Simple ways to improve practice profitability

Long-range strategic planning requires making hard decisions in your practice. First, you must decide what you and your team are going to do more of. What's working? What services, activities, and products generate the most practice growth and are the most profitable? For example, are pre-anesthetic risk assessments profitable—and good medicine? If so, you may want to challenge your team to increase clients' acceptance of such procedures.

Bob Levoy

Next, ask what you and your team can start doing that you're not doing today. What new services, activities, or products could and should you introduce to improve practice growth and profitability? Would extended hospital hours make appointments more convenient for target clients? Would in-house lab work offer medical and economic benefits?

Third, you and your team needs to decide what you're going to do less of. What's not working? What takes a lot of effort and contributes little to practice growth and profitability? Can you limit or eliminate these tasks or services and channel those resources into services or products that will yield a higher return on investment? For example, one New Jersey companion animal practitioner loved to do equine work, but after thinking about it, admitted, "It no longer makes economic sense to continue offering these services."

Clarity is the key to long-range strategic planning. The more time you take to clearly define who you are and what you want to accomplish, the more profitable your practice will be.

Veterinary Economics Editorial Advisory Board member Bob Levoy is a seminar speaker in Roslyn, N.Y.