How to Break Free from the Limits of Time, Space, and People
When most doctors think about profit, they focus on more. More patients, more procedures, more days on the schedule. But here’s the truth: more isn’t better. In fact, chasing volume often leads to diminishing returns.
You don’t need to do more. You need to leverage what you already have.
The richest breakthroughs in profitability come not from increasing the volume, but from increasing the value of every moment, every patient interaction, and every procedure.
The key to transforming your practice lies in leveraging and maximizing the resources already at your disposal – your time, your space, and your people.
Shift Your Mindset Focus to VALUE, Not Volume
Let’s start with a fundamental shift in how you think about profitability. Most doctors get trapped in the mindset of chasing volume – more patient visits, more crowns, more procedures, more units of anything.
But the real key to profit isn’t in quantity; it’s in quality.
What’s the worth of the work you’re doing? What’s the value of each procedure, each visit? When you shift your focus from how much you’re doing to how valuable each thing is, you unlock a new level of profitability.
Think about it like this: instead of focusing on how many crowns you place in a day, focus on the value of each crown and the outcome it delivers for your patient. Instead of counting how many hygiene appointments are scheduled, focus on how to maximize each patient’s lifetime value by upgrading their care or adding more comprehensive treatments.
This shift from volume to value is where the magic happens.
It’s not about cramming more into the schedule – it’s about increasing the quality and worth of what’s already there.
The Three Limiting Factors: Time, Space, and People
As a private practice owner, there are three limiting factors you deal with every day: time, space, and people. These are the resources that shape the limits of your practice, but they also hold the keys to unlocking greater profit.
- TIME: The Most Finite Resource
Time is your most valuable and finite resource. There are only so many hours in a day, and you can’t create more of it. That’s why it’s critical to ask yourself: What is the time I put in, and what is the value I get out?
This question applies to everything you do in your practice. Whether it’s a new patient experience, a procedure, or a team training, the goal is to maximize the return on the time you invest.
You need to get laser-focused on how your time is being spent. Are you spending hours on low-value activities that don’t contribute to profit? Are your appointments structured to ensure that you’re getting the most out of every minute? Time is the currency you can’t afford to waste.
- SPACE: Maximize What You Have
Next, let’s talk about space. Your office has physical limits. There are only so many operatories, so many rooms, and so much equipment. You can’t keep adding more space without running into serious limitations.
But here’s the thing: you don’t need more space to increase profit. You need to maximize the use of the space you already have. This might mean rethinking your schedule, optimizing how rooms are used, or staggering patient visits to ensure that every inch of your office is working at full capacity.
It’s not about expanding the walls of your practice – it’s about getting the most out of the square footage you already have.
- PEOPLE: Leverage Your Team
The third limiting factor is people: your team. As your practice grows, it’s tempting to keep adding more staff to handle the workload. But this comes with increased payroll, training, and management burdens. The key to maximizing your profit isn’t hiring more people; it’s leveraging the team you already have.
Your team members are capable of more than you might think. With the right training, systems, and accountability in place, they can take on higher-value roles. This means giving them the tools to handle patient education, upgrade treatment plans, and engage patients in conversations that lead to greater case acceptance.
Instead of adding more people to the payroll, focus on maximizing the leverage of your current team. It’s about getting them to operate at their highest potential, so you can increase profit without adding more overhead.
The Secret to Optimizing Your Returns…
Here’s the big takeaway: volume has diminishing returns. At some point, doing more actually leads to less profit, because time, space, and people all hit their limits.
That’s why LEVERAGE is the key to optimizing your returns.
Leverage is about getting more value out of the same effort. It’s about doing what you’re already doing, but doing it better, smarter, and more efficiently. When you apply leverage to your time, space, and people, you unlock profit that most doctors overlook.
For example:
- Leverage time by focusing on the highest-value procedures and scheduling your day to maximize productivity.
- Leverage space by optimizing how rooms are used and ensuring that no operatory sits idle.
- Leverage people by empowering your team to take on higher-level tasks and responsibilities that directly contribute to profitability.
When you leverage what you already have, you don’t need to chase volume. You just need to maximize the return on your current resources.
Maximize What You Already Have
The greatest breakthroughs in profitability come from maximizing the resources you already have. There’s always room to move the needle – to increase profit without adding more to your schedule or your overhead.
Ask yourself: Where can I get more out of what’s already in place? Can you restructure your patient flow? Can you optimize your team’s roles? Can you focus on higher-value treatments instead of chasing more procedures? These are the questions that will lead to greater profit.
Remember, it’s not about doing more – it’s about getting more value from the same effort. When you focus on maximizing what’s already working, you create a practice that’s not only more profitable, but also more sustainable and scalable.
More Isn’t Better, Maximization Is
At the end of the day, more isn’t better. Chasing volume leads to burnout and diminishing returns. The real key to profitability is leveraging and maximizing what’s already in front of you: your time, your space, and your people.
When you shift your focus from volume to value, and from quantity to quality, you’ll see exponential growth in your practice’s profitability.
Remember, your greatest breakthroughs will come not from doing more, but from maximizing and leveraging what you already have. That’s how you achieve lasting, sustainable profit.
Respectfully,
Scott J. Manning, MBA