Nurse Practitioner business owners wants to grow their business and practice. Doing so not only allows us to be more successful, but also allows us to be of service to more people.
However, just like small business, not all practices are successful.
Here are 12 steps you can take to help you be identify areas examine and strategies to assist you in building the business of your dreams.
- Take care of yourself. It’s not easy having a business/practice. You work hard. In order to keep up with the demands, it’s essential you take care of YOU.
- Identify and know just who your clients are. If you know who they are, you can clearly provide services to them. Your best marketing tool is your satisfied clients.
- Stay current with our specialty. In todays world, things change quickly, and you are expected to keep up with the trends in your specialty.
- Customer/Client service is paramount. There are lots of choices available to many patients today and good customer service is essential.
- Improve your financial acumen: this starts with having a clear idea of your financial health.
- Know where your money is coming from and where it is going. Without this information, you are essentially blind.
- Manage your cash flow! You cannot survive business without adequate cash flow. You have to know where money is coming from and where it is flowing to.
- Correct any blocks that inhibit money from coming into your practice. If you are accepting insurance, make sure claims are not being denied, and if they are, take steps to correct them. If you accept checks from patients and they bounce, or if patients are not paying…you’ll need to take steps to correct this deficit. Make sure your front desk people are collecting and recording copays.
- Know where your money is going. Who is managing your money – paying bills, making deposits and keeping the books? Always check and double check to make sure everything is correctly accounted for.
- Control inventory. Are you ordering supplies appropriately? You do not need to order supplies for the year, only a few months at a time.
- Make sound business decisions. While we practice in order to provide a service, you are still running a business. If you don’t “mind your business”, you will not be able to provide a service.
- Prevent loss through monitoring expiration dates on vaccines and medications you may have in your office. Monitor these things on a regular basis.
- Plan, plan, plan. You need to plan out your marketing,. You growth in terms of staff, personnel, finance and the administration of your business.
One more thing. Learn from those who have gone before you and ask for help when you need it. More and more NPs are doing what you are doing. Gather with them. Examples are NPBO, and our NP Business group on Facebook. Gather mentors around you. Take action, it does not have to be perfect, but it does have to be forward moving.
Do you have suggestions for practice growth? Feel free to post them below.
(c)2009 Barbara C. Phillips, NP