Eyeworld

continued on page 10 Lower the bucket, not your expectations It's time to accept the difficulty of finding an administrator who has a comprehensive understanding of every single area of medical man- agement required to run a practice today—and one who has the time to add to that already extensive and ev- er-growing bucket of responsibilities. Depending on the size of the practice, this bucket may be filled with respon- sibilities such as: • HR (payroll, compliance, new em- ployee recruitment including pro- fessionals, overseeing the corporate 401K plan) • Budgeting, forecasting, equipment procurement, A&Ms, satellite starts • Financial management, both micro and macro • Marketing, staying ahead of the ever-changing delivery modalities • Maintaining contracts, insurance, BSA, tertiary services • Community outreach, both in the local referring community and in the local commerce market • Tracking and keeping up with gov- ernmental regulatory changes • Managing the managers • Board duties • Legal and ethical oversight, includ- ing social media complaints and positive score oversight If an ambulatory surgery center or optical department is involved, administrators can expect to see these responsibilities double or triple. Every administrator may bring a different skill set to the table, special- izing in one or several of the responsi- bilities listed above but not all. While one person may excel as an optical department administrator, knowing how to manage these specific em- ployees and teaching them to sell and understand the patient/buyer's needs, another person may have little to no experience managing this kind of team but may have an impressive background in accounting. Another may have extensive IT knowledge, while yet another excels at tracking and ensuring compliance with reg- ulatory changes such as the ICD-10 switch. However, the modern adminis- trator need not be the person with the most specialized skills but the one most able to manage a wide variety of outsourced skill. In other words, lower the bucket so that others may reach in and carry the load, but make sure the bucket is held by an administra- tor qualified enough to keep track of these specialized helping hands. Choosing successful outsourcing contacts While some doctors may be hesi- tant to agree to outsourcing work traditionally handled solely by the administrator, the fact is that doing so in 2017 could be the best way to streamline the business side of a practice, eliminating inefficiencies by relying on experts for certain resourc- es and increasing cash flow overall. The trick is deciding which resources to outsource. Each admin- istrator's individual knowledge base and background, as well as the skill set of those currently reporting to the administrator, will determine what is best outsourced within a practice. Some of the most commonly out- sourced resources include: • Billing • Collections • IT • Accounting • Coding • Marketing " The modern administrator need not be the person with the most specialized skills but the one most able to manage a wide variety of outsourced skill. " March 2017 • Ophthalmology Business 9

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