Is Your Staff Preventing or Exacerbating Your Burnout?

Recently we have focused on understanding the problem of physician burnout in medicine. Many experts have noted that the root cause of physician burnout are organizational issues. If you are a physician employed by a medical or hospital group, then yes you are part of a larger organization and can attribute components of burnout to your employer. But what if you are part of a private practice, then you are the organization and your decisions directly impact your risk of burnout.

Let’s start by looking at what research tells us is the number one driver of physician burnout-administrative responsibilities. Many administrative responsibilities are driven by government requirements but it is how these obligations are managed that determines the impact on performance and ultimately burnout.

If you are in private practice, your options for managing administrative responsibilities includes technology; voice driven records, hiring a scribe or perhaps a physician assistant. As the practice owner, you control the structure, the quality and performance of your practice staff.

Many physicians step into private practice with a lack of clarity on the importance of their staff and the need for a practice infrastructure. A common response is, “I’m a small practice and only need to hire two or three people so I don’t really need a staffing structure” and they jump right into hiring a staff and seeing patients.

Hiring staff members that consistently put supporting patients first is the first step to building a strong practice. This can be overwhelming but the ability to control your own destiny including reducing the risk of burnout is worth the effort. Your staff is the key to a successful practice and a synergistic life.

A physician can be world renown but if the first staff person that the patient interacts with is not compassionate, the patient may never make it to the exam room. Staff behaviors have a direct impact on your reputation and practice results.

If you are in private practice, it is never too late to modify your staff structure or if you are considering moving into private practice, please consider the following:

· What roles are key in making my practice successful?

· What values will I share with my staff makes decisions that are aligned with my core values?

· How do I identify candidates that share my values?

· How will I communicate expectations and performance to my staff?

Yes, there are many more things to considering when building a practice, but nothing is as important as the people you hire to represent you. Being selective will ensure the foundation of your practice is built to support your patients and you and can reduce the potential for burnout.

If you have a disparity between your vision for your life and your reality, and are ready to align the two, please contact me at smays@impactpracticeconsultants.com.