Latest / Beyond the Needle: The Aesthetics Business Podcast / The Business Side of Aesthetics Nobody Prepares You For with Yogeeta Bawa

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The Business Side of Aesthetics Nobody Prepares You For with Yogeeta Bawa · Beyond the Needle: The Aesthetics Business Podcast

• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Be on the Needle, the Aesthetics Business Podcast.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: Each week, I'm here to share real actionable strategies and bring on expert guests to help you level up, attract more patients, and build a standout brand.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: Let's turn your passion into a thriving business together.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: Real quick before we get started.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: Now I know this from experience both as a business owner and as a former clinic manager.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: The operations side never gets easier as a clinic grows.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Staff schedules, payments, marketing, all of it pulling attention away from the treatment room.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: That is, unless you have Gloss Genius, the intelligent system that does all of that work for you, so you can focus on the work you love and watch your revenue grow.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: Gloss Genius is sponsoring this episode and is giving you an exclusive code.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: Enter code Needle at glossgenus.com for 50% of your first two months of their MedSpa and aesthetic plans.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: Available to US businesses only.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, let's get into the episode.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: Hi everyone and welcome back to Beyond the Needle.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: Today I'm delighted to be joined by Yogi Tabauer, co-founder and managing director of Time Clinic, a two-site multi-award-winning clinic.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: She is also the founder of the Invisible Business Partner, where she works with clinic owners on the business side of running a clinic.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: And that's exactly what we're getting into here today, the business side.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: Because most of you got into this industry because you love what you do clinically, but nobody really prepares you for everything that comes with actually running the business around it, the hiring, the systems, the finances, managing a team, and trying to switch off at the end of a day all of it.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: What I think makes Yogita's perspective really valuable is that she's not coming at this from the outside.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: Before aesthetics, she had a serious corporate career.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: She worked across Europe, the Middle East, Asia, America, and was involved in the London 2012 Olympics.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: And she's taken everything she's learned from that world and applied it directly to Building and Running Time Clinic alongside her husband, Dr.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: Bauer.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: So she understands both sides of it in a way that most people don't.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: We cover a lot in this episode: overwhelm, boundaries, how to actually structure your time when everything feels urgent, how to start delegating without everything falling apart, and why understanding your numbers matters more than most people realise.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: If you're a clinic owner who feels that you're constantly busy but not really moving forward, this one is for you.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: Just a quick reminder before we get into the conversation: if you enjoy these episodes, don't forget to subscribe to the podcast on the listening platform of your choice and do leave me a little review as well.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: It really does mean a lot.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, let's get into it.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: Hi Yogita, thank you so much for coming on to the podcast.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: It's so lovely to have you here, and I am so excited to pick your brains today about all things running an aesthetics clinic and business.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: But for anyone who hasn't come across you before, give us the overview.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: Who are you?
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: What do you do?
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: And tell me a little bit about the two sides of your work and what they look like today.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for having me on today.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_01: I'm really excited to be here.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: So a little bit about me and Yugita Bauer.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: My background has been in corporate management my whole career.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: So I've come from a business background and did that for many, many years.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then I started decided to work with my husband, who some of you may know, Dr.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: Bauer, who wanted to create and have his own aesthetic clinic.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: And this was back in 2017.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I continued in my management roles and part-time started to help build a brand and like an idea and a concept of how we're going to build an aesthetics clinic.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: In 2019, I left my role full-time and went into this to really be the clinic manager and really the clinic owner.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: So everything I've done since then has been about creating a time clinic, building a team, creating a successful clinic, and recently expanding to our second site.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: It's a busy, good clinic.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: And with that has been obviously challenges and hurdles that everyone faces, but also implementing a lot of my management and strategic planning skills that I had, which has been an advantage for us.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what I wanted to bring to our clinic.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_01: So that's everything I've been doing.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: As well as that, I've recently launched my business mentoring last year.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: So that's been really exciting.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: And that's working with clinic owners and practitioners, particularly, who are generally don't have that business support in their clinic, and they're running their clinics on their own and really want help and support and understanding how to be operationally successful, how to make sure their numbers are working, understanding margins, understanding teams, hiring.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_01: There's so much more to the business side of things, as well as the clinical skills, which they're excellent at, but sometimes we just want to organize that chaos going on behind the scenes and make sure their businesses are running efficiently.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: So that's really exciting.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: That's called the Invisible Business Partner.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: So that's also another branch to my boating to my boa that I'm doing.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: So safe to say you're a very busy lady.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Before we get into all of the kind of really practical business advice today, I have to ask you.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, like you say, you're you're working alongside your husband building a time clinic, which is actually something that I'm seeing more and more practitioners doing, you know, opening clinics with their partners or their partners coming in and, you know, helping with the operations side of the business.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: What does that dynamic look like day to day?
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: And what would you say to someone who's building alongside a partner and maybe finding it harder than they expected?
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's really exciting, but it's also challenging, and we need to just face that.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: So working, the dynamic changes when you're a couple and then you go into work together.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, the dynamics change.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: You suddenly have a professional hat on and you can't take the home relationship into work because it's a very different dynamic.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: So I'd say for us, it's worked really well because I'm looking at operations and business and I'm not the practitioner.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's very distinct roles for us, where it was anything medical, anything clinical, any treatments we're gonna bring in, any devices, manner of leads on that.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't question that necessarily because it's like this is what's gonna do best for our patients and their conditions and how we're gonna treat and extend our portfolio.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: But what I do challenge is the numbers.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm the one who'd be like, okay, that's great.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: How much does that cost?
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: You know, what are the margins?
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: What's the return on investment?
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: Have we got the patients ready and waiting?
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: What does that marketing strategy look like?
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: So, in that sense, we work really well together.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: There are obviously moments where we may not agree on everything, but we have learned over the years to prioritize in terms of does that commercial investment make sense?
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we compromise on certain things, and we've led quite clearly on eye lead or HR operations, accounts, various aspects like that, and really just ensure he's in the loop because he needs to be.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: And coming into those meetings where it's relevant, and I'll sort of say, I'm deleting with this, but can you come to the end of your accounts meeting kind of thing?
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: And he does the same when it's certain meetings where it's important that I'm there, but other times he will just continue and lead on his own.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: So we've got a really nice distinction between us.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: But my advice would be if you are starting out and you're working together and it's a bit more challenging, try and create distinctions.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: Otherwise, in the early days, we were stepping on each other's toes, and that gets frustrating because I've replied to that email or I'm dealing with that, but also he has, and now we're clashing because we're both trying to be helpful, but actually stepping on each other's toes.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: So we did then stop and go, okay, I'll deal with all of these areas or suppliers or contracts, and he would do various things.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: And when we need to, example, hiring staff, one of us will lead on the shortlisting, but together we'll interview because that's makes sense.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_01: So that's where we've learned.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: But I'd say just create distinctions, and it doesn't need to be a job prescription because maybe it's not that formal when you're working together.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: Ideally, you would have that, but just being a bit more clear about I'll deal with XYZ and the other person deals with XYZ.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: So you have a bit of distinction and try.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: The biggest thing and the hardest thing continues to be not talking about work at home, those hats.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: That's always going to be the challenge.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: And any couple I know in any type of business that work together, they just naturally talk about work whenever they have a spare moment.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_01: When you're at dinner, when you're on holiday, wherever you are, you will just somehow naturally digress towards a work conversation.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the hard thing.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_01: So some we've tried to create rules now.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: Doesn't always happen, but we are trying to create walls when we have personal time or couple time or away or anything.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's we are here, but we're not going to talk about work.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: And when one of us does, we'll try and catch ourselves and go, no, no, no, we're not going to talk about that.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: We're going to talk about that on Monday.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't always happen.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: But try and create your own boundaries because that will help your relationship and also just need downtime as well.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's such great advice.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, having some clear kind of responsibilities and communicating with that on that right at the very start so that you both know what you're going to be doing and you're not, like you say, treading on each other's toes.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: But also boundaries.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that was another thing I was going to say to you is how do you stop yourself digressing into in conversation at home and bringing up work all of the time?
