Delegate Efficiently

Like other optometrists, I wear many hats. Every day, I juggle business ownership, family responsibilities, patient care, staff management, and more. All these commitments got me thinking, “What if I could accomplish more by doing less?” What I discovered is that prioritization, delegation, and collaboration help me attain this goal. Here are some action steps to accomplish more by doing less.

IDENTIFY WHAT MATTERS NOW

I recommend creating goals categorized by timeframe. Next, share these goals with your staff and family, so they can help generate ideas to refine and achieve them. I have found that this approach allows me to focus on what I can accomplish now, while also keeping track of my dreams for a later time.

WRITE, SCHEDULE, AND SHARE IT

My staff in every department of my practice—front desk, pretesting, optical, and marketing—creates daily and weekly checklists. Whether shared on Google Docs or a Slack channel, these checklists keep us organized and facilitate collaboration. During brief, weekly meetings, we review our progress and celebrate our successes. Scheduling weekly administrative time for each member of the team helps them check items off their checklist. Twice a year, we reevaluate every staff member’s responsibilities and update them as necessary.

To facilitate shared responsibility, assign specific staff to quarterback certain tasks, such as optical shopping, and answering phones, on different days of the week. To make this clear, post the tasks. To ensure everyone is on the same page, provide brief instructions on how tasks should be accomplished, and establish a timeline for completion.

Pro tip: Be patient and flexible. Your staff may not execute every task the same way you would, and that is OK. Pause before redoing something or asking for it to be redone your way. If changes are truly necessary, working together can show staff how you would like tasks done.

PLAY TO PEOPLE’S STRENGTHS

Delegation is usually most successful when tasks play to a person’s strengths. Therefore, I suggest analyzing each staff member’s skills, and assigning tasks accordingly.

It’s important to be able to recognize which areas are not your strengths. As an example, organizing the office is not one of mine. Therefore, I ask my team (and sometimes my kids!) to step in on 1 day each month to tidy up. 

Pro tip: Use positive written and oral feedback to significantly boost staff morale and commitment to the tasks at which they excel. 

FOSTER COLLABORATION

Delegation does not stop with you. If I tell my manager what needs to be done, that doesn’t always mean she has to do it herself; rather, she may find the right person for the task. To create a practice culture that encourages staff to share their knowledge and responsibility, implement cross-training. I emphasize to my staff that cross-training makes them more valuable and builds their resume. Doing so earns me their buy-in.

Several delegation strategies have worked well in my practice. Here are a couple examples::

Providing Patient Education

After I finish an examination, one of my technicians reviews key points with the patient, such as prescription information, at-home treatment for dry eye disease, and glasses recommendations. Patients then receive a “homework sheet,” which lists these key points. I have each staff member shadow me to watch how I present this information to patients, and I even write rough patient-facing scripts for staff to follow during each of these patient interactions.

Reviewing Employees

Every quarter, my practice manager writes action plans for staff improvement using a template I created and shares them with me. I conduct a few of the reviews, and she completes the rest.

CREATING AND MAINTAINING A TEAM-MINDED CULTURE

I have found that following these action steps to do more by doing less has decreased stress and created a practice culture that embraces collaboration and delegation. When you trust your team to take initiative and participate, they are best able to learn and grow.