Managing a private practice, like any business, means managing growth. And growth always happens in phases.
We all start as beginners somehow - right? I know.
But the start up phase of a private practice can be completely overwhelming. No one taught us how to do this in grad school, and we have a LOT of questions.
Whew boy.
So. Many. Questions.
(And that’s just for starters!)
Well don’t worry my friend, because I’ve got you covered.
In today’s episode, I’m going to break it all down, so you’ll know what you HAVE to know up front, and what can wait.
In this episode, I’ll share:
Feeling a little overwhelmed? Let’s fix that.
Let’s get you started, so you can open your doors to new income, and new ways to help others.
~Wendy
xoxo
P.S. Don’t miss the journal prompt below!
_______________
THIS WEEK’S JOURNAL PROMPT:
Based on what you’ve learned from today’s episode, what one thing could you do today to move your private practice, your business, forward?
_______________
EXTRA RESOURCES:
_______________
DON'T FORGET to GRAB THIS! >>> The IP360 SCORECARD
As a coach of mine used to say, running a business is a full contact sport. There are SO many different parts of it to keep up with, manage, think about, and create - at every step of the way. How do you know what to work on first or where to focus your energy? How do you tell where your weaknesses are and where you're solid?
Well I’ve got you covered! The IP360 Scorecard, based on the 7 Pillars of an Ideal Practice, is designed to give you a practical, actionable, big-picture review of your practice as it stands. And you can complete it in less than 10 minutes.
Click on the link below to get your free copy today.
The IP360 Scorecard
Wendy Pitts Reeves, LCSW
Host, Ideal Practice
Private Practice Coach and Mentor
www.WendyPittsReeves.com
Wendy@WendyPittsReeves.com
Managing a private practice, like any business, means managing growth. And growth always happens in phases.
We all start as beginners somehow - right? I know.
But the start up phase of a private practice can be completely overwhelming. No one taught us how to do this in grad school, and we have a LOT of questions.
Whew boy.
So. Many. Questions.
(And that’s just for starters!)
Well don’t worry my friend, because I’ve got you covered.
In today’s episode, I’m going to break it all down, so you’ll know what you HAVE to know up front, and what can wait.
In this episode, I’ll share:
Feeling a little overwhelmed? Let’s fix that.
Let’s get you started, so you can open your doors to new income, and new ways to help others.
~Wendy
xoxo
P.S. Don’t miss the journal prompt below!
_______________
THIS WEEK’S JOURNAL PROMPT:
Based on what you’ve learned from today’s episode, what one thing could you do today to move your private practice, your business, forward?
_______________
EXTRA RESOURCES:
_______________
DON'T FORGET to GRAB THIS! >>> The IP360 SCORECARD
As a coach of mine used to say, running a business is a full contact sport. There are SO many different parts of it to keep up with, manage, think about, and create - at every step of the way. How do you know what to work on first or where to focus your energy? How do you tell where your weaknesses are and where you're solid?
Well I’ve got you covered! The IP360 Scorecard, based on the 7 Pillars of an Ideal Practice, is designed to give you a practical, actionable, big-picture review of your practice as it stands. And you can complete it in less than 10 minutes.
Click on the link below to get your free copy today.
The IP360 Scorecard
Wendy Pitts Reeves, LCSW
Host, Ideal Practice
Private Practice Coach and Mentor
www.WendyPittsReeves.com
Wendy@WendyPittsReeves.com
You're listening to ideal practice, episode number 87. So what if you're not in private practice yet, but you're really thinking about it and you're super tempted and it's something you've been kinda wanting to do for a long time? Or maybe you are already in practice and you've kinda got things off the ground, but you're still stumbling around a little bit and figuring everything out. How do you know what to work on or where to focus your efforts? How do you even know where to start figuring stuff out? Heck, how do you know how to tell if you're on track and if you're doing things right? You're doing things well, like, is this where everybody is at this point in the game? Well, don't worry about that, my friend, because that's what I'm going to help you with today. So stay tuned. Hi, I'm Wendy Pitts Reeves and, with over two decades of experience in the private practice world, I've built my six-figure business while learning a lot of lessons the hard way. This is the first podcast that shows you how to apply the principles of energy alignment and strategy to build a practice that is profit-centered but people forward. This is the Ideal Practice Podcast. Hey folks, welcome back. This is Wendy, your host. Thank you so much for tuning in to another episode of the Ideal Practice Podcast. I'm so glad you're here.