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: Because it must be such a natural thing, especially if you're both doing your own separate roles throughout the day.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: You know, he's treating patients, you're doing all the behind-the-scenes business stuff.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: When you finally like sit down together at dinner, that might be like the only time you've really had that day to speak to each other.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: It must be very difficult to bring up work.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: Again, you learn over time to, and it does happen.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not going to say it doesn't, because sometimes things are just urgent or pressing and you need to discuss it.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: But what we try to do with the rule of thumb is we're creating a schedule.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: We should have a daily meeting together.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_01: It sounds bizarre, but that is when we've got our work hats on.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: And when we start the day, it's these are the things we need to discuss and have our own meeting together.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: And then we go about our days doing what we need to do.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: And even though we are passing each other, like you say, we're doing different things during the day.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: And then we will obviously catch up between those things and try and do it that way.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: So we're scheduling that time so we can have intentional time.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's really important.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_01: And only then uh we have young children as well, so it's like we really try to not talk about work when it's with the family because that does again create a different atmosphere as well because we're distracted by work commitment.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_01: And if we need to, we do, you know, when they're in bed, we'll we'll have we'll have a catch up.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: So it is consuming, it does take up a lot of our time, but we've tried to create over the years, and we are continually doing better with having intentional time allocated to actually discuss work and have those meetings and actually giving ourselves actually around 15 minutes after bigger meetings to give us time to digest and discuss decision.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: It's not left for days on end, it's actually okay, where are we with this?
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_01: And let's move forward and then we'll decide who's doing what.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: So I'll take an action or he'll take an action, and that's working really, really well because then it's just moving things forward a bit quicker.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so yeah, it's just being intentional with things and yeah, amazing, such good advice.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: So moving on to you know, all the business side of things.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's so much that we can talk about here.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: And when we spoke before this recording, I mean, you just had so much great advice.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: So this I know is going to be a really, really great episode for people to listen to.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: Now, when clinic owners first come to you, you know, looking for help or support, normally, you know, it's because they're feeling overwhelmed.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: What do you see that look like in practitioners?
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: What do their days look like and what's kind of keeping them up at night?
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: What are the biggest problems that they're facing?
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: Common issues tend to be that your to-do list is just endless and you just can't stay on top of it.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_01: And then that tends to create stress, obviously, overwhelm and can lead to burnout.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: And that's actually really great.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: So I think people start to just tread on water and they're just trying to keep their head above water and literally just be like, Can I get through today?
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: And as soon as they wake up, they're on reactive mode.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_01: So the fight and flight syndrome we know about, they're just responding to messages and emails, and there's no structure, it's just going straight in, and the whole day it sets the tone for the whole day, and the whole day is very reactive, which is exhausting.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_01: And that whole day, and they feel like they're doing so much and they're so exhausted, but they don't feel like they're achieving as much as they would like because it just feels like you're always just firefighting, and that's a really clear sign that you know you need some support and help, and you just really overwhelm because everything is overflowing, and you're just trying to keep on top of it, and you don't know where to prioritize, you just whatever's coming in first is what you're dealing with, and then things get left and missed, and that that's stressful as well because you have these intentions that you're not quite getting to.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that's a really big sign of just not being able to manage on the day-to-day workload, getting behind on key tasks and and things that you want to do, but you're just not getting to it, even though you want to maybe get behind on responding to people as well.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: If do you have a team or you need people waiting for you, patients are waiting for you to respond to something, you're just not quite getting to it.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: These are all classic symptoms of I'm just not quite coping because I've got so much to do and I don't know where to start and where to finish.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_01: It's just too much.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: So you're continuing this pattern because it's what's normal.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_01: You don't know how to change and break the pattern.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: So I'd say that's one really clear indication of wanting some support and need is is overwhelmed.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: How do people break that loop?
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: It's almost like a catch 22.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: You, you know, you get busier and busier, so you're, you know, treating patients all day, and then you don't actually have time to work on the business and grow it further, or hire people because that in itself can feel like it's going to take up a lot of brain space and energy.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: You know, marketing things can get left behind.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: Like you say, patients are waiting for responses longer than they should be.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: But it's almost like, how do you get out of that cycle?
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's one of the first things I like to do.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_01: Is it's almost just having firstly you have someone objective, and I think that really helps because then that person's coming in as an outsider with a clear view when they start to break down what's happening of this is actually what's going on, and you're so close to it, sometimes you just can't see what's happening.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: But the other thing is, I like to just stop and go, okay, where are we?
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: And where do we want to be?
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_01: And then it feels like it can be counterintuitive when you're so busy, you haven't got time to do that.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: But actually, when people do, and it doesn't take a lot of time, but just someone holding your hand and supporting you, going, we're just gonna look, we're not gonna spend days on it.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's just a task we're gonna do is go, what did you intend on doing when we started this?
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: Whether that was five years ago, whether it was last year, it doesn't really matter.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's what did we intend on achieving with this business?
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_01: Where are we trying to go and where are we right now?
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: And then what's holding you back?
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: What's causing these delays and this stress and this overwhelm?
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: And that's usually quite easy to pick when you start discussing these things with someone, whether it's lack of support in terms of resource, maybe you need a bigger team, whether that is that you don't have a streamlined inquiry process.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: There's various aspects we can identify and go, okay, these are the priorities which is holding you back and causing a lot of this overwhelm.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_01: So then I would create a plan of what we're going to prioritize, how are we going to move closer to the goal that we achieved, we wanted to achieve, and what's holding us back.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: And then from there, we can build a really clear plan of where we prioritize, what support we need first to help the practitioner get more control in their business.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: And just having an understanding of what's holding them back, what the blockers, that's what I like to call them, what's blocking you, and what we can do to do that.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: And then there's usually tools, whether it's online tools, whether it's an actual physical person, there's the various ways we can then work around helping someone.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes people have teams, it's not always about having more resources.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes the teams are overwhelming as well.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's another big responsibility.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: So it's about looking at team structures, who's doing what?
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: What hours are they doing?
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: What does that pay look like?
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's just the reviewing with a fresh pair of eyes together what's holding us back and how we break that down and move forward with clear intention again and a clear plan.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: It just makes you feel stronger, it makes you feel clearer, and you just feel like you know where you're going.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_01: And the noise that we feel starts to reduce because we're more prioritised.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I work with clients around, you know, having prioritization processes, how we manage our time, and that's a whole different conversation around time management in itself.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: If somebody's listening and they're kind of at that stage at the moment where they're they feel like they're doing everything, they're a little bit overwhelmed.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they, and this is something that I hear a lot, you know, they they're finishing a very busy clinic day, and then they're going home, and then they're applying to admin, or they're completing this.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: Someone said to me the other day, you know, they got home after like a nine, ten hour day of injecting, and then they were like doing all their treatment plans and sending them to patients because they are worried that if they didn't do it quickly, then those consultations would drop off and uh they wouldn't, they would be less likely to convert.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: Someone's doing that and it's like really and they're having no downtime in between their clinics.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: What is like one or two things that you recommend they do today to kind of start to break that cycle and make some changes?
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_01: Even though it may feel really hard, my first top tip would be to create a break in the day.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: And I know it feels really hard.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: I do really understand because you want you know you could see one more patient, maybe in that 30-minute slot, and that's what you want to do.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: You want to continue to have your diary really busy, back to back, and the demand is there, which is a great place to be, but you have to look after yourself first.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: So having that break, and most of us probably won't move away from the clinic room and have an actual break, but even if that break is to catch up on the notes, create some trauma morning, so you're not doing this at 11 p.m.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: at night, which is like you say, very common and it happens.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: Creating a little bit of a boundary, a break in your day, gives you a chance to first breathe and just catch yourself, catch up on some of your notes, perhaps maybe do one or two of those treatment plans, and then you go into another session.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: So if you think of them as sessions, and most practitioners are familiar with the idea of sessions from the NHS, you have these blocks where you have two, two hours or three-hour blocks, then you give yourself a little bit of time just to catch up, get on top of the morning, and then go again, and you maybe do that in intervals.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: That would be one way to manage it.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: The other way is having enforcing an admin half day.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_01: And the way you manage that with your patients is set expectations.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: Don't tell them when they're in the consultations.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: The first thing I'd say is at the end of it, you know, thank you, thank you for teaching today, or things you would say to wrap up, but also your treatment plan, your bespoke treatment plan will be with you within 48 hours or whatever that is.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: If it's for 24 hours, 40 hours, 72 hours, something reasonable where somebody's willing to wait, but you've told them.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_01: So they're not going to necessarily go elsewhere within 48 hours and have another consultation.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_01: They've you set the expectation as a practitioner that respect you.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: You are the authority in the room.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: We want to tell them you're going to receive the documentation of the treatment plan within an X period that gives you breathing space.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: So you don't have to necessarily do it that evening.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe you can block out an hour the next morning to do the treatment plans from the previous day if that's more viable.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: And then you can get those out that day.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: And that's really not that much time in it.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_01: As long as they know, I think that's the biggest thing.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: If you haven't set the expectation, then naturally some patients will feel frustrated and think, oh, I might go elsewhere because I haven't received it, because expect an instant document because they have no other way.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: We've done that for quite some time where we've set an expectation of 48 hours.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_01: Usually, more than not, it's before that, but it gives us a window to just allow for any delays and give us a chance to do them.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_01: To the standard, we like to do them as well without rushing.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I really think it's been such a positive response.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: People respect that and they're okay with it because you've told you've set expectations.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_01: So there's two things you can instantly do to avoid having to do really late evenings catching your porn admin at night.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: What would you say to someone who is like, you know, at that point where they are struggling with the admin load and maybe they're thinking about bringing on someone to help with the admin side of things?
