pracTice managemenT | fInAnCIAlMAnAGEMEnT | make sure that you
diligently work within the parameters of your budget. celebrate success with your management team when this is accomplished.
External professionals
This is the right time to reassess the relationships you have with external professionals. It is astonishing that some businesses have not figured out that a down economy is one in which you cannot take business for granted. The competition for the customer has increased dramatically, and if businesses do not provide exemplary customer service and a high-quality product, then the chances of being replaced increase exponentially. The demand for better service applies
to all professionals who support your practice. These are some questions that you need to ask yourself: ■ Are you getting what you need from your current attorney, accountant, and consultants? ■ Are they serving your practice to the best of their abilities, or have they taken your business for granted? ■ Are they delivering timely, accurate, and useful information at a fair market price? This is also a good time to review all of
your insurance policies and evaluate the necessity. Are any of them redundant? You may want to consider having several brokers bid for your policies.
Create a budget The single greatest area of opportunity with regard to fiscal responsibility in the medical practice lies in the area of budgeting. Having a plan and a budget
78 ❚
with operational and expenditure parameters is essential to successful daily operations. A budget is simply a financial planning tool that lists all planned expenses and revenues. It is a forecasting tool which enables the management team to apply appropriate intervention in a timely manner. A simple six-step process for creating a
budget might be: ■ Gather all historical income and expense financial data ■ Separate into fixed and variable expenses ■ Perform assessment of future trends and changes based on past performance ■ Establish expenditure limits ■ Monitor and compare the actual results on a monthly basis (at a minimum) and compare it to the plan ■ Make necessary changes and modifications.
Make sure that you diligently work
within the parameters of your budget. Celebrate success with your management team when this is accomplished. When you exceed the budget, strive to understand what happened. Have your management team provide the cause and then offer coaching and counselling to avoid going over budget in the future. Holding yourself and the management
team accountable is essential to the success of budgetary compliance. The budget planning process will provide you with the information needed to
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prime-journal.com
implement changes. Appropriate oversight, accountability, and flexibility will help you achieve the goal of improved financial growth and stability for the practice.
Conclusions The first step to improve the financial strength of your practice is to take action. find the time to work with your management team and communicate what you are looking for and why it is important. Schedule monthly meetings to review the top line data and hold yourself and your team responsible for sustaining financial diligence.
Declaration of interest Page S. Pilandis President,CoreHealthcareConsulting,
www.CoreHC.com
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This is an edited chapter from Cosmetic Bootcamp Primer, edited by Kenneth Beer MD PA, Mary P. Lupo MD FAAD, and Vic Narurkar MD FAAD. It is available from Informa Healthcare, at
www.informahealth
care.com
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