new business models Archives

“If it ain’t broke,” maybe you still should fix it

This meme popped up on one of my feeds recently, and whenever it does, it makes me smile (and think). It's a picture of a horse tied to a lightweight plastic chair. The horse is standing patiently and obediently, presumably unaware that he could easily shake off the chair, break it, or drag it along and run away if he chose to. The caption is always some variation of, "The thing holding you back might be all in your head." Time to break free? It's an idea always worth exploring in my opinion. Whenever working on an intractable problem, I always seem to find that testing some assumption or another can lead to a solution. It's natural for business owners and managers to rely on assumptions. No one has time to rethink every workflow or financial policy or technology strategy every day (obviously). That's one reason why unhelpful or outdated assumptions can be hard to spot. It's a challenge that affects everyone, but perhaps especially very busy people who shoulder a lot of responsibility. What's more, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" or "that battle's not worth fighting" or "we tried that once and it didn't work"–some of the most common assumptions we make to help us keep things moving along—can be very useful maxims that help keep the to-do list manageable and avoid wasting energy. Even well-founded assumptions can outlive their usefulness as times change, though. And when they do, the same guideposts that once were so helpful can undermine progress. Part of my job as a consultant is to help practices identify and question their assumptions, to be sure they're still helpful. A mini case study I saw this play out recently with a practice that wanted to add clinicians but lacked office space, especially at the front desk. As a result of earlier expansion of the provider team, the front desk was already understaffed by at least fifty percent. ("We can't fix that. There's nowhere to put anyone else.") Despite this obvious constraint, the owners had an opportunity to hire two clinicians they really

By Morgan|2025-02-02T14:34:22-08:00February 2nd, 2025|

Technology for patients: Think good, not perfect

(c) Barclays PLC* A few days ago, the ATM turned 50. The first ATM in the world debuted in London in 1967; we got our first one in the US in 1969. Wow! I bet that the ATM has been around longer than many of you reading this. It's hard to imagine a time when this technology wasn't on every street corner. Yet when the ATM was first introduced, it was slow to catch on. In fact, it took about 30 of those 50 years for the ATM to be used by 2/3 of consumers -- and even as recently as 2013, more than 10% of consumers still had yet to pick up the ATM habit. The ATM's slow-but-steady path to everyday use got me thinking about technology in the medical practice. Technologies to connect patients and practices, especially on the administrative side, have emerged at a fantastic pace in the past few years. But many practices we've worked with have hesitated to implement them, for fear that the majority of their patients won't use them. Some practices that have implemented, say, a patient portal or online scheduling, have been disappointed because only a portion of patients seem excited to use it. "Laurie," they say, "we tried that. Only 20% of our patients used it. It was a failure, so we abandoned it." But when the ATM was first introduced, the adoption rate was much slower even than a 10% or 20% utilization your practice might see on its new payment portal or online schedule. So why didn't the banks give up? After all, implementing an ATM network is a massive, risky, very costly undertaking. So why were the banks undeterred by their meager initial results? And what can we learn from it for our own technology initiatives? The key is to focus less on the people who don't try the technology, and more on the people who do. For every one of those few customers who used the ATM in those early days, the bank could declare a victory. The consumer who wanted to use an ATM

By Morgan|2022-01-01T22:51:48-08:00July 4th, 2017|

Medicare-focused practice network shows high promise – Forbes

This article about ChenMed on Forbes really caught my eye, because for a while now I've been wondering why no one has created a practice focusing on Medicare patients. All the big attention is generated for practices quitting the program, but while Medicare's hassles and limitations get plenty of coverage, the spotlight is rarely trained on its advantages: speedy and predictable reimbursement. ChenMed has identified a few key success factors, including location (they started in Virginia, which they identified as an area poorly served for Medicare patients), an emphasis on preventive care, and a custom, home-grown technology system. They're raising capital and looking to expand into other markets. We'll be watching. Read the story on Forbes.

By Morgan|2022-01-01T22:52:40-08:00February 26th, 2012|