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: But again, that can feel, I think, quite stressful because it's, you know, where do you begin with finding somebody, then you've got to train them up, and that feels like time consuming.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: What tips can you give people around that?
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: And and also knowing when is the best time to bring someone on, like when is the right time?
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: Because again, that's when you bring someone on, and oh, and for most people, I think that's the first thing that they do when they're when they're when they're growing their business, you know, is they get to a certain point, then right, okay, I'm going to bring someone on to help me with the admin side of things.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's normally like the first kind of team investment that someone would make.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: How you know what how do they know when is the right time to do that in terms of from a financial point of view as well?
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so I think there's two things.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: Firstly, you'll just know that you're not managing to stay on top of things.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_01: When we get to that point where we're just getting slower and generally just going, oh gosh, I haven't replied to all the emails on WhatsApp and et cetera, et cetera.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's overwhelming and and is impacting your personal time a lot.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: I know we all work outside of a nine till five necessarily, but when you really are at every moment replying to people out of hours, in the evenings, weekends, you there's no structure.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_01: I think there's a point where we need to say, I need support and help, and that's okay.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_01: That's the first thing.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_01: I think we all at some point, and that's a strength of growth as well.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's a sign of growth.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_01: It's like I can't manage it now.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: I've got overcapacity, I need support, and that's not a bad thing, it's a good thing because it shows we need extra support.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: So when you've decided that you do feel like an extra pair of hands would be really helpful, just imagine if someone else was taking care of all the inquiries and replies, how much time that would give you to work on other aspects of your business.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, that's the question.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_01: And if the answer is yes, actually, this is better for someone else to do it than me, then that's probably a good point to start thinking about hiring.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_01: The other task I like to do, and hopefully this is helpful for everyone, is if you're not sure and you've just got so much going on, is take the opportunity, we'll literally take Probably 15 to 20 minutes if we do it quickly, and have what I call the 10 pounds an hour task, the 100 pound an hour task, and the 1000 pound an hour task.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: And it's just write it down, piece of paper, three columns, and we're talking about what are the 10 pounds an hour tasks, and really they are WhatsApps, calls, emails, all the things that could be done by someone other than you.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's the differentiation here.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: Could someone else do this?
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: And they are the£10 an hour task, which is not necessarily not important, they're extremely important.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_01: It just means that you could delegate to someone else.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_01: Then you've got your£100 an hour task, which is more than likely being in the treatment room, and that's supposed to be delivering treatments, probably leading on treatment plans because you're the only one who can decide what goes in them, things like that.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: And then you've got£1,000 an hour task is where you really are in that clinic owner mindset.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: What's going to move my clinic forward?
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: What's going to give me the bigger numbers?
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_01: What's going to generate the revenue?
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: What's going to give me that's the that's when you're working on your business.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the only task that you can do at this point.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: So there's generally the£100 an hour and£1,000 an hour task that tends to be that person that can only do that.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: And then, and if you've got a team of other therapists or practitioners, they could be in that hundred pound an hour area as well.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: But the£10 an hour task is tends to be a lot of the admin that someone could do really, really well, and maybe even better than you because you they that's their dedicated role as well, so they're not missing things.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: So that's in sometimes a really helpful way to differentiate what goes where.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_01: And then that is a great way because that list then becomes your job description, and then it becomes all the things I need someone else to help me do.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: So you've already done half of the job, which is creating that job description or to-do list.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: From there, then there's other ways of hiring.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: We've used that, essentially using that, making it more formalized and creating and talk to your accountant when it comes to finances.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_01: The other ways looking online and seeing what a role like that.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: So let's say a receptionist or front of house, what other companies are advertising for, just to give you a feel for what the hiring, the cost is.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_01: Speak to your accountant, I definitely say, look at the numbers, make sure that you can afford it, your business can afford it.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're not ready for the full-time hire, because that is a huge responsibility as well.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: A great way to do it is looking at a VA or a PA.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: The differentiation between the VA is virtual assistants, they're not going to be in your clinic or in your space, they will work remotely.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: They could be anywhere, literally, in the country.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: So that gives you a lot more freedom.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_01: But you can also find VAs on LinkedIn, on Indeed, on various other online platforms where you'd put your job prescription and say this is how many hours you need per week.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_01: And to work that bit out, I would say think about how much time you're spending on those tasks that you've got on your list now.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_01: You know, is it around four hours a day?
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: Is it two hours a day, whatever that looks like for you?
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: And give yourself, let's say, you want to start with 10 hours a week, which is not too bad.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's a nice place to start.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_01: You find the person, you would need a little bit of delegating, they need access to your systems, but most of these can be done remotely now, where people can get access to your systems to help you.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: And that person would have a retainer, they'd have a dedicated number of hours they work for you, and you tell them what that looks like.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: Is it an hour a day?
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: Is it, you know, two full days, whatever that works for you, and you make that arrangement.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: The other opportunity is a PA, which is personal assistant.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: That person could then be nearer to you.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_01: They might be coming in to help you and do it face to face a couple of hours a day, again, somewhat remotely as well.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: So it's lots of flexibility around having support.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't have to always be go straight for a full-time employee if that's not where you're what you're ready for.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: And that's a really good step to see how much support you can gain and then building towards hiring someone in your clinic on payroll if that's something you want to do.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: That also gives you flexibility.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_01: So if you're not ready financially to have someone on your payroll, you can then have this retainer, which is easy to then discontinue if you wish to, and you know how much you're spending per month is a cost to your business, but it's a real worthwhile cost.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think it's such a good investment for people to make.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I think once they free up that brain space that all of that admin kind of overload is taking up, people will be amazed like how much things can change and like how much more motivated they are then to work on other areas of the business, maybe invest some more time doing content for social media or writing email newsletters, or you know, and and also when you've got somebody who's keeping an eye on things, like you say, things don't get missed, and they can also take the time to go through kind of the database and look at who hasn't been in for a while and start re-engaging patients.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_00: And those are the kind of things that don't tend to get done when you're already juggling a million other things.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I think it's a great investment for people to make if they are at that stage where things are starting to feel a little bit overwhelming.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_00: One of the things that we've that you've spoken about with with me previously is decision making and in particular decision fatigue, which a lot of practitioners experience.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_00: Tell me a little bit about that.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_01: I think the decision fatigue tends to come from the fact that we are quite overwhelmed.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: And when we're feeling that way, you just haven't got you said the brain sprays to think about anything else.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: So even making small decisions that normally wouldn't be hard can feel quite hard when you're doing it constantly.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: Clinic owners on a daily basis will make multiple decisions, and they could be micro decisions, but they are even when they're in the room with their patients, they're making decisions all the time.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: And then you've got your business decisions as well, where you have to constantly make them, and you probably don't even realize that's what's happening.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_01: Your brain is working and is overpowered and stimulated all day, and you probably only rest when you physically have to sleep, and then you start again, and that allows you to have no downtime, no restoration, to give yourself the best opportunity to make better decisions and feel refreshed.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not actually always about going on holiday or having a few days off, that's great, we all need that.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_01: But actually, in my experience and my advice is you have to create structures in your own life to then make better decisions.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: And what I mean by that is your business life, your work life tends to be a reflection of your personal life.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_01: And if you are not having any structure or any time for yourself, if you can't get to do your exercise or your meditation, or you just don't even know what time you eat, or it's all just very random and chaotic, that's going to reflect in how you're operating your business because that's just the way it goes.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_01: So the really successful entrepreneurs are very much about structure and very much about investing in themselves before their work.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: And these are the most successful people that you know everyday names we'll all know of that have created amazing businesses, but they invest in themselves first because you learn over time that if you don't do that, everything else will start to fall apart at some point, include decisions that you make, because they're not the best decisions, because you're fatigued, essentially.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: So, what might that look like?