Speaker 1:Over the Christmas holidays, in fact, I got I hope she won't mind if I share this I got a voxer message from a member of my Evolve group, one of my students who is in my group, mastermind this year. She lives in England and she sent me a screenshot of her Spotify podcast wrap-up. Do you know what I'm talking about this? If you listen to podcasts on Spotify, it will automatically, once a year, give you kind of a really kind of a cool, visual, artistic, artsy-fartsy kind of description of what you've been doing and what you're listening to the most and what you're enjoying the most. And she sent me a screenshot of her summary from Spotify that showed that Ideal Practice was her number one most listened to podcast and I got to tell you that was a lovely, lovely, little, sweet gift to get over the holidays. It made my day. That's the first time that's happened to me and I would like that to happen some more. That was really really, really, really great and it was so kind of Zoe to send that to me and share that, because she didn't have to do that, but it made my day and I just wanted to thank her for doing that, tell you all about it. So let's talk about where I want to go today.
Speaker 1:I wanted to do an episode about the startup phase of any private practice. A couple of years ago I had a new student, a new coaching client, who joined me that she had been invited to join a baby group practice that was just getting off the ground. She at that point she was the third member of that group, the third partner in that particular structure, and the other two folks that she was joining had been in practice for a while, understood the basics of business, kind of knew a little bit about what they were doing, but for her this was a completely brand spanking new idea. She actually this was. I love this story and I just want to share this with you. She actually had been a teacher.
Speaker 1:This was a second career for her. She had worked for, I think, decades, like 20 years or so, in the classroom and I think she probably was really good at what she did because she is unflappable. It doesn't really matter what kind of things kids throw at her. She can handle it, she is organized, she is creative, she really loves kids and this is also, I think, part of being a good teacher. It was hard for her to know, to understand the things that were impacting her students outside the classroom that were making such a difference to their ability to learn inside the classroom. So over time I don't know all the factors that went into this, but I can only imagine the amount of self-awareness, deep thinking, courage, just sheer courage she went back to school y'all and made a big career change at midlife, got her training finished, went to grad school, went back to grad school again and shifted her career from becoming from being a classroom teacher to being a psychotherapist, a clinical social worker, which is so cool on so many levels, and that passion, that drive that got her through that transition was not nothing.
Speaker 1:So, as a former teacher, she was already an accomplished professional when she came to the private practice world right, and she was already a clinician. She'd already been working in the field for a little while. But let me tell you, as a therapist in the middle of a midlife career change, who now was also starting a business, that was tough. The clinical part wasn't the problem, it was starting a business. She literally had spent a lifetime working for someone else and now she was working for herself, and she was not only that, but she was in partnership with two people who she saw as being ahead of her. That's not really what it was at all. They just had a little bit more experience with this piece of things, but they were all sort of in a beginner mind at this point. None of them had ever started a group practice before and in various ways they were also in transition, right, but it was still really hard.
Speaker 1:And she often would talk about how stupid she felt and I don't like that word, but that was her word. She said I just feel stupid. I feel like I don't understand what we're doing here. I don't understand what we're talking about, and I know that there were moments when she had to have felt like maybe she'd made a mistake, maybe she wasn't supposed to do this, maybe she should have stayed where she was, because that's what we do, isn't it? When we leave something that is really familiar, we can do it with one hand tied behind our back. We've been doing it so long. We know exactly, we know all the ins and outs, we know the game, we can play it, and then you move into something brand spanking new that's so uncomfortable it's, and it's interesting.
Speaker 1:I think this is especially uncomfortable if you are a little older, if you're in your 40s or 50s. Actually, one of my colleagues in my private, in my group practice that I used to run, she did the same thing. She had been on the administrative side managing insurance and HR stuff in a mental health clinic a large major mental health agency and in her 50s she went back to school, got her degree and became a psychotherapist and eventually joined my practice. I was always so blown away by that, that kind of transition. Well, if you're used to knowing what you're doing in anything, whether you're in a form of your career one moving to career two, or you're a clinician, you're a psychotherapist, you're a yoga teacher, you're an energy healer, you're a physical therapist, you're a Reiki practitioner and you know that stuff inside and out. But you've been working for someone else and now you're gonna work for yourself. Well, that's a whole new ball game, isn't it, my friend? It's a whole new ball game.
