesn’t matter whether the practitioner is starting an online program, focusing on another business venture, or simply spending more time with the family outside of the office…if there are no real systems in place, it doesn’t take long for things to unravel. The doctor must then abandon the other projects to perform triage in order to restore life (and profitability) to the brick-and-mortar clinic.

But what if you could find the secret to keeping your employees motivated, productive, and on purpose, even when you are not physically in the office to motivate them? That would be pretty awesome, right?

Well, here’s the good news. There are systems that you can put in place to create a practice that builds motivation and leadership right into your process – so that your employees are inspired…whether you are there or not. Read on to learn a few of the essential elements, strategies, and systems I have employed both in my own clinic and in my clients’ practices to create a motivated team and a self-managing business.

Design Your Internal Mission Statement

First Things First. Do you have an Internal Mission Statement? This is a statement just for you and your staff. If you don’t have one, don’t feel bad. A lot of companies do not. However, the most successful ones – absolutely do. This is not the same mission statement that you put in your reception area for all to see. This is the private mission statement, the one that is designed to remind both you and your staff the difference you are making in the world. This is the statement that ultimately creates your office culture.

What is the The Big Why for the existence of your office? What’s the reason that your employees show up every day with smiles on their faces? Vishen Lakhiani of Mind Valley calls it the Code of Awesomeness. (I love that!)

Here are a few examples of what your Internal Mission Statement might include:

• To make our community a better place to live
• To get people off of unnecessary drugs
• To extend the lives of our patients and clients
• To treat everyone we meet with compassion
• To operate with integrity and honesty
• To contribute to our co-worker’s success wherever possible
• To change the face of healthcare in our community
• To save lives on a daily basis

This statement serves to remind your staff that they play a critical role in the impact your clinic has on the community every single day, and to create an internal environment of respect and collaboration.

Creating Your Office Culture

In order to have a self-managing company, you need to attract great talent. Talent in an office environment (especially a service-oriented one) depends on many factors, most of them having more to do with attitude and less to do with the technical skills. Skills can be taught…attitude and creativity cannot. In order to find employees that will create your winning team, it’s best to hire for attitude and aptitude, and be willing to help fill in the gaps of the technical skills they may lack.

We are looking for employees who are engaging and interesting. They play well with others. They seek personal fulfillment and satisfaction from their place of employment. They are enthusiastic about what you are doing in the world, and they are excited about your mission and want to join you. In order to attract these superstars, you need to sell them on why they want to work for your organization. Simply put…what’s in it for them?

Just like when you’re creating marketing to attract patients to your office, you need to create marketing to attract top talent to your office. Focus on benefits and why your company provides the best offer out there. Let’s look at some factors that top-notch employees look for in a job:

• The opportunity for growth
• The achievement of happiness
• A rewarding experience
• The need to feel significant

Strive to create your office culture to include activities, philosophies, and incentive programs that support each one of the above areas. You will build a team that stays motivated and productive whether you’re in your office seeing patients…or sipping a tall, cool drink on the beach in Bora Bora.

The Opportunity for Growth: Help Them Grow or Watch Them Go

Staff Meetings: Hold weekly staff meetings, establish goals for the week, and have a training topic for the week. Cross-train your staff so that each employee can do another’s job if someone is out for a day. This also creates more autonomy amongst your employees. When they understand the nuances and requirements of their coworker’s position, they’ll be far less apt to criticize them once they’ve walked a mile in their shoes.

Friendly Competition: Have a competition for the “patient story of the week/month”. Each employee submits the best patient testimonial (videos of the patients giving testimonials get bonus points) or outcome they had during the week. The best one wins a prize.

Continuing Education: Take your employees with you to seminars that you attend and/or send them to seminars geared to help them do their job better.

Hire a Coach: Bring in a specialist to train them.

Incentivize: Provide a scholarship to them for attending a personal development training such as Landmark Education, “The Work” by Byron Katie, Peak Potentials, Tony Robbins, etc..