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_01: It might be having a set time you wake up every day, whatever that looks like for you.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: Having a routine, you know, bodies love, well, brains love routine instructor, having that same regimented routine to some extent of whether you have lead or water, whether you have your coffee, whether you go for a run, whatever that looks like for you, having that in place sets your day for what works for you.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: And if that means, and it's hard again to do these things, but it doesn't mean people will run away.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: And that's a really big fear factor, I think people have, is if I start my clinic at, I don't know, let's say 10, hypothetically, so I can fit in the things I need to do for myself, or might not see all my patients.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_01: People may not come.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: I need to be open at nine o'clock, I need to be open till 7 p.m.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: Because of the worry that goes somewhere else.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_01: It's not necessarily true because we just again set expectations.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: We tell people we open at 10 o'clock on every day and we finish at whatever time.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_01: People respect that as long as they know, as long as you're not changing it all the time and set some structures.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_01: Now you've given yourself a little bit of a window.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe some practitioners I know use the morning, they start their clinics at 11 because they use the morning to do what they need to do for themselves and then have two hours of dedicated admin time, where they'll work on it, they'll have their meetings, they'll have their emails, whatever they need to do, and then they go into the other hat of practitioner, and now they are ready to see their patients to give their best rather than trying to juggle everything in between.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_01: Again, it's creating structures that work for you, and you finish, give yourself maybe an hour at the end of maybe you don't finish at seven, maybe you finish at six, and give yourself an hour of catching up with those notes we discussed and treatment plans.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_01: So when you are home, you can be off to some extent.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_01: You can actually enjoy your evening.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: When we start to work towards these routines, we start to see changes, not just in ourselves and how we feel, because we feel better.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_01: We start understanding that actually was that thing so important.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we get so stressed about replying to things and actioning things.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_01: But when you have a little bit of time, you really start to just naturally, your brain has a moment to process and you start to go a little bit and go, actually, it's okay if I wait a couple of days to do the thing.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's nothing's gonna happen.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's okay.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: You start to prioritize better and make better decisions.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_01: So I'd really encourage looking at how we just make small changes.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: I would never say let's all just completely change our lifestyles like tomorrow, it's not feasible, but small micro changes, like recently, because I'm my my role is very desk bound, I'm not getting enough steps in.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I feel you can start to feel fatigued by the end of the day.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_01: So having just 10 minutes, which is not a lot really, 10 minutes after lunch and after dinner to walk anywhere, just around the block, wherever it is, just to help my digestion, help my mood, help the fact that I've had a break from a screen, but also improve myself.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_01: So there's lots of just micro things.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_01: Having um less caffeine, I've switched from caffeine to decaf because I still like a cup of tea.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um but you know, I'm changing small changes, one thing at a time.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_01: You start to see these micro changes and how well it helps your business and it helps you as a clinic owner.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I love that.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's so true as well.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's so important that we give ourselves that time to work on ourselves because it's so easy, like you say, to fall into that habit of work, work, work.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_00: And for practitioners, that might look like you know, you come in, you do some admin, you see your patients, and then before you know it, it's the end of the day, then you've got a bit more admin, then you go home, you rush, you have dinner, etc.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: etc.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: And you're not actually having any time to, like you say, process and think about things.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm quite guilty of doing that type of thing myself in my workday.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I always notice that when I'd step away for, you know, a couple of hours and do something social, or maybe I, you know, have a full day off and go and do something different and completely get out of my normal environment, you know, at the weekend or whatever.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_00: That's when I start to really like I have my best ideas, you know, because our brain actually manages to slow down from thinking constantly about the next thing that we've got to do, the next or the next patient you've got to see, you know, as a practitioner.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: And you actually get to, you get, you know, you start to think about other things and you get great ideas and you feel refreshed and you go back into work with like lots of new things that you want to do that you wouldn't have thought about if you hadn't switched off.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I think it's very important.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's really important, but also I think, you know, the easy things to say, and we can hear these things.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I've heard I've listened to other podcasts as well, and you think, oh, that's great, but to implement is really difficult, isn't it?
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_01: So I think what I'd say to that is really just don't be hard on yourselves because what you is amazing, and you know, to juggle a business, grow a business is really challenging in any bit in any industry.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: We know in our industry is very competitive, we know it's evolving, and it's really exciting space to be in.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_01: The technologies are incredible, but we're having to stay on top of everything, and we have a lot of industry events as well.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, we're everywhere doing everything, and you probably have a partner or families and other things going on in your life as well.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I'd say, you know, we hear these things, but it doesn't mean you have to do everything all at the same time.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_01: Take what works for you, but just try if you can make small changes to implement something that helps you.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_01: Whether, like I said, that's a five-minute meditation, and it's even that can be really hard to implement, you know, can't it?
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_01: Even just reading a book at night instead of watching TV, whatever that looks like, small changes a little bit at a time, you'll start to see the difference.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_01: But the biggest thing I'd say is try and take a break, even if it's such a short break in between, especially when you're seeing your uh patients.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_01: Busy clinic days are incredibly stressful.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_01: You're just on adrenaline the whole day and you don't get time to catch yourself.
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_01: Just having that break will give you a better energy for your patients.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_01: So you're gonna deliver better in the room, it'll give you the energy to write the notes better and just not feel fatigued by the end of the day.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_01: So that would be my big takeaway and just start small, and that's all we can do.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's it.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_00: Implement one thing next week, you know, whether that's getting up 20 minutes earlier and having a walk beforehand or sitting and enjoying your coffee beforehand, and then you can build on it from there.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't need to be, you know, a huge routine change overnight, but slowly the the benefits of those things will start to kind of show.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: So another thing I really wanted to talk to you about is the knowing your numbers side of things, you know, the finance side of things, which I know you're quite passionate about.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, a lot of practitioners I think have a rough sense of their revenue, but no real visibility beyond that.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: What are the numbers that you think every clinic owner should be tracking?
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_00: And what does it tell you about a business when someone doesn't know them?
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_01: I think this when someone doesn't know them, it would be it could be that overwhelming piece we spoke about.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: I think most people have a good intention.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_01: They really want to understand it is they want to know the numbers at the top of their heads about every kind of metric you could possibly think of.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_01: Realistically, it's not going to happen.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_01: We tend to leave it to our accountant and we have our end-of-year view, and the accountant will probably show us what happened that year, and some of it will be good, some of it might be surprising, whatever it is, you haven't really had the opportunity to look at that throughout the year.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_01: And really, I'd say for clinic owners, as much as we've talked about overwhelm and busyness, you know, we've talked about methods to reduce that so we can start getting time back.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_01: And when we have some of that time back, I'd implore everyone to start understanding their numbers.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_01: And it's more than just your revenue.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's a very big metric.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, we need to know how much money we're making, but we also need to know where the money's being spent.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_01: That's really important because but you know, revenue is a vanity metric, they call it.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_01: So, because it can look great, but actually, how much profit is are you gaining from that?
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_01: So we look at how much revenue you're making, and I wouldn't say annually, I'd say monthly.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_01: And let's gain it down to a monthly basis.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_01: So spend some time every month if you can, looking at how much money you've made the previous month, how much was spent, so your overheads.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_01: Let's look at where the money's going.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_01: And most of it will be things you're familiar with, it will be your you know, your staff, it'll be your consumables, your products, etc., or maybe your rent and other things.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_01: But sometimes those costs can really creep when we're not keeping the eye on them because we're just buying what we need as we feel we need it, and suddenly we're spending more than we were, perhaps on a certain supplier or something else is going on.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_01: This is why monthly is much more helpful for a clinical owner than just looking at it annually.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_01: So we need to know our overheads, we need to know the treatments we actually deliver because we tend to continue to add to our portfolios, which is great.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_01: But then do we know our margins?
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_01: Do we know how much money we actually make when we're selling, even skincare, as well as actual treatments, injectables?
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_01: Because in the room, we may or may not have improved, increased our prices over time, even if we have, is that in mind with inflation?
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_01: Are we still making the same amount we were?
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_01: What should that be?
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_01: And we want to be looking at those numbers.
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're not sure what this should be, because that is a really challenging task.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_01: Firstly, speak to your suppliers.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's the first place I'd go because they're there to support you and help you, and they know the RRP cost price, as well as what's going on in the area that you're in.
• 39:12
  SPEAKER_01: Because what's happening in the north may be different from somewhere in central London, and we can't operate in the same numbers.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_01: But we want to be talking to our local reps for your suppliers and saying, How much should I?
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_01: And skincare brands always have an RRP, and most companies now, even with injectables and other services, have an RRP for certain treatments.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_01: And you look at your competition, you look at your key competitors in your area and see what kind of prices they're selling at.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_01: But once you've known that, you're really looking at how much money do I make.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_01: Every time I'm in this room delivering this treatment, how much money do I actually make from this?
