Having a successful career as an office manager requires a specific skill set. However, knowledge and ability is only half the picture. To really enjoy this job, you need a particular type of personality. Let’s explore some of the traits that will help you thrive in this demanding position. The DiSC assessment talks about 4 types of behavioral/personality based attributes that are helpful in this type of discussion:

Attention Practice Managers!
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Is your practice legally compliant with employee practices and documentation? Do you have questions about how to handle an employee-performance issue? Do your employees know the expectations of their job and of your office? For practice managers and doctors seeking answers to employee policy and performance issues, it is essential to begin with a comprehensive human resource system. Efficiently acquiring the correct information is critical to the success of a practice.

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Physicians’ offices are hotbeds of patient information – not just medical records, but insurance and other financial data – that must be kept secure.  The amount of data is increasing, and so are incidences of information pilfering, identity theft, and fraud.  At the same time that the amount of recorded data is going up, medical practices are becoming increasingly large as doctors create partnerships to better serve their patients and conserve expenses.  This means that a greater number of people than ever have access to a given medical or financial record.  All this information must be kept secure, but many medical practices are struggling with this requirement because keeping data secure is time-consuming and can reduce the efficiency of the practice as staff members spend time logging in and out of computers and going for help when they forget their passwords.

A happy staff makes for happy patients, and happy patients means more business. You will also find that employees are more productive, and you will be more likely to retain them, which will save you the time and cost of training new workers. Putting a little more time and effort into keeping everyone happy is a win-win!

Telecommuting, also known as working from home or from a virtual office, is an attractive prospect to many practice managers. Avoiding a lengthy and irritating commute is a top motivator for practice managers who work in large, crowded cities with heavy rush-hour traffic. And working from home often raises productivity by offering blocks of uninterrupted time for completing projects. This series of articles will explore the concept of telecommuting for practice managers.

If you’ve investigated the option of telecommuting your practice manager position and think it might work, you’re probably at least somewhat apprehensive about the next step – proposing the idea to the owners/physicians at your workplace.  The first and most important rule is to be thoroughly prepared.  This article, the second in our series on telecommuting as a practice manager, offers some tips to help you make a presentation to your owner/physician that has the best chance of being accepted.

Patients who are no-shows for their doctors’ appointments cause efficiency problems and irritation for many practice managers, as well as increase expenses for the practice.  No-show fees can be a deterrent, but they don’t guarantee compliance with scheduled appointments.  Many practices either have receptionists call patients with appointment reminders, take their chances and deal with no-shows as best they can, or have both things occur as patient reminder calls slip through the cracks in staffers’ busy schedules.

You might think wearing uniforms at work will solve all your dress code problems. Wearing uniforms can help with employees not having to try to figure out what is appropriate attire for work and it will be cost effective for the employees who don’t have a lot of extra money to buy nice clothes for every day of the week.