Regular Performance Reviews: Every 90 days, have a constructive review of employee performance with suggestions for improvements delivered in an encouraging, non-critical, non-judgmental fashion. Use the “praise sandwich” technique:  what they did well, what they didn’t, and then another thing they did well. Always end the review on a positive note. (If you can’t find a positive note, it may be time to have a different kind of discussion with them…)

Communication: Keep the lines of communication open. Ask them to give you feedback in return, so that you can improve your company based on employee needs.

The Achievement of Happiness: Happy Employees = Happy Clients

Start the day with a brief 5-10 minute positive focus team meeting: Provide the opportunity to discuss goals for the day, wins from the day before, and welcome suggestions to make the office run more smoothly. Have time for an open forum. Encourage honest, constructive feedback.

Teambuilding: Provide team activities to help employees bond with one another. (Example: Have your team randomly pick names from a hat. Each will become another’s “Anonymous Secret Angel”. They can swap notes of encouragement or small gifts to show the other that he/she is appreciated.)

Once every quarter, or even every month, organize an office activity (bowling, hiking, dinner, sporting event, concert, pottery painting etc.). These are completely voluntary activities. They can also be used as incentives and rewards for meeting goals and benchmarks.

Have a theme day in the office once a month: This is another completely optional activity for your staff. This day can be based around something like “Outrageous Tie Day, Hawaiian Shirt Day, Crazy Hat Day, Casual Day, or Dress as Your Favorite Superhero Day”. (This may or may not fit with your office environment. You certainly don’t want to be dressing as The Joker if you’re the doctor!) You can also gear this around National fill in the blank Month…get creative and have fun with it!

Have an Open Door Office Hours policy: Make sure your team knows that both you and your office manager are always available to discuss issues that are of concern to them. In order to protect your schedule, hold these hours on certain days of the week, with no appointment necessary. Set aside an hour during the week, say Tuesdays from 12-1 pm. This way your staff knows that you are available to address their concerns privately. Many times, your employees will work the issue out on their own while waiting for Tuesday at noon to roll around. They learn to become more self-sufficient this way.

A Rewarding Experience: A Little Reward Goes A Long Way

Cash & Prizes: Provide incentives to your employees for meeting goals and benchmarks. Some of the rewards you can issue were addressed in the Team Building Activities section above. However, cash bonuses, movie tickets, gift cards to restaurants, spa gift cards for facials, massages, manicures, etc. are also fun motivators. Sometimes the best rewards are more than financial. Consider offering “lunch with the boss” for a job well done. Personal rewards such as these can really boost morale and give other employees something to strive for.

Good old-fashioned praise still goes a long way. If an employee has done a good job, do not gloss over it or forget to mention it. (And bonus points if you mention it in front of others!)

BONUS TIP: Know Your Love Languages

The Five Love Languages, by Gary Chapman, has been on the best-seller list umpteen times.  It helps to break down what really motivates people, and how to speak to people in a way that they will most appreciate. The book was so popular that there is a “Love Languages” book for practically everything under the sun.

The book designed for the workplace is called The 5 Languages of Appreciation in The Workplace.

Praise is a great motivator, but it must be given in a way that is meaningful to your employee. If your employee’s love language is Tangible Gifts, you can tell them what a great job they did, but they will respond much better to a Starbucks gift card!

In order to determine your employee’s “language of appreciation” you can have them take a complimentary quiz available online: Click here.

The Need to Feel Significant: Let Your Employees Know That They Matter

• Make your employees feel as though their skills and talents are noticed and appreciated as often as you possibly can.
• Recognize them for doing a good job, at times when perhaps it is not expected.
• Provide them with a degree of autonomy in their position whenever possible.
• Allow them freedom to have some form of decision-making control.
• Encourage them to share their opinions and provide them the opportunity to give input.

Well… if you got this far… kudos to you! You’re clearly devoted to creating a great work environment for your employees, which is the first step in creating a self-managing company.

If you are interested in a complimentary practice evaluation, click here. I would love to learn more about your practice!

Do you have any specific strategies for creating more autonomy and motivated employees in your office? If so, I would love to hear about them! Shoot me an email and let me know what works for you.