If you are twenty-something and just out of graduate school, take heart! I just read this guest post by Dan Schawbel in Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist. Dan points out how your generation has been raised on personal branding. Check out his article here.
Even if you are doing many things “right,” you can still end up destroying your private practice. Here’s the 5 top ways you can blow it up fast:
# 5 – Don’t change things up.
Keep doing the same old things you used to do when you started in the business 20 years ago. Be predictable i.e. boring. Keep working with the same old issues (and only those same old issues) that you’ve always worked with. Don’t develop new bodies of work, new skills, or new interests. Allow your work and your practice to become dated and irrelevant. It works every time.
Caution! Caution!
# 4 – Don’t ask your clients.
Whatever you do, do not survey or poll your clients. Don’t ask for their feedback about anything . . . your office location, the way they are greeted at the front desk, your billing / fee collection process, your clinical effectiveness, or their thoughts about your work after they terminate. And, should your clients volunteer such feedback, be sure to argue, justify, or dispute it. Whatever you do, make sure you do not actually consider it and make appropriate changes (see comments above).
# 3 – Don’t ask for referrals.
Don’t explain that you are expanding your practice; don’t tell friends and family that you have a few extra time slots to fill; and, don’t tell clients that your business depends on referrals from satisfied customers. Better yet, tell everyone you know that you have a one month waiting list and are not looking for new clients.
# 2 – Don’t brand yourself.
Branding is for businesses that want to present a clear, succinct and memorable message about who they are and what they represent. By not branding you and your private practice, you can ensure that your business becomes forgettable, at best and, at worst, becomes confused with too many / unprofessional images and messages. To kill your practice, I highly recommend avoiding all tendencies toward branding.
# 1 – Don’t niche your practice.
Most importantly, try to be everything to everyone. Be a generalist. Do everything OK. Work with everyone all right. Refuse to specialize in anything and become forgettable fast.
Why isn’t your private practice surviving?
Working on your business is not the same as working in your business. That came as news to me when I first read Lynn Grodski’s primer, Building Your Ideal Private Practice. I used to think that if I was seeing my clients or charting notes on my clients that I was working on my business. After all, this is why I went to graduate school — to learn the clinical piece.
It’s Not Enough
Unfortunately, the clinical knowledge and skills of psychotherapy did not begin to prepare me for the business end of private practice. As long as I wanted to work in an agency or hospital for someone else, that would have been good enough. However, for those of us who have the entrepreneurial bug and yearn to be in business for ourselves . . . the clinical knowledge and skills are only half of the private practice package. In fact, you can easily and quickly starve to death if you know nothing or do nothing to work on the business end of your practice.
Working On Your Business
To paraphrase Lynn Grodski, “working on your business is at least as important as working in your business.” And, working on the business means spending time, money, and resources to create and sustain a healthy flow of clients coming into your business. Some of these tasks include:
To work on your business means recognizing that your work in private practice extends far beyond just the skills of counseling and psychotherapy.
What I’m Doing
Today, I have met with my graphic designer, Jennifer Gunther of Nudge Creative, to rework my business card and letterhead. I have vetted a potential printer for my print needs. I have collaborated with my blog designer, Beth Hayden of Basics of Blogging. I met another colleague for lunch to brainstorm about my marketing needs. I’m writing this post for my blog. These are the things that I am doing to work on my business today.
What about you? What are the ways that you are working on your business today?
Tamara G. Suttle, M.Ed., LPC has maintained a private clinical practice since 1991 and founded Private Practice from the Inside Out in 2003. She has spent almost 20 years consulting and teaching marketing strategies to health care professionals like you. You can learn more about her clinical practice at her website.
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