Speaker 1:We are all beginners at some point, like there's always a first time for everything and it's always a blend of excitement and dread, right? Well, when you start a practice, you're starting a business. You are a beginner all over again. And even if you've been in your field for years, running a practice y'all, running a business is a completely new skill and you will once again be a beginner. And I'll tell you, unless you are a business major or you have some kind of other business or entrepreneurial background like it's in your family or you've done things like this in the past you may actually feel like you have to learn an entirely new language. Seo, launches, list building, irresistible offers, lead magnets, content planning what the heck is all that? And what does that have to do with me just wanting to help people? And, as someone who's been in practice and been in business for a ridiculously long time, I'm gonna tell you that that beginner part of this never really goes away, because I'm still learning new things all the time. Personally, I wouldn't have it any other way, but I mentioned this to you because I want you to understand that everything you do is practice right. I used to work with a coach who would say it's all R&D people, it's all R&D, it's all research and development, which I loved. I took great comfort in that.
Speaker 1:A lot of times, when people start a practice or start a business, things may be a little rough at first and it's really really easy to be tempted to think that you're just not cut out for this whole entrepreneurship thing, because there are so many things about it that you don't understand or that make you feel a little squirmy inside, or that it looks like everyone around you's got it all figured out but you don't. And that can that can wreak havoc with your sense of self, your sense of confidence, and you may think I'm just not supposed to do this, but y'all, that's not what that means at all. It just means you have new things to learn. You didn't used to know how to be a healer either, right, but you learned. And I bet you weren't great at it at first, but you got better and you're still getting better.
Speaker 1:So today, to make this easier for you, I just want to highlight three areas in particular where you can focus up front to get your practice up and running as fast as possible and as healthy as possible from the start. I'm just going to kind of lay out some real key things to figure out from the start. If you're the kind of person who kind of likes to see the whole picture, this is fine. Wendy, I appreciate this little step by step stuff. That's great, but I kind of want to know, like, where am I going here? What is the big picture? What does it take to make a practice work? Well, I got you covered. If you want to get a really quick and dirty easy overview of where you stand, where your practice stands, from a higher level perspective, then here's what I got for you.
Speaker 1:I have created something called the IP 360 Ideal Practice 360 Scorecard. It's a scorecard that gives you a really quick and easy way to walk through a few questions and score yourself on where you are in your own practice development. And the cool thing is literally you can do this in like 10 minutes. But the cool part is, if you download this and it's completely free, it's always available you download this, fill it out for yourself. In a day or two. After you get that, I will send you an overview, a little handy chart, where I've laid out the three phases of development, from startup and where we go from there. I've laid all that out for you. That will show you exactly exactly where to focus and kind of where you might be, depending upon what phase you're in right now. So if you want to get that it's super cool. Go to my website wendypitzreevescom forward slash 360, the number 360, wendypitzreevescom forward slash 360. It will be glaringly obvious where your practice is, where your attention needs to be right now, and then, when you get that chart, in a day or two, you'll have the whole picture. So I think you'd like that, all right. So I just want to give that for those of you who are a little more impatient and want to kind of see the whole thing.
Speaker 1:Now let's go back to beginner mind. Let's go back to beginner mind and talk about three areas of activity, three types of activities where I want you to focus your energy right here, at the beginning, when you are in startup mode. We're going to talk about decisions you need to make. Everything starts with a decision. We're going to talk about the basic minimum level skills that you'll need to learn right off the bat, and we're going to talk about actions to take first. Okay, so let's start with decisions, because you will find, as a practice owner, the main thing you do y'all is make decisions like all the freaking time. This is actually what it means to be an entrepreneur. You are constantly making decisions, but when you're getting started, there are certain basic ones that you've got to figure out right up front. And I'm going to start with one that no one ever talks about and it might seem like this doesn't matter so much, but I actually feel like this is the foundation, the ground on which you must build your practice, and that is I want you to decide to be a business owner, not just a practitioner, and I want you to decide that by getting super clear on why you want to start, want to start a business at all.