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_01: And that is really empowering because when you know that, you know where to spend your energy and your time, and that's why I see it.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't mean we stop selling those services, it just means actually, if I want my revenue to increase and I want to see better margins, if I have better margins, I take home more because you're making more profit.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_01: Let maybe if I push in terms of marketing, now it's steering your marketing conversations and strategies.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_01: If I want more of X, because this is actually really profitable for me, then let's talk about that in our marketing strategies and other areas in conversations in the room.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_01: So it's giving you information, it's informing you where you get the most return in the time when you're in clinic.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_01: And that's really powerful because it's not just a number now, it's actually informing you.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_01: You want to maybe increase sales in X treatment because you could do four of them and make the same amount of money doing something that's not necessarily as profitable.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_01: We want to be focusing on the high profit treatments.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_01: So that's another metric I think is really important.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_01: Understanding your margins and that will inform you for your decisions.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_01: I like to look at my what I call my blueprint of my clinic.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_01: So, other than those revenue and operational numbers, money, want to look at actually how many inquiries I've had this month.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_01: Looking at retrospective rates of last month, some most systems will give you some sort of data around this, some don't because you can't maybe put your WhatsApp or your phone calls into your CRM.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, the different systems are available.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_01: But you're looking at how many inquiries you've had that month because why is that matter?
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_01: It tells you when you start to build it month on month, is that going up or down?
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_01: What's happening?
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_01: Did I do something this month which increased my inquiries?
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_01: Was there a social media campaign I ran that was very successful?
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_01: Did I have an event?
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_01: Or is it generally consistent?
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_01: And that's okay too.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_01: But it starts to build an understanding of what's going on.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_01: So, how many inquiries, how many converted is really important because we want to know how many of those actually converted?
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_01: If they didn't, and we want to improve that.
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_01: So let's say it's 50% conversion, hypothetically.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_01: Let's aim for 55, let's aim for 60, and then just make your own milestones of how you get the conversions to go up.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_01: How many are, how many cancellations I look at, and or missed appointments, and if so, have you got a deposit in place?
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_01: Are you enforcing the the late no shows and all of those things?
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_01: Look at your processes.
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_01: I like to look at where they pay came from, so marketing source.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_01: I like to know that everything I'm investing in is actually working and what's happening around that space and doing more of the good stuff.
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's always helpful to know.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_01: So there's a number of key metrics that they're just some basics around what to do.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_01: And average patient spend is a really important one, and how I do average patient spend is you look at the amount of patients that were in over that period, how much money you took over that period, and you're dividing the numbers, and it gives you an average patient spend.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_01: And why this is really important is you want to see that stays quite consistent over months and have again your own internal milestone or goal of what you want that to be.
• 42:50
  SPEAKER_01: So let's say hypothetically it's£150.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_01: Let's say you want you want to make that get towards a 200, right?
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_01: So let's say we want to get to 175, and I always say do it in increments.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we need to be realistic as well, and then the month after to maybe 200 or give it three-month quarters to give yourself a chance to do it.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_01: Why does this matter?
• 43:09
  SPEAKER_01: Because if you're seeing 200 patients and your diary is absolutely full, and that feels really good because you're so busy, but your revenue is not really improving.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_01: To me, that's a concern because that means your average patient spend is probably quite low.
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_01: You're seeing the volume, but you're not necessarily getting more money.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_01: What we want is less patients and more revenue.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_01: That's where we want to know where our best treatments are, most profitable treatments, because we want people to steer them towards those, if relevant, obviously if appropriate.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_01: And a mix of the other treatments and maybe not as profitable because we want to give a blend of treatments to our patients.
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_01: But now we understand that if I still see, I could possibly see a hundred people and make the same amount of income.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_01: And that's where we want to be because it's a quality of a quantity, because then you are just leaning on burnout because you are so busy seeing everyone.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_01: But is that worth your while?
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the question you need to ask yourself.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_01: So when we have these metrics in front of us, we can start understanding the behavior of our clinic, and then we can start to steer things very slowly in the direction we want them to go in.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_01: And if we want to improve our average patient spend, we want to start have creating treatment plans that have the higher profitable treatments.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_01: So we see less but make more, and that starts to become more efficient in your clinic.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_01: So there's just some of the metrics.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_01: There's a couple that I would say start thinking about if you can, and where possible, do it monthly.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_01: It feels like a chore and a task, but genuinely it changes clinics.
• 44:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I've seen it firsthand.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_01: When they start to understand these numbers, it transforms where they put their time and energy, and they really start to value their time and also where which treatments they really want to focus on.
• 44:51
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_00: You and you give so much.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_00: Great information.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_00: You always answer the next question I was going to ask you before I've asked it.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_00: So monthly looking at the metrics, I think that's really important.
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_00: And probably a lot of people listening to this right now aren't doing it at least as often as monthly, if at all.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_00: But yes, I think those are all very important metrics to be looking at.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_00: Now, when people do start tracking the numbers properly and they don't like what they see, maybe they're not happening, they don't have a great average patient spend.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_00: What is the best way to respond to that if you if they're seeing something they don't like or if the figures don't look as good as they thought they would do?
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_00: What's the best way to respond rather than just feeling bad about it?
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_01: So everything can be changed, right?
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_01: So even if we're in a place where we're not happy with, the great thing about knowing this is you can't improve what you don't know.
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_01: It just simply put.
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_01: So now you know where you are, we can make great changes around that.
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_01: So you accept where we are.
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_01: That's okay.
• 45:45
  SPEAKER_01: This is where I am, but it doesn't have to stay this way.
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_01: I would start with, if that was the case, looking at your prices.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_01: So go back to basics.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_01: Let's look at all the treatments you have and all the skincare and any other products you sell.
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_01: Ask yourself, are these working for me?
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_01: Are people actually buying these treatments, services, products?
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_01: Because you don't may not need to keep everything that you've already got in your portfolio.
• 46:07
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't mean just because you had it, you have to keep it.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_01: Things can change.
• 46:10
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the great thing about having that power in your own clinic of making those changes.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_01: So firstly review what you have and see if they there's a demand for it and how much time and energy it takes for you to manage those type of things as well.
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_01: So that's the one thing.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_01: Then I'd say what's the margin on that.
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_01: Again, if you're not sure, speak to your reps first.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_01: They can help you with this information and see and look at the number of sales you've made in those spaces.
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_01: That should be in your CRMs.
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_01: Also, your accountants can probably break down your sales as well around X number of treatments or services and products have made XYZ, and you can already very quickly see what's making you money and what necessarily isn't.
• 46:47
  SPEAKER_01: And then when you've decided what you are going to keep, it's almost a reset.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you're looking at your portfolio again from a fresh pair of eyes, you decide what you want to keep.
• 46:55
  SPEAKER_01: Now we're going to do what we said earlier and look at local competition, what they're selling the similar products and services for.
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to speak to my rep and I'm going to ask her what the RRP is in my area for this particular service or product.
• 47:07
  SPEAKER_01: And then I'm going to work out if I sell eggs, I make X, right?
• 47:12
  SPEAKER_01: So we need to know our margins.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_01: Now we've sort of had that confidence of a reset, a refresh.
• 47:17
  SPEAKER_01: And then we're going to look at marketing campaigns and how we're going to make sure in-house as well as external marketing.
• 47:23
  SPEAKER_01: I would then in my clinic have internal packages that I probably want to start putting together to making sure they feel appealing, have price plans, payment plans, whoever you can call them.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: And that's not always external finance when I say that.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_01: You can do that.
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not obviously popular.
• 47:37
  SPEAKER_01: But just your own internal this treatment plan is going to be X.
• 47:42
  SPEAKER_01: Let's just say it's a thousand pounds for argument's sake, but you can pay£200 a month.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_01: And now it feels more accessible for people.
• 47:49
  SPEAKER_01: And now they've got you've got cash flow coming in.
• 47:52
  SPEAKER_01: And you get a number of people doing a couple of these plans, or courses, even if you're selling a course of microneedling or facials, that's great as well because you can do that monthly if people want to.
• 48:04
  SPEAKER_01: And if they buy it up front, then give them an incentive, give them an extra one free, or another something else complementary to value add.
• 48:11
  SPEAKER_01: So I would then create a fresh set of packages, courses, internal marketing that I'm going to be telling my patients about when they come to see me.
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_01: That you know, I'm looking at your skin, let's start again, let's look at skin analysis if you have one, give them advice and say, I've just created, we've got these recent courses that I think you'd be perfect for.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_01: Now you're upsetting those, and you will definitely see an improvement in your numbers just by doing some of these changes, as well as external marketing as well.
• 48:39
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_00: Again, I think it's it's it's like what you said about the daily habits and the routine, it's looking at the numbers, you know, and working out what needs addressing and then just making small changes as you go rather than trying to do everything at once and then getting overwhelmed again.
• 48:54
  SPEAKER_01: Another way to do it is well, it feels like a lot to look at the whole portfolio you may have, is just take one section, just exactly to your point, Emily, that rather than doing small things, so maybe just look at all your microneedling first, see what's going on there, see what your packages and courses look like, look at the numbers there, and then take it section by section, take it on your skin boosters or your fillers or whatever that is, and take them by section so you can do this over a course of three months or so rather than all in one week, because that's even time-consuming as well.
