You have spent years improving office efficiency until your physician’s practice hums like a fine Swiss watch. You have raised the level of patient satisfaction to the point where the doctor is now treating the children of his patient’s children -but now it is time to move on.

Whether you are one of the thousands of the wave of baby boomers about to enter retirement, or just ready for greener pastures, as a professional medical office manager it will likely be your responsibility to help pick and train your replacement. 

Finding the right person to fill your shoes is no easy task. It will likely take time. As long as your leaving is mutual, and on good terms with the practitioners involved, time will be your greatest asset.  In the Practice Manager’s world, “2-weeks notice” just won’t do in most cases. In some larger clinics or multiple-doctor practices, Office Managers make plans to leave months, sometimes even years, in advance.

Handing over the complexities of running a medical office will be difficult at best.  Many Practice Managers pride themselves on having developed office strategies that increased their value to the point of practical indispensability.  It may make you feel very good to know how much you will be missed, but the greatest service you can do your practice and patients, is if they hardly notice the change a few weeks after you are gone.  And that takes a lot of planning.

Even if you are leaving your job because you are taking a ”better position” and do not expect to be that heavily involved in finding and training your replacement – career counselors know there is a right way and a wrong way to move on. No matter what your circumstances your can make your transition as trouble-free for the new Office Manager as possible by:

Leaving a list of all important contact numbers, along with a schedules for inventory and supply orders, financial reports, and a staff calendar

Leave your desk, physical, and computer files as organized as possible.

If you will not have any direct contact with your replacement – be sure someone will be able to bring him or her up to speed on any long-term future plans you may have initiated, such as office renovations, technology or software upgrades, new hires, etc.

Leave instructions on your accounting software, billing, and EMR solution, in case your successor used a different system in his or her last job

And finally, if you are comfortable doing so, and are leaving on good terms – many HR experts suggest you offer your phone number, in case there are any questions or need for advice.

Given the pressures that the typical Office Manager faces, when you know you are leaving, the strains of a certain Johnny Paycheck song may come to mind, and that may be a nice fantasy – but burning bridges is never a good idea, even if you are retiring.