Speaker 1:What purpose is driving your decision to do this? What do you want this business Notice, I'm saying business, not just practice what do you want this business to do for your clients? Just as important, what do you want this business to do? To provide, to allow, to create for you? I really want you to spend some time thinking about that. Why do you want to do this? Y'all? Because this is not for the faint of heart, I'm going to tell you. Anyone who says it's easy to start a business is playing with you. It isn't. It is relatively simple, but it is not easy.
Speaker 1:One of the things that will help you is that, when you are crystal clear on why you want to do this at all that's going to help on the days that it's not much fun. That's going to help on the days that you don't feel so smart. On the days that you're feeling like you're dragon. On the days that you're wondering if you're getting it right. On the days you wonder if it's ever going to get any better. You will have those days. You also have lots of awesome days, but knowing your why is going to help you.
Speaker 1:That's the first decision I want you to make. I am deciding to start a business because I want this for my clients and I want this for myself. The second decision I want you to make and this is so much harder it seems to be I thought this was kind of obvious when I started my own practice, I will admit, but gah-lee, based on what I've seen with my students and with my clients, I think it is kind of hard. And that is I want you to decide who your people are. Who is your initial, your beginning, your first out of the gate ideal client, who will they be and how are your skills well suited to serve them. Do not make the mistake of saying I just want to help people. I'm going to open a practice and I can work with everybody. You gotta start somewhere, my friends and I cannot say this clearly or strongly enough your practice will get off the ground faster if you are known for something from the very beginning.
Speaker 1:As I was preparing this, this episode for you, I was thinking about when I started my practice. You will remember those of you who've been listening for a while I had been the family therapy director of a residential treatment center. Where I was, we were working with pretty tough to serve adolescents from all over the country. They were dealing with lots and lots of complicated situations and they were in pretty bad shape by the time that got to us. So when I went into private practice, trust me, those kind of kids I can handle that. I can handle that well and I enjoyed them. I loved those kids. They were challenging, but I love those kids and their families. So it made perfect sense to me when I started my practice to tell people I worked with Adolescents and their families because that's what I knew. Right, I actually knew lots of things, because I didn't start my practice until I'd already been working in the field for Ten years or so. So I actually had a ton of experience when I went into practice, but the most recent thing I've been doing was working with teens and their families, so it made perfect sense that that was my initial Ideal client.
Speaker 1:You've got to decide who are you going to focus on at first. Who are your people, and Then the third area where you've got to make lots of decisions is all around your payment setup. And by that I mean what's your initial pricing structure? What are you gonna charge for an intake? What are you gonna charge for your basic service? What are you gonna charge for a no-show? I hope it's full fee. What are you gonna charge for a late cancellation? I hope it's full fee.
Speaker 1:I Will offer you one piece of advice here, if I can. If you'll just hear me Don't offer a sliding scale in the beginning. You will be tempted because you will feel Many of you will feel this sort of eagerness and a sense of desperation. I just need to get people in the door, and In the beginning I, like almost everyone, struggles with just the whole concept of getting paid at all, and there's Lots and lots and lots and lots of mindset and energy work to be done around that. You will be tempted to ease your own discomfort by offering a sliding scale from the start. I encourage you not to do that. I Would say to people no, I'm not really doing that right now. I may add that later, but for now I'm not able to offer that. I'm so sorry.
Speaker 1:You also have to decide if you're a psychotherapist or you are in some area of healthcare that is Covered by a third-party reimbursement structure, by insurance. You have to decide. Are you going to accept insurance or not, and if so, which ones? I'm gonna tell you right now you don't have to. This is not necessary. You totally can begin a practice from the very start and never take a drop of insurance. It's also fine if you want to.
Speaker 1:There's lots of things, lots of factors go into that decision. There's not a right or wrong way. There is the ideal way for you and there is not, and I'm always gonna do it this way. There is the ideal way for now for you, and you might want to decide right off the bat if you want to offer some kind of payment plan for people. There's lots of ways to think about that as well too. That's a way of coping with folks when their investment with you is significant, but offering a payment plan that has a structure to it is one way you can kind of help with that.
