Address Your Staffing Issues the Way the Largest Companies Do
Revisiting his conversation with Steve Chenoweth of Therapy Partner Solutions, Paul shares practical ways PT business owners can attract, retain, and engage staff, from flexible time off to student programs.
Full transcript
Generated from the episode audio and lightly edited for readability.
Good afternoon and welcome to another episode of Paul Martin's Crucial Conversations. Today we're going to take a look back to last week's discussion with Steve Chenoweth. We're going to find some opportunities for you to take action on today. Steve, as you recall, is the CEO of Therapy Partner Solutions. And Therapy Partner Solutions is a private act private equity-backed physical therapy company based out of Fernandina Beach, Florida. Now, Therapy Partner Solutions has a very unique model. They have acquired highlevel functioning companies that work together to drive a physical therapy business.
And what we asked Steve was what does he believe are the three biggest challenges for private practice business owners for the remaining of 2023 and as we start heading into 2024. And you know his response was interesting. It was staff, and staff, meaning finding and attracting staff, maintaining a high level of staff productivity, and then making sure that your staff are actually being reimbursed for the services that they are providing. Look, 2022 staffing was the biggest and most talked about threat to the rehabilitation industry. And as we spoke to Steve and as we walked to business and as we talked to business owners across the United States, you know, we often pick up ideas that we've never heard before.
And I want to share some of those with you today. First, Steve offered some great solutions. First of all, being creative with time off, better utilization of physical therapy assistance, and being in a constant recruiting mode. We had a consultant nearly 20 years ago before we had staffing challenges that instructed the companies that we worked with to be in a constant recruiting mode. And he, his name was Dennis Bush. And he is still ringing in my ears today for companies to be in that constant recruiting mode.
You know, in fact, we have an example of a practice in California. Now, this company has a they're based in California. They also have a clinic in Hawaii. Not bad markets to live in and visit, right? And what they have done is they give their physical therapists the choice of using what they call bonus points that they earn through their certainly just through their HR system, but also for additional time for exceptional outcomes for operations focus above and beyond. They can then use these bonus points that they earn for time off, for extra cash, or for continuing education over and above the continuing education policy.
And they say this is has just been wildly successful for them. And in the interview process, other than the two beautiful places to live, they do not seem to have a staffing problem whatsoever. You know, as we work with companies across the United States, we see many similarities among practices that don't seem to have quite as much of a challenge finding professional staff. And believe it or not, we have practices right now that we are working with that are overstaffed. We have many practices that just do not seem to see the staffing crisis, the staffing issue.
Let me walk through some of those similarities that we see among those practices. First, it's a strong system. Notice I say system of communication. Communication at all levels. A real career ladder. So a career ladder that not only you can see on paper but is being played out through an emerging leaders program. We have developed an emerging leaders program and I can tell you that certainly we didn't copy anything but we looked and studied many allerg emerging leaders program especially the emerging leaders program for enterprise car rentals has an incredible emerging leaders program.
We've developed something very similar. And in addition, just creating an environment of hard work, openness, and all of these combined, we can actually make work fun. And that seems to be when you ask physical therapists, you know, what is most important to you at work? It's the ability to be able to carry out what they do, but they also want to have fun. They want to have relationships. They want to have a best friend at work. You can't have that if you don't have strong levels of communication.
In addition, a very formal and well-managed student program that extends to getting involved in the schools that you serve with these programs. We have seen many times physical therapists as well as physical therapy business owners going into the schools making doing special lectures sitting on panels really making themselves a part of the program that they are serving through programs where they obviously have students internships at their locations. These are two attributes along with what Steve laid out that seem to be a very common thread amongst practices that do not seem to be understaffed.
They always seem to have good solid staff. You know, the next area that Steve and I discussed was therapist productivity. Again attracting and attaining staff therapist productivity. And Steve said something here that I think is really important and again something that we see very common among successful private practices that is clinical practices and business practices go hand in hand. That is gold. When you can instill in your practitioners that they will be taught clinical practices, clinical strategies as well as business practices and business strategies. That's gold.
And get their buy in on that. The most successful practices clinically, operationally, and financially will clearly communicate and gain buyin from their staff on what is expected from them clinically, what is expected operationally, and what is expected financially from their staff. They do have a fiduciary responsibility to the practice as well as to their patients. We commonly refer this as a PT at said company. Let's call it XYZ company. You are on a clinical team and you're also on a business team. And we at XYZ physical therapy will be crystal clear in all of those expectations and we will get your buy in on those expectations.
That as a part of an interview process if it is ex in fact what is happening in your practice is gold then execute on what you have told the recruit what you have told the new therapist on absolutely carrying out on making sure that they are clear on those expectations and then finally Steve and I had a good discussion about reimbursement you know Steve clearly sees that there is a lack of education to our therapists in regards to the reimbursement they are receiving for the services that they are providing and that this is a huge threat to the success of private practices.
This also understandably so seems to be a very sensitive area for business owners communicating those realities to their professional staff. And it makes sense as many business owners are not clear on different payers and how they're being reimbursed. Sometimes the business owners don't truly have an understanding of how they are being reimbursed. Well, as it relates to this education process, I have two strong recommendations around reimbursement. First, educate. Educate. Educate. First yourself on how you're being reimbursed by insurance companies in your market. I promise you, your staff will be exhilarated that you are including them in having a full understanding of how we as therapists are being reimbursed.
And this is not you against them. This is us in some ways against insurance companies that undervalue our services. And not all insurance companies undervalue our services, but it creates a team that you're on along with them. Now, we in the past have strongly urged you to create an insurance cheat sheet. It's a card and it provides the very basic understanding on how each of your payers will reimburse you for services, special items that are not included, special items that are included, etc. This literally is a card about this big, typically with some line items across the top, couple line items down the side with insurance companies, and they have everything they need to have a full understanding.
But don't stop there. Give them a test. Make it fun. You know, we did this with a company in New York. I'll never forget it. They had 26 therapists. We created insurance cards. We gave them a test. And what they did is they came up with a little bit of a game of which clinic had the highest level of percentage on the test. And there was one clinic that everyone had 100%. There was one clinic that was in the low 80s in terms of percentiles. They were forced to take the test again.
Study, take the test again, but make it fun. And come back to it and make sure your therapists are having these discussions. Second is challenge your staff, your professional staff to bill for everything that they do. And bill for what the patient needs. What do our patients need from us as physical therapists? Well, I didn't want to give it away, but what I should say is what do our patients need from us as skilled, highly skilled physical therapists? They need skilled care. And then we need to bill for it because we've earned it.
We've gone to school. We've learned our trade. We are proud of our trade and bill for it. 97110 therapeutic exercise is not skilled care. I'm not saying don't bill for it. What I'm saying is that when you are providing skilled care that requires balance coordination remember 97530 therapeutic activity and 97112 neuromuscular. Those are skilled codes being performed by skilled physical therapists. So, put these strategies in action today and not only will you get better buyin from your staff, but you will boost your bottom line. Thank you. And if you have any questions on what we talked about today, just click below. Let's talk.
Want to talk about your own business?
Marlton, NJ 08053