• 49:25
  SPEAKER_01: And that's where having business support is really helpful as well.
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's just sometimes not knowing where to even start, because that can feel like a really big task.
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're not familiar with the reports, maybe in your CRM, how do you even find this information?
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_01: Every system works slightly differently.
• 49:41
  SPEAKER_01: So if you have all got that, then to speak to the people that are there for you and sometimes we underutilize the support out there.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_01: So if you have your CRM, reach out to them.
• 49:51
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, like I'm trying to get my head around reports, and I want to know X, Y, Z, maybe the five things I mentioned.
• 49:58
  SPEAKER_01: Well, how do I find my average patient spend?
• 50:01
  SPEAKER_01: How do I find my monthly revenue?
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_01: How do I find where I'm spending more, you know, the clinic costs?
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_01: Speak to your accountant if you need to.
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_01: If they're helpful, they should be able to give you ways of having a running PL where you can actually see like a way to do it.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_01: And most software, accounting software have the opportunity.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_01: They can show you how to use it.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_01: So don't feel hesitant to ask the people around you for help as well, because you're paying for these services.
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_01: We just underutilize the support that we have.
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_01: Again, I've mentioned suppliers a couple of times, they will help you.
• 50:31
  SPEAKER_01: We just have to ask, it's how much we ask for as well.
• 50:34
  SPEAKER_01: Get say I'm reviewing my numbers, I'm not sure what I should be charging because I'm not seeing the sales, I would like to.
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_01: Can you help?
• 50:41
  SPEAKER_01: They will come and help you with events or with your RRP or even courses because they have that experience in the field.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_01: So I just start with those people that are there to help you succeed.
• 50:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, amazing advice, very important.
• 50:55
  SPEAKER_00: Now, Time Clinic is a multi-award-winning clinic running across two sites, and you've built a team with a culture around it.
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_00: What were the key things that you and Dr.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_00: Bauer put in place for it to kind of grow and build across those two sites in the way it has without you both not necessarily needing to be in the room all of the time?
• 51:18
  SPEAKER_01: There's a huge challenge to do that because I think most people have a goal of wanting to build a successful clinic, but not having to be there all the time.
• 51:25
  SPEAKER_01: Because that's the that's probably a goal for many.
• 51:27
  SPEAKER_01: And that was one of our goals.
• 51:29
  SPEAKER_01: And initially it wasn't.
• 51:30
  SPEAKER_01: Initially, it was just to build and grow and have a brand and you know have patients come in, but then you evolve and your goals change, and the goals then became that actually we want the team to feel really empowered and self-sufficient, so we don't have to hand hold throughout every day, basically, to allow us some time back to work on other things.
• 51:49
  SPEAKER_01: So, one thing we did right at the beginning was values, and some people see this as a bit fluffy, if you want to call it that, but it really isn't because actually sitting down and actually deciding on what's important to you.
• 52:02
  SPEAKER_01: When I say values, is what do you what does your clinic represent?
• 52:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a representation of you ultimately, but you know what does that mean outside of you?
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_01: Because if your goal is to have a successful team, the team has to sing from the same hymn sheet as well.
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_01: So they're not a you, but they need to have the same values as you, they need to find them important.
• 52:22
  SPEAKER_01: And if we haven't set the tone, we haven't even got a chance for our team to be working from the same hymn sheet.
• 52:28
  SPEAKER_01: So have your values defined.
• 52:30
  SPEAKER_01: Work.
• 52:30
  SPEAKER_01: I worked, we worked together, people on your own work, and think about what do I want for my patients?
• 52:35
  SPEAKER_01: Some of those might look like honesty, trust, integrity, authenticity.
• 52:41
  SPEAKER_01: There's some of the probably these familiar ones, and maybe other things as well.
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_01: So that's what we did.
• 52:47
  SPEAKER_01: We wrote down our core values of what we wanted for time today.
• 52:50
  SPEAKER_01: We believe in them or we live by them, but we wanted to make them big enough, I guess, that anyone else coming in at any point in the journey would also understand them, but be able to abide by them.
• 53:03
  SPEAKER_01: So they had to be something that was tangible and meaningful as well.
• 53:07
  SPEAKER_01: So what we then did is wrote them out.
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_01: I've got little booklets, like time clinic booklets of our values, our core values, our mission statement.
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_01: So, our mission statement, we have our core values, and there's about five of them, and then we shared them, you know, appropriately with each team member as they've come into the clinic.
• 53:24
  SPEAKER_01: And occasionally every six months or so, I do a team session where we'll do something external, you know, together just for some for the culture part of it.
• 53:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I actually give them the booklets or I will say them again and say, you know, let's some are forgotten naturally, some are new.
• 53:40
  SPEAKER_01: So we want to make sure everyone's always on the same page.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_01: And so this is what time cleaning is about.
• 53:45
  SPEAKER_01: We want people to trust us, so we will always be honest, whether that's whether to refusing someone's treatment or whether that's giving the best treatment plan that's right for them.
• 53:54
  SPEAKER_01: And even if we've made a mistake, I'm talking about admin teams or anything, that we'll be honest and we'll own up to it with each other, but with our patients.
• 54:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's what it's about.
• 54:03
  SPEAKER_01: And I talk about that with them, not just to preach, but you live by it.
• 54:07
  SPEAKER_01: You have to live by it, you have to lead by example as a clinic owner.
• 54:10
  SPEAKER_01: So that's some little touches we do, but you'll define your values, who you are, and how you want to represent your clinic.
• 54:17
  SPEAKER_01: Ensure people coming into this space of yours, it's such a personal space.
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_01: They understand and they believe.
• 54:23
  SPEAKER_01: Have posters in your staff room.
• 54:25
  SPEAKER_01: Make sure you talk about them in team meetings, have days out where you talk about your culture and actually what's stopping you from that.
• 54:32
  SPEAKER_01: Like, have you noticed anything that's changing?
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_01: Have one-to-ones, which is what I do, because in those private conversations, people will maybe feel they can share things that are not aligning with our culture.
• 54:44
  SPEAKER_01: So we want to address those things and make sure that we're showing from the front that we listen, you can trust us, we will support you, and we'll make the right changes to improve the conditions if needed.
• 54:54
  SPEAKER_01: So that's something that we put in, because I think you have to put that in.
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_01: But in terms of allowing them to work on their own, after they're trained, after we feel they're competent, Dr.
• 55:03
  SPEAKER_01: Bauer spent time with all the practitioners, even if they're very competent and trained and experienced, they shadow him.
• 55:10
  SPEAKER_01: He has a whole process, and then he will shadow them.
• 55:13
  SPEAKER_01: And there is an investment of time, but that time at the front is about doing it the way we like, the way he likes, because every clinic runs differently.
• 55:21
  SPEAKER_01: So let's make sure you're doing the consultation the same way as him.
• 55:24
  SPEAKER_01: Let's make sure you're following our processes, our treatment plans are consistent, so that at the end of the day, when we do leave them to it, they've had that training and that input and they know the standard expected from them.
• 55:35
  SPEAKER_01: With our admin staff, I spend a lot of time with them, literally doing, I will sit and do front of house.
• 55:41
  SPEAKER_01: I did it recently, a new starter for a week, and I spent every day sitting there.
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_01: She was watching me, going, This is how we answer the phone, this is how we reply.
• 55:50
  SPEAKER_01: Because I think if I can show them how I like it done, how I would want anyone else to do it, and then then start handing over and delegating and showing them this is the standard.
• 55:59
  SPEAKER_01: So there's things like that, but now I feel more confident that if I'm not in the room, they should be doing it the way I expect.
• 56:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I do have regular meetings and various checks just put in place.
• 56:09
  SPEAKER_01: We use online tools where we can to support ours.
• 56:12
  SPEAKER_01: So task lists, so we all have them.
• 56:15
  SPEAKER_01: Rather than just having lots of WhatsApps, we do have WhatsApp communication.
• 56:19
  SPEAKER_01: I use a system called Trello, and there's other people out there that do similar things that are free as well.
• 56:25
  SPEAKER_01: You could use Teams or whatever platform you're using.
• 56:28
  SPEAKER_01: I have tasks for them.
• 56:29
  SPEAKER_01: So that's a way where I know that if they've done it, they'll tick it off and I get notified.
• 56:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's a way for me to manage without micromanaging and being in the room.
• 56:37
  SPEAKER_01: And I can do that from anywhere.
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_01: So it allows me some flexibility and freedom because we've got to invest in training, invest in us showing them the way we'd like it done, but also allow people to grow in their roles as well and give them the opportunity.
• 56:53
  SPEAKER_01: So that's how we've we do things really.
• 56:55
  SPEAKER_01: And we've had to, especially over two sites, to empower the team and show them that and reward them where relevant, you know, not just money, it's not just monetary.