Speaker 1:So this is the first area of activity. You got a sort out. Those are decisions you've got to make and once you've decided you've decided, right, it, put it in writing somewhere, share it with an accountability partner, shoot me an email and tell me what you've decided, because something, something about saying it out loud in Writing to yourself or to someone else, will make it more real. Figure that stuff out, okay, all right, the second area of activity when you will need to focus are certain skills that you need to learn. So there are decisions you got to make first and then, once you've decided, then you got to go out and learn how to do a few things.
Speaker 1:Okay, and I'm gonna hit the hardest one right off the bat, and that is Don't groan, don't roll your eyes at me. That is, believe it or not, sales and marketing. Oh, wendy, I don't want to talk about that. Oh my gosh. This is why I don't want to start a practice. Well, before you have a little miniature freak out, which I do not judge, because I've had lots of those myself I want to say all I'm talking about here is a very basic Entry level, beginner's mind, type of sales and marketing. And the reason why you have to have this y'all is because you're starting a business. Remember that decision you made. If You're starting a business, a business means you sell something. You sell something, you sell a product, you sell a service. It get paid. That's what a business is and and you have to tell people about it because if nobody knows about it, no one's gonna buy it. So we are talking entry level, very beginning, super simple quote sales and marketing. Unquote. You know how I did this in the very beginning. You want to know what this looked like. For me, there was no internet. That's how long I've been at this y'all.
Speaker 1:I Went to my local public library and I don't know if they even have this anymore, but back in the day they used to have something called a city directory. A city directory was literally a book, a printed book that was like six inches thick, I mean a massive volume that had a listing of essentially Everyone. I don't honestly don't remember at this point if it was, if you had like public citizens, like just everyday people, or if it was Businesses. What I remember is businesses, but I remember going to to the library, taking a legal pad with me, getting the city directory for my little town and opening it to doctors, and I made a list of every physician, medical practice, mental health practice, social service agency, anything dealing with kids or teens, because I told you that, right, that was one of my decisions. I Just literally was flipping through the pages of this big fat book, making a list of names, addresses and phone numbers on a legal pad, and then I typed, made copies of like actual physical letters. I Think I had business cards drawn up. I don't remember if I had a brochure at that point. Back then we did trifle brochures. Remember that nobody does that anymore, but back then that was the thing I can't honestly remember. If I did that, I don't think I did. I think I just wrote a letter and Put business cards in it. No, wait a minute, you know what I did. I am just now remembering this y'all.
Speaker 1:It's been a long time I actually had printed formal Announcements. That's what I did. I've forgotten. All about this is coming back to me. I went to an office store I think it was kinkos and Ordered you know how you get printed invitations to a special event like a wedding or an anniversary party, something like that. I had printed like a four by six card, something like that, a formal, like an announcement on On nice card stock with really like I'm particular about this kind of stuff and I golly, this is so funny, I hadn't thought about this in forever. But anyway, I printed up I don't know a few hundred of these Announcements announcing that I was opening my practice, my name, the name of my practice, my mailing address, my phone number we didn't have email and so it's all those by then and who I was going to be serving, serving teens and their families in whatever county. And then I took that handwritten list that I'd made at the library and, by golly, I mailed those suckers out, one at a time, with stamps. Yes, I did. And I don't even remember if I printed labels or if I hand labeled them, knowing me, I hand labeled them because I always had trouble doing labels. Oh, that's so funny to think about. That was my marketing.
Speaker 1:Sales, and marketing is no more than business language for making an announcement, sharing the news, letting people know that your door is open and that you're ready to help, and telling them how to contact you. Like that's all, it is Okay. The sales piece of this is learning how to practice your pitch. If you've been following the podcast for a while, I have spoken to this very thing. You do need to kind of learn what to say on the telephone, learn what to say on your voicemail, learn how to ask for the business when someone calls you and says, hi, I'm looking for help with my son, or I'm looking for help with my relationship, or I'm looking for help because I feel terrible and I don't know what to do about it. You got to know how not just to say, oh, I'm so sorry, I'd love to help, but you have to also learn how to say here's how I work. This is where we would start. This is what the investment for that would be. This is how we can set that up. Here is how payment would look. This is what we'll do when you come. This is where we'll go from there. You got to learn how to talk like that folks. That's the sales piece of this. So, very beginning skill level, learn how to just start talking to people about what you do and telling people how to hire you.
