When Doctors Should Outsource
The maxim "Work smarter, not harder" can be especially important for doctors and dentists. The needs of your patients keep your specialized skillset in high demand, often for very long hours. In addition to managing your patients' health, you also must manage the health of your business. And sometimes even the best support staff can’t execute projects that are vital to your professional development and your Return on Life.
If any of these scenarios apply to you or your practice, consider outsourcing as a possible solution.
1. You need a personal assistant.
Your customer support team and scheduling system keep your meetings and patient appointments in order. But are you the one coordinating that calendar with your kids' soccer games, lunches with your spouse, and exercise routine? Who's answering routine emails? Paying the bills? Sorting through that stack of resumes and putting the five best candidates on your desk? Organizing your grocery list? An outsourced personal assistant can take care of mundane tasks and keep your personal and professional lives in sync.
2. Your business is growing, but not fully grown.
A mature medical practice will probably need most of the same executive infrastructure as any other business. But at the early stages of growth, hiring a full-time CFO or compliance team might not make a lot of financial sense. Instead, you can outsource many of these services part time as you need them — say, during tax season or as you're preparing to integrate new technology into your practice. This kind of outsourcing can be an excellent stopgap, delivering professional services on demand without the cost and hassle of hiring full-time employees.
3. You have an open project, not an open position.
With all due respect to your Facebook likes, you're a doctor, not a content creator or social media manager. And even if you do have a great idea for a new marketing campaign, it's probably not worth your time to design graphics and text, let alone figure out the optimal schedule for posts or how many ads you should buy. But you probably don't need to make a full-time hire to get that campaign or another short-term project off the ground either. Turn to the gig economy and you'll find a wide talent pool of professionals who can execute a wide variety of tasks.
4. You have specific goals that you want to achieve.
One potential pitfall of productivity hacks like outsourcing is that hard workers tend to pour the extra time they create for themselves back into the business. That can lead to exactly the kind of stress and burnout that you were trying to avoid by outsourcing in the first place. Or, you might get distracted by a new shiny object rather than focusing your time on the highest uses of your skills. Whether you want to work on becoming a better doctor, train for a half-marathon, or coach your son's baseball team, try to identify some specific goals that outsourcing will help you achieve. As time starts to open up on your calendar, fill in tasks that will help you achieve those goals before you take on any more responsibilities that you'll just want to outsource away in the future.
5. You need help managing your money.
Outsourcing is, typically, a short-term arrangement. That's definitely not us: we want to build meaningful, lasting relationships with folks. But we do believe that when you work with us on a Life-Centered Financial Plan, you'll spend less time worrying about your finances and more time living your best life and achieving more in your career.
Make an appointment to visit our offices and let’s talk about some of the money management tasks we can take off your plate.