• 57:04
  SPEAKER_01: It's maybe if you have targets and you want to incentivize that way, or maybe it's other things like let's all go for drinks on Friday night, or maybe you can have an hour off early because it's been a great week and you've done so much hard work.
• 57:17
  SPEAKER_01: I really appreciate that.
• 57:18
  SPEAKER_01: Why don't you go home early today?
• 57:19
  SPEAKER_01: And I think people just really respect that you notice and we acknowledge the good work people do because they want to come in the next week working harder for you and wanting to do more.
• 57:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I think just really paying attention to what's happening around you and your team.
• 57:33
  SPEAKER_01: Birthdays, you know, do you want to do a birthday collection and give everyone a gift?
• 57:37
  SPEAKER_01: Do we want to it depends how far you want to go, but I think just in general, rewarding people in the right way to make them feel valued because that means so much more than just your salary or your pay sometimes.
• 57:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's so, so true.
• 57:52
  SPEAKER_00: I think, yeah, a lot of people focus on that kind of training side of thing, which obviously is important, you know, when someone first starts, but it's also like, you know, the relationship that you build with your team long term and creating a nice culture and a nice environment to be, which I think these days for people is a lot more important to them than just money alone, is like actually enjoying where they go to work and working in a nice environment because there's a lot of clinics out there, you know, uh that they could possibly work in.
• 58:21
  SPEAKER_00: What's going to make them stay at your clinic?
• 58:24
  SPEAKER_00: And like you say, there's a lot that goes in initially to of time and money and to training.
• 58:29
  SPEAKER_00: So why wouldn't you put the time and effort into also retaining that that employee and getting the best out of them?
• 58:36
  SPEAKER_01: Well, just to add to that, sorry, is that you people are have very different motivations, don't they?
• 58:40
  SPEAKER_01: Like we just said, you know, but actually when you spend the time with them to understand, when they start, I'll always ask them, you know, what's your goal?
• 58:48
  SPEAKER_01: Where do you want to be?
• 58:50
  SPEAKER_01: And it's so different for everyone.
• 58:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's not always just because they're in a certain role, they're naturally going to want to do.
• 58:55
  SPEAKER_01: Let's say I'm a therapist.
• 58:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's not necessarily I want to be a senior therapist.
• 58:59
  SPEAKER_01: There could be something else they're interested in or they're intrigued by.
• 59:02
  SPEAKER_01: It might be that, oh, I'd really like to speak at a conference.
• 59:05
  SPEAKER_01: I've always wanted to do, and I just don't know how, or I don't know how to have the confidence to do it.
• 59:10
  SPEAKER_01: For some people, it's I want to become manager or I want to learn that particular treatment that I've never had the opportunity to do, and I'm more confident to do.
• 59:17
  SPEAKER_01: There's just people are so varied in what their motivations are.
• 59:20
  SPEAKER_01: So I did that's a really, really good way.
• 59:23
  SPEAKER_01: And I found it's worked really well for my team and had long-standing team members, touch or is understanding what's important to them, what does their career progression look like, and feed that where you can, not immediately, they have to prove themselves first to make sure they're stable and we're working well together, but remember those conversations, have them documented, create a folder with their, you know, notes and things like that in there, your minutes, but to remind yourself, because it starts to get hard when your team expands to go, you know, the six-month review, for example.
• 59:52
  SPEAKER_01: I will pull that up and say, so we talked about you'd really love to do this management course.
• 59:57
  SPEAKER_01: Are you still interested in that?
• 59:58
  SPEAKER_01: What does that look like?
• 59:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I will say it to them, I'd like to go ahead and research what kind of course, what does it look like?
• 1:00:04
  SPEAKER_01: What would you like to get?
• 1:00:05
  SPEAKER_01: How would that add value to your role?
• 1:00:07
  SPEAKER_01: What do you need from me?
• 1:00:08
  SPEAKER_01: Put the work back on them because if they want to do it, they need to find the information, give it back to you, and then you assess if that's relevant and if it will help you in your clinic as well.
• 1:00:17
  SPEAKER_01: But it's showing that you're listening and you care about their career progression because it's so expensive to hire that you don't want to lose retention, it's key with patients, but also with your staff, like trying to keep people this time investment is really worth in in my experience, doing that if you can.
• 1:00:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:00:35
  SPEAKER_00: And on the other side of that, actually, I think what a lot of people struggle with is if they, you know, they hire somebody or they've got a member of their team who perhaps isn't as aligned with their values as they once, you know, as they thought, or issues start cropping up, maybe they're not doing things that the way they should be, or they're late constantly, or you know, little things like that.
• 1:00:57
  SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of people then struggle to address that because they're, you know, I think as medical professionals, you you're you don't necessarily have that kind of manager experience.
• 1:01:09
  SPEAKER_00: And it can be when you especially if you're a small team, you're all kind of you know, you want to be friendly with each other, you will, you know, you get to know each other on a personal level.
• 1:01:16
  SPEAKER_00: So it can then be quite hard to discipline people when it comes to it.
• 1:01:21
  SPEAKER_00: What would you say are your kind of top tips for practitioners going through anything like that?
• 1:01:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's incredibly awkward.
• 1:01:28
  SPEAKER_01: I know, I understand to being there.
• 1:01:30
  SPEAKER_01: So, and even for the you know, practitioners as well, it's a difficult thing to do, it's not easy because you want everyone to get on and you want everyone to enjoy being at work, but it let's be real, like you said, it doesn't always happen.
• 1:01:40
  SPEAKER_01: You're not always going to get that.
• 1:01:42
  SPEAKER_01: I'd say, in my experience, the first thing I do is address it quickly.
• 1:01:47
  SPEAKER_01: It's one of the biggest mistakes that I've seen is when we just give people good faith continuously, and it's a nice thing to do and it's a great value to have, but you can't in a working environment.
• 1:01:58
  SPEAKER_01: So if you start to see something happening, don't just keep giving it the benefit of the doubt, have a conversation.
• 1:02:03
  SPEAKER_01: I think that requires a one-to-one or a meeting with that person and saying what you're noticing.
• 1:02:09
  SPEAKER_01: I've noticed that you've been coming in late the last few occasions.
• 1:02:13
  SPEAKER_01: Is everything okay?
• 1:02:14
  SPEAKER_01: So we don't want to come down a ton of bricks, we want to ask what's going on, and we want to do that in a way that's approachable and give them the chance to explain what might be happening.
• 1:02:22
  SPEAKER_01: And it could be a really valid reason and we try and support them if there is something we can do.
• 1:02:27
  SPEAKER_01: But if there isn't and it continues, let's say you've had the conversation, you've tried to address it and it continues to happen, or there's other problems arising, then again, you need to have a conversation, document everything, would be my advice as well.
• 1:02:40
  SPEAKER_01: From a HR perspective, we don't just want to have nice, friendly conversations.
• 1:02:44
  SPEAKER_01: We want to be recording meetings or having minutes, we can transcribe everything now as well.
• 1:02:49
  SPEAKER_01: Have something documented via email or in a document somewhere in a folder with the staff members, because that, if ever needed, hopefully not, is going to be your evidence.
• 1:02:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's going to be the thing you need that supports you if everything's go anything goes sour in the future.
• 1:03:04
  SPEAKER_01: Likely it wouldn't, but things do happen.
• 1:03:06
  SPEAKER_01: So address in a friendly, approachable way.
• 1:03:09
  SPEAKER_01: If it continues, you need to start stepping up the game of how assertive you are.
• 1:03:14
  SPEAKER_01: This is continuing.
• 1:03:15
  SPEAKER_01: We've already had this conversation.
• 1:03:16
  SPEAKER_01: As you can see from the email I sent you with the minutes on the 4th of July, this has not changed.
• 1:03:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's proving to be a concern and impacting my clinic.
• 1:03:24
  SPEAKER_01: So now we have a bit more of a sterner approach.
• 1:03:27
  SPEAKER_01: We're not just being, is everything okay?
• 1:03:29
  SPEAKER_01: Have things changed.
• 1:03:30
  SPEAKER_01: We talked about this, you know, whatever you can do to see what's going on.
• 1:03:34
  SPEAKER_01: And at this point, if you feel necessary, you might want to give them some sort of warning.
• 1:03:38
  SPEAKER_01: And it doesn't have to be horrible, it can just be if this continues, we're going to have to assess your role or we're going to have to assess your hours.
• 1:03:47
  SPEAKER_01: And we need to make them feel like this is important and it's impacting the clinic, and it's not okay.
• 1:03:52
  SPEAKER_01: Because it's not just what they do and the impact it has on your clinic's performers, it's also what the other team members, if you have other team members, start to think is okay.