Speaker 1:Okay. So the first piece of sales and marketing. The second skill you need to learn I've got four here is money management, and I'm not. This is I'm not talking about a budget, I'm not talking about tax strategies, I'm not talking about investments. I'm not talking about complicated stuff. We're talking beginner level.
Speaker 1:First of all, you got to figure out how to collect payment at the time of service and how to track payments over time. How are people going to pay you Cash check square stripe? Do you know how to do that on your phone? Figure out how to take a payment in today's world. It is so freaking easy. I literally took a client's card the other day and tapped on my phone. I had an instant payment. He had an instant receipt. So easy, super cool, but you need to figure that out. You got to get that set up.
Speaker 1:You'll also need to learn focus on learn here how to manage an irregular income and how to strike a balance between your business finances and your personal finances. I've also talked about this before. At a bare minimum y'all, you need a business checking account and savings account that is completely separate from your personal. Your client payments need to go into your business checking account or savings, however you want to do it, and then you will pay yourself out of that. You will literally give yourself a paycheck out of that and you'll need to learn how to put money aside for taxes, because you're going to have to be paying taxes on a quarterly basis, not an annual basis. This is the very beginning baby steps towards managing the money side of a practice. Okay, so we've talked about sales and marketing, very beginner level, talked about money management just a few things right off the bat you got to have figured out and you got to learn.
Speaker 1:The third thing, third skill area that takes practice. Y'all remember everything is practice is learning how to be a leader of yourself. I think this is one of the trickier things about running a business. When you work for somebody else in fact, the client, the student I was telling you about at the beginning, who had so much trouble at first and felt so, you know, like a fish out of water when she started her practice I had to tell her, I had to say be kind to yourself. You've always worked for someone else who set the structure for you, who set the boundaries for you.
Speaker 1:When you work for somebody else, they tell you when to show up, they tell you what time you have to do things, they tell you when, when the meetings are. They tell you when you're going to get paid. They tell you all like, all those things are figured out for you when you have your own business. You got to figure all that out. You have to learn how to set boundaries around your time, set boundaries around how you get paid and how you manage your money. You have to learn and develop your, your self-discipline muscles. You have to create your own structure and whether you honor and respect that structure nobody cares. But you, nobody else cares if you show up for work or not.
Speaker 1:Let's say you're in the very beginning and you don't have that many clients yet because you're in startup mode. But you tell yourself you're going to be at work from nine to four, three days a week. Are you at your desk at nine o'clock, whether you've got a client or not, and are you working on your practice If not? That's a place for structure and for discipline. That's what self-leadership is. Okay. So that's a skill I will tell you. Be kind to yourself now. Please don't beat yourself up, because this takes a while to kind of grow into. It was one of the hardest things for me, honestly. Money management and self-leadership was one of the places I had a lot of trouble in the beginning.
Speaker 1:And then I would say, the fourth skill set is just the whole concept of thinking like a CEO, and by that what I mean is you're going to have to start learning about business. So that means signing up for coaching if you need to, listening to podcasts like this and there are lots of them out there reading books about business Before I started to practice, I had never read a business book in my life, nor could you have made me, because I would have been boring. But let me tell you, when you run a business, all that stuff is a lot more interesting than it used to be, because now you've got a stake in it yourself. Now it matters to you. So you got to do that kind of stuff. So we talked about decisions. We talked about skills, the skills you got to learn. Don't let this overwhelm you, because if you write down what I'm saying, it actually isn't very much. These are just simple little things. All right, now let's talk about the actions you need to take. We talked about decisions. We talked about skills. Let's talk about actions. So this kind of goes with the sales and marketing piece I just mentioned. I've actually already talked about this A very beginning, entry level kind of action to take when you have made this decision and you are ready to take on clients is basic entry level networking or communicating with your colleagues and beginning to position yourself as an expert with your people, with those clients you've decided to focus on here at the beginning.
