Calculating the Perfect Number of Office Staff For Your Growing Healthcare Practice

Key Things To Do To Determine The Right Number of Office Staff for Your Healthcare Practice

Determining how many office staff is right for your unique healthcare practice can be done through actions you can start taking today. It may take time, but through deploying the key initiatives below, you are sure to find the number that is right for you and your business.

1. Efficiency Study

An efficiency study is one of the simplest things you can do to get a clear picture of what a certain employee does in a day. Have certain employee(s) document for two hours what they do down to the minute. If it is too much, it’s a clear sign that the employee needs extra help. If there was unnecessary down-time, you can give that employee more to do. To ensure an honest timetable is kept for each employee, you can have them keep a schedule for each other instead of themselves.

Another similar version of this would be a task log. This is where employees right down their test and how long it takes them to do during a normal day.

2. Outsourcing & Automation 

Perhaps two of the best things to ever happen to businesses, outsourcing and automation are two of the smartest business decisions you can make. Automation can take tasks done by humans off of overflowing plates, and get them done cheaper, faster, and more accurately. Outsourcing tasks or entire parts of your healthcare practice can save money and be sent straight to people who specialize in that specific area. Outsourcing and automation can help a healthcare practice become more efficient and possibly prevent you from hiring a completely separate person to complete those tasks.

3. Trial and Error 

Finding the magic number for office staff for your health care practice doesn't happen overnight. It may take trial and error. When it comes to employees, of course, it is best to start low and add more if you need to, instead of hiring a bunch and having to let some people go. Start low and slow, and build up as you need to.

4. Task and Time Map 

If you have no office staff yet to help you determine their tasks and how long it takes, create a task map by listing out all the tasks you will have your office staff do and predict how long each task should take. Include about 25% extra time to account for breaks, busy times, and people being gone. This will give you a rough estimate of how many hours an employee will spend doing certain tasks.

5. Quality Over Quantity 

When it comes to certain tasks or health care practice processes in an office, some people have more experience and are more knowledgeable than others. One experienced and knowledgeable person may be able to do the tasks just as well and in a shorter amount of time than two novices could. This would allow you to hire one person instead of two. The only downside to this is the more skillful and knowledgeable someone is, the more you have to pay them, but it won't be as much as two wages.

6. Look To Other Healthcare Practices For Inspiration 

If you have colleagues who already have a successful private healthcare practice, look to them for inspiration as to how many office staff you need. Ask them what has worked for them, and also ask them how they determined how many office staff was there magic number that allowed their practice to run smoothly and efficiently.

7. Different Factors to Consider 

There's no magic formula I can give any private healthcare practice the magic number of how many office staff do I need. What can help you get to that magic number is taking into consideration the different factors that are unique to your private practice. Some examples of this would be the different services you offer, like labs, x-rays, prescriptions, etc. Other factors include your patient population and how many other health care practices are in the area.

Now that you are clear on your path to choosing the right number of office staff for your health care practice, we hope you can use one or more of the above actions to help you get there.

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It’s okay if you are still unclear about how to go about determining the right number of office staff for your healthcare practice, let alone hiring and picking great candidates. I can help with that, and would love to provide you with some clarity - book a virtual coffee (or whatever your drink of choice is) chat with me here: https://calendly.com/SabrinaRunbeck/Hello?month=2022-11