Chiropractic Coaching: Reducing Friction in Training Associates

Hello everybody and welcome to Thrive in Five. I’m Dr. Dennis Perman and I’ll be your chiropractic coach for today. This edition is called Reducing Friction in Training Associate Doctors and we’ll be focusing on how reducing friction can upgrade and improve multi doctor offices. Most chiropractors have had significant training in caring for patients, but not in overseeing another doctor or running a team of doctors.

By understanding the six essential strategies, you can build an associate doctor training program and an organization that uses the most current thinking to offer an extraordinary service to your community and reap considerable reward for your contribution. The first of the essential strategies is to reduce and eliminate friction wherever possible.

Let’s explore how to apply that to training associate doctors. There are really two kinds of associate doctors. I call them clones and foils. A clone is an associate doctor who is a lot like the head doctor. Enough so patients easily accept him or her. A similar personality, a similar touch and adjusting style, or even a similar look.

Clones borrow the positive anchor of the head doctor, which leads to a favorable response and smooth integration. A head doctor would hire a clone to increase volume, to increase capacity, and provide more of the same type of service to more people. Clones will help you build a larger version of the practice you currently enjoy.

I call the second kind of associate doctor a FOIL. FOILs are deliberately different from the head doctor in some way. And you would hire a FOIL if you want to offer expanded services to current patients and also attract new patients who might be looking for something different from your usual approach.

One simple example is when a male head doctor hires a female associate or vice versa, so patients with a gender preference can be served well. FOILs may specialize in clinical techniques that are not the general technique of the office. For example, some chiropractic offices add an associate doctor who’s well versed in pediatrics, or rehabilitation, or functional neurology, or functional medicine, or decompression.

Depending on your practice model and your desired outcomes, you can provide a variety of services through the associate driven practice model. So, clothes help you add volume. Foils help you add scope. If you want to help more people in your niche, look for a clone. If you want to offer something different, consider what kind of additional services or products you want to integrate and choose a foil with those assets.

By having the right associate doctors in the right roles, you decrease friction and gather potential energy for serving more people and having more to show for it. Your training should be conceived to set them up to win for the benefit of your patients, your community. And the greater good. You want them to succeed, which also turns out to be good for them and for you.

Circle, circle. So watch. If you use an Ossie’s full spine technique and you want to serve more of your neighbors by increasing your capacity, hire a clone who also uses full spine technique. You can offer the same service to more people without much friction in training the associate in the art of your practice method.

But put someone who prefers using light force technique or functional medicine in the same position, and it could be stressful for them to follow your act, like trying to put a square peg in a round hole. Sometimes, patients may voice an interest in having a softer or a firmer adjustment or a more comprehensive approach.

They may have spouses, friends, and family members who feel that way. And if the demand is there, it helps you decide what kind of foil you need. It’s better for the associate, better for the patients, and better for you, with less friction because the fit is right. There are many other ways to use foils. A traditional subluxation based family chiropractor could add a functional neurologist who specializes in improving brain function.

Or a functional medicine expert to address nutrition or lifestyle concerns. Current patients love it, and new patients are attracted in response to the new energy and new services. Let’s talk about reducing friction in the training process itself. While the content of the training will be custom tailored to your practice and the kind of associate you hire, the format of training any associate is built on four simple steps.

Design your curriculum, provide real time experiences, script and role play the common exchanges, and debrief frequently until the protocols are conditioned and automatic. Simplifying and minimizing friction in the training process will make it more pleasant and productive, and will also become more profitable more quickly.

Even before the training begins, gain and maintain rapport, a necessary precondition that facilitates better communication and less resistance. You’re building a complex relationship, employer employee, director staff doctor, mentor mentee, all filtered through the global perspective that you are colleagues at a different time and place in your careers.

So treat associates kindly and respectfully, the way you’d want to be treated in their position. Besides the obvious benefits of a supportive environment, one day they may be in your shoes and your influence will be felt as a legacy of excellence and mastery. Clarity reduces friction and facilitates learning and compliance.

Design a curriculum that clearly conveys the essence of your practice. Start with your practice philosophy and your own personal story. It’ll establish your credibility as a guide and a thought leader. Make your content as straightforward and thorough as possible. To coach your associates on required office procedures, have them sit in on those procedures being performed by you or a well trained teammate so they get the idea of how it’s done in daily practice.

Once you create this context and understanding, you can begin training them on the specifics of their particular role. Give the associate a script, manual, or strategy to follow, to standardize what he or she says and does. The quality, control, and certainty reduces friction in their learning process, because they’re clear on what’s expected of them.

And it also reduces friction in their patient care, because they adhere to the model you developed, consistent with the flow of the practice. Ask questions to guide the learning process. Pose situations that come up frequently and quiz each other on the best possible responses. Review typical scenarios and practice until it becomes second nature and their performance is fluent and genuine.

Schedule regular training sessions as well as spontaneous on the flight experiences. The more your associate doctor learns what it’s like in real time in your practice, the more effective and congruent he or she will be at representing you in daily practice and helping you to build your brand.

Training should be ongoing, even for veteran staff. It’s too easy to drift off course, so the training creates checks and balances in both directions. Dr. Bob Hoffman recommends creating a list of up to 52 topics and to train on one each week for a year. And when you finish the list. Start over again.

You’ll improve year after year. For most of us, this entire process of training associate doctors would be supported by the third essential strategy, an offsite chief operating officer or a coach. Having a sure hand who’s been through it many times before can guide you, help you problem solve, and streamline the training process even more.

When the entire team is brought up to a level of excellence and mastery, the friction ebbs and the service flows. With effortless ease. That’s what you have to look forward to when you reduce the friction in training your associate doctors. If you find these ideas on the six essentials, as compelling as we do, or if you just want to help as many people as possible and have as much as possible to show for it, scan the QR code you see on the screen, and it will take you to the six essentials website.

Thanks for watching. I’m Dr. Dennis Perman for The Masters Circle Global, where legends are made and legendary practices are built. through chiropractic coaching.

Checkout our other Thrive In Fives

Don’t forget to learn about our Practice Growth Calculator