Speaker 1:So, for example, when I started my practice and I told you I went from running the family therapy department at a residential treatment center so it just made sense to tell people I was working with teens. Of course I would do lots of other things and did, but it made sense to start there. Well, so what did I do? I went to any kind of professional meeting, nasw, or any kind of workshops or any gathering of any type that was happening in my community with my colleagues, where I was going to run into other mental health folks. And when I was just meeting people, hi, my name is so-and-so, what's your name? What do you do? Oh, that's great.
Speaker 1:I would say, oh, yeah, I've just opened a practice in my town and I work with teenagers. Believe it or not, I know, not everybody loves that, but I actually kind of like a good grumpy teenager every now and then when I don't live with them. So that's what I'm all about. If you ever need help with someone, you've got a client who has an adolescent who needs some help. By all means, I'm just across the river, here's my phone number Would love to help out if I can. That's basic networking, basic positioning yourself. I didn't say, oh yeah, I'm an expert in treating teens, I know everything there is to know about adolescents. No, of course I didn't say that. I said well, I've been working for the last several years at a residential treatment center which everyone around here knew the name of. All I had to say was I had worked there and I now was branching out into my own practice, where, of course, I would be doing some other work. That's all I had to do. That did position me as an expert.
Speaker 1:Who can you meet with? What natural opportunities do you have to just hang out with colleagues, y'all people in your own building, people that you haven't talked to for a while you want to meet with for coffee? Your professional association? If there's a local chapter meeting and maybe you've never gone now you need to go. Just get yourself out there. That's the first thing I want to say.
Speaker 1:The second thing, in terms of actions to take is essentially you got to get some systems and processes, processes in place for certain kind of basic things you're going to do. I'm going to see how I got one, two, three, four, five, six things that you will feel better if you got these things figured out. The first one is also not what you're going to expect me to say, and that is designing and managing your schedule. I am amazed at how often I talk to my students and coaching clients about schedules. It's incredible how often this comes up, turns out. I feel like this is kind of like the. Have you ever been bowling? You know the things they put down the side of the alley and a bowling alley when you're just getting started, or for kids that keep the ball from going into the gutter. I could use that actually I'm a really bad bowler, but I digress. They will put these guide rails of sorts down the gutters that keep the ball on the alley and keep it from falling into the gutter.
Speaker 1:Your schedule is that for your practice. So this is why I think, from the, you could say this is another decision to make. Also, you could look at it that way, but it is a practice in that I really encourage you to get out a weekly calendar, a week at a glance, look at the days and the hours for each day and circle the hours where you want to put clients. Which days, which hours do you want to put clients. If you don't decide that on the front end and set that up as a system on the front end, you know what's gonna happen. Someone's gonna call you and say can you see someone? So can you see me? Can you see my kid? Can you see us? We can't get there until after work. Do you have a 7 pm? And if you didn't already decide that 7 pm was the time you're gonna go? Well, yeah, sure, I'll do that. I would so much rather you decide first the hours you want to plug in a client and then, when somebody calls you and they say, do you have this time, you look at your calendar and you go, no, I don't. Actually, I do have this and this. How about that? Would one of those work? And they will find a time to fit you, not the other way around. So you need a process, you need a structure for your schedule. When are you seeing clients? When are you doing admin work? Cause you're gonna need time for that. When are you home with your kids or off playing? When is me time? Put that on your calendar first, but especially circle the hours where you're gonna plug a client in.
Speaker 1:The next process you're gonna have to figure out is how you're gonna manage an intake If you really are brand new and you haven't got your first client yet and you get a call today from someone saying, hey, I heard you were starting a practice, are you open yet? Cause I got someone I think you'd be great for. Do you know what to do with that person? Get ready for that. How do you manage an intake? How do they call you? What paperwork do they need to fill out? How do they schedule? Where do they meet you? Is it online? Is it in person? How? So when All that? Figure that stuff out. If someone calls you today and says I wanna see you, how do you actually make that happen? Your core service what's the primary thing that you do? And again, how, where, when, under what circumstances? How are you gonna do that? Where do they come? What's the process? Where do they wait if you're with somebody else, like all that kind of stuff?
