Do Your Solutions To Problems Weigh Your Staff Down?

As an office manager I know that it is hard to set goals for myself and staff members.  At times “work” just seems to get in the way of completing goals that would actually move the practice ahead in a more productive way. For example in our medical practice most of the assistants are cross-trained, which is very beneficial most of the time, but there are times when it seems that the more we trade off in helping each other to get things done the more chaotic things become and the less productive we are, we become “overloaded”.  One of the reasons I think that this happens is that many of the job tasks that we need to complete need focused time, such as preparing charts, verifying patient benefits, or inventory.  It is a known fact that when you are disrupted from doing a task it takes 7-12 minutes to regain your focus and get back to work, so we become less productive.  Maybe the answer is to look at a different solution to getting job tasks done that would be more productive and would still allow staff members to step-up and help one another.  “Overloading staff” happens gradually and many times goes unnoticed until things start spiraling out of control.  Managers need to take the time to step back and look at the big picture to see how they can unload their staff by making things simpler.  One way is to allow staff members to have a block of time to do certain duties where they are uninterrupted where they can get lets say, get all of the inventory for the month done, by being allow one afternoon a month to do it without being pulled away.  Another task maybe pulling and putting together the charts for a week at a time on one afternoon a week.  I think you understand what I am trying to get across, but the idea is to uncomplicated the way we do things and by doing this we accomplish what needs to be done without weighing anyone down.  They know they will have the time to get their key tasks done and the rest of the time will be spent productively processing patients in and out of the office.  Its time to lighten up around the office and everyone will feel much better. http://www.managementcraft.com/2010/11/solutions-should-fit-the-context.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ManagementCraft+%28Management+Craft%29 8/17/2012