Speaker 1:So, designing your schedule, managing an intake, developing your core service, your number one thing you do collecting and processing payment. So I talked earlier about that. That was a decision you need to make. I also said it was a skill you have to learn. Well, here's the action to take. You've gotta set this stuff up. Go open the bank account, go set up square on your phone if that's what you're gonna use and practice it. Practice it with your own debit card or credit card or your spouses or something like. Practice it with somebody, but get that system set up and learn how to take payments. So a lot of this. Do you see how this flows? You make the decision. There's a skill here you have to learn and there's an obvious action to take that ties all that together. It's not that much Y'all just to get this off the ground, but these are the biggies. So start with all that.
Speaker 1:I will add one little caveat for some of you. This is specifically for those of you who are in the mental health world or who are in traditional mainstream medicine. I don't know that this applies for everybody, but it certainly does for psychotherapists. You will also need to have a plan, a system in place for emergencies, for how you wanna manage emergencies and for how you wanna manage absences, and what I mean by that is how will you handle after hours calls. If you are working with a population where emergencies are likely to happen, how are you gonna handle that? Can they call you? Can they text you? Is there? Are you just gonna have them call 911? How you wanna set that up, that is something you gotta think through. And do you have a backup? Like, if you're gonna be on vacation and you're gonna be out for a few days, do you need to have someone who takes call for you? Not everybody has to worry about that and I actually don't really have to think about that so much anymore in my practice, but for many years I had two or three specific colleagues and they had me where. If somebody was gonna be out for a while, I would say can you cover for me? And I would change my greeting on my phone to say I'm out of the office until this date while I'm gone. So and so is covering for me. If you need some help, here's how to reach her. So that is also something you might need to figure out, depending upon what you do. So that's it.
Speaker 1:Let me just sort of pull all this together for you so that if it sounds like a lot, you will hear that it is not. You have to decide why you wanna do this to begin with, so it will carry you through the hard days. You will decide who you're going to serve at first. You can change your mind later, but you gotta start somewhere, decide who you're gonna serve and why you are the right person to serve them, and you have to decide your initial payment setup. Okay, so there's that. And then you will need to learn how to talk to people about what you do, how to make sort of an announcement, how to just get used to saying I'm open for business, I'm ready for calls, I'm happy to serve if you have someone that I can help. You will have to get used to that. You will have to learn how to handle getting paid and what to do with that money. You will have to learn to practice self-discipline. I said it. Set up personal boundaries around your time and money. All that you have to learn how to think like a business owner. All of those are skills and you will need to take action in all of those in all the ways that we've talked about. So that's it. This will get you started and this is all you have to do in the very beginning.
Speaker 1:So I was telling you about my student, my client, who had been a teacher. We actually just wrapped up. I've been working with her for the last couple of years and she is ready. She and her partners are ready to fly, or partner are ready to fly on their own at this point. And when we were doing our wrap up call, where we were sort of reviewing and enjoying all the progress that she made, she said that one of the things she felt best about was that she truly feels like a business owner today. Her practice is extremely well-defined. She is very clear about who she serves. She's working with a pretty tough population that doesn't phase her a bit, and her practice is taking off like a rocket, and so is her income. So her confidence has grown tremendously. She no longer feels like quite the beginner that she was a couple of years ago, because she isn't. That doesn't mean she doesn't still have things to learn Of course she does. We all do. But she's doing great and I am really proud of her and so excited to see her take off on her own.
Speaker 1:From here on out, your practice will evolve over time, my friend, and just like everyone else, everything else, you will move through different phases of development. Being in startup is exciting. It's also a little crazy making and it can be a little scary, but be patient with yourself. This is a grand adventure and you are just getting on the road. There are lots of cool things to see and do and discover in the coming days. Have fun, all right, have fun. Believe in yourself. You're gonna figure it out. I promise that's what I've got for you today. I hope this is helpful. I hope it gives you some nuts and bolts you can hang your hat on, which is really mixing a metaphor in a really bad way. But anyway, I hope it helps and I hope you have a lovely week here on Ideal Practice and in your Ideal Practice and by all means, reach out to me if you need help in some way. If there's something here that you're not quite clear about, just shoot me an email. I'm happy to clarify. In any way, I can have an awesome week, everybody, and I will see you here next time on Ideal Practice. Bye now Bye.
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