• 1:04:00
  SPEAKER_01: And that can cause an ongoing cultural effect where then other people go, Well, that's not fair.
• 1:04:06
  SPEAKER_01: It causes other politics and in the off in the clinics.
• 1:04:09
  SPEAKER_01: So I'd say reproachable, friendly warning, address the situation, minute it, document it, share it with that person, follow it up if it continues, do these things quickly.
• 1:04:20
  SPEAKER_01: So even a week later, if necessary, 10 days later, and then start to come into more warnings and things like that if needed, if things don't improve, or I'm going to have to start asking you to message me or knock on my door when you arrive because it's been ongoing.
• 1:04:36
  SPEAKER_01: So now we're starting to show that you're account showing accountability.
• 1:04:40
  SPEAKER_01: That's some way to just sort of start managing.
• 1:04:42
  SPEAKER_01: Because I think people need to know you're serious, you can't just be their friend.
• 1:04:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I know we we want to be our friends with our colleagues, but you are a clinic owner and you are a practitioner, and it's your business.
• 1:04:52
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what one thing medical professionals and a lot of practitioners feel I think quite difficult to manage.
• 1:04:58
  SPEAKER_01: It's a business as much as you do and you know you enjoy it, as you start to expand, you have to treat it as your business, and that's impacting your business when you get performance issues.
• 1:05:09
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 1:05:10
  SPEAKER_00: That's yeah, very, very good advice.
• 1:05:12
  SPEAKER_00: Now, as we start to wrap up the episode, can you, you know, for a practitioner listening who's, you know, listened to this, and I'm sure they've got loads of great takeaways, and they've realized that they are surviving rather than building, what are the first three things that you would tell them to do this week to actually start to shift things?
• 1:05:29
  SPEAKER_01: Great question.
• 1:05:30
  SPEAKER_01: So I think top three first would be give yourself the chance to look at your tasks that I mentioned.
• 1:05:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's not very time consuming.
• 1:05:38
  SPEAKER_01: Look, even if you just look at your£10 an hour task, which meaning you're what could you delegate?
• 1:05:42
  SPEAKER_01: What are the easy things that you could delegate and someone else could do?
• 1:05:46
  SPEAKER_01: I would recommend you do that first.
• 1:05:48
  SPEAKER_01: And when you've got that, then look at what option, if you need that option, could support you.
• 1:05:53
  SPEAKER_01: We talked about VAs, PAs, or hiring, or even maybe someone in your team that could take on a bit more responsibility.
• 1:05:58
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't always have to be a front of house.
• 1:06:00
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe someone could share the load.
• 1:06:02
  SPEAKER_01: Two would be put in a break.
• 1:06:05
  SPEAKER_01: Look at your diary and give yourself a little bit of white space.
• 1:06:09
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody wants white space in their diary, but sometimes it's a good thing.
• 1:06:12
  SPEAKER_01: Block out a lunch break or an admin break, whatever you want to call in, to catch up for yourself, give yourself a chance to catch up.
• 1:06:19
  SPEAKER_01: So you're not doing everything in sociable hours.
• 1:06:22
  SPEAKER_01: I'd say that would be definitely a good thing.
• 1:06:23
  SPEAKER_01: And do one kind thing.
• 1:06:24
  SPEAKER_01: Just ask yourself the question around what do I need to perform better?
• 1:06:29
  SPEAKER_01: And that's really, really personal to you.
• 1:06:31
  SPEAKER_01: But genuinely look in the mirror and ask yourself, what do I need?
• 1:06:34
  SPEAKER_01: Be honest with yourself.
• 1:06:35
  SPEAKER_01: Because you're only holding yourself back if you're feeling like this.
• 1:06:38
  SPEAKER_01: Do I need an extra hour of sleep?
• 1:06:41
  SPEAKER_01: Do I need to exercise more?
• 1:06:43
  SPEAKER_01: Do I need just someone to share the load with and some more support micro?
• 1:06:49
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever that looks like, be honest with yourself.
• 1:06:52
  SPEAKER_01: Write it down and I'd say if you can, just promise yourself you'll do one thing to move closer to the thing you need when you've got that answer.
• 1:07:01
  SPEAKER_01: Because it is really personal.
• 1:07:03
  SPEAKER_01: So I'd say so.
• 1:07:04
  SPEAKER_01: That helps with a little bit of structure in terms of blocking out time.
• 1:07:08
  SPEAKER_01: It helps with looking at yourself and identifying what support you actually need, where you need what things need to change.
• 1:07:16
  SPEAKER_01: And that the final thing was just something around your list of what you could delegate.
• 1:07:21
  SPEAKER_01: And it may not be admin tasks, maybe something else.
• 1:07:23
  SPEAKER_01: Usually it is admin, but it may be something else where could other practitioners possibly support you?
• 1:07:28
  SPEAKER_01: You don't want to do any more, or you're finding really time consuming, but actually you really want to do some of the more profitable treatments or something you enjoy more.
• 1:07:35
  SPEAKER_01: Let's get gut support.
• 1:07:37
  SPEAKER_01: People are excited to work in your clinics, so maybe we can delegate in another way as well.
• 1:07:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:07:43
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 1:07:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, three things that actually aren't going to be that hard to implement, you know, and maybe do one this week, one the following week, and then one the week after.
• 1:07:53
  SPEAKER_00: And like we said earlier, over time you'll start to see that the difference of just making those small changes really start to pay off.
• 1:07:59
  SPEAKER_00: Last one, if you could go back and give yourself one piece of advice on day one of coming, kind of coming in and building a time clinic clinic, knowing everything that you know now, what would it be?
• 1:08:09
  SPEAKER_01: Gosh, such a good question.
• 1:08:11
  SPEAKER_01: I think it would be like honestly, I think you'd be creating a structure.
• 1:08:17
  SPEAKER_01: So even though that was my background and I obviously support others in that, when you're in your own business, you tend to just start doing.
• 1:08:24
  SPEAKER_01: You start doing things, and that doing tends to snowball, which we've talked about today.
• 1:08:29
  SPEAKER_01: So I think if I could go back, I would have taken the time to just stop and go, this is actually how we want it to go.
• 1:08:37
  SPEAKER_01: Have that planning and slow down a little bit because I think we're all rushing, we're all really desperate to get to a certain point or a certain goal, have a certain thing.
• 1:08:47
  SPEAKER_01: And actually you get to that, and it's never enough because there's always something else that you're achieving, aspire to.
• 1:08:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's good to have that motivation, but maybe just take the time initially to plan ahead and go, actually, what's more important to me is making X amount of revenue so I can pay myself X amount, so I can actually have time off, or whatever that looks like for you, and I'm working out backwards.
• 1:09:10
  SPEAKER_01: And that's one big thing I'd like to tell everyone is just whatever your goal is, whatever situation you're in right now, whether you're just starting out or you're very experienced, is you always have still have a current goal, what you're moving towards.
• 1:09:22
  SPEAKER_01: What is that?
• 1:09:23
  SPEAKER_01: And how do we reverse engineer that?
• 1:09:25
  SPEAKER_01: And that's a really good way that I found works really well now, and I didn't do that at the beginning necessarily, which I would have done, is reverse engineer how do I, I'm here, I want to get there, and this is where I am, and how do I get to that point, build and plan, and planning is underestimated.
• 1:09:40
  SPEAKER_01: Doesn't mean you need to plan to a T every day, but you need to have at least by the end of this month, I've done this or that, and then you before you know it, six months is gone, and you're much closer rather than just being carried away with the noise and the day-to-day stuff, you're actually making intentional, purposeful decisions and actions, and that's when it starts to feel good because you know that you're moving towards something that means something to you.
• 1:10:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that going back, it was much more trying to do a bit of everything because everyone tells you lots of things and you don't know what to trust and what to believe, so you do it all, and and an example of that is we do a lot of print advertising in our local areas, some high-end magazines that go to it's quite a bit of an investment.
• 1:10:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't believe I had to do any ROI, but it worked for our dental clinic, so we just thought we should do it.
• 1:10:30
  SPEAKER_01: We did, you know, put advertising in the local tube station, we did all these different things that we don't do today, but we just did a bit of everything.
• 1:10:37
  SPEAKER_01: And what you realise is do things, do some things really, really well.
• 1:10:41
  SPEAKER_01: Don't do everything all at once and just see what works.
• 1:10:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so that's one definitely one big learning.
• 1:10:48
  SPEAKER_01: Be really purposeful and strategic.
• 1:10:50
  SPEAKER_01: Try it, test it, and then you know, try something else if that doesn't work.
• 1:10:55
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing, such great advice, and yeah, I'm sure that people listening are going to take a lot away from this episode.
• 1:11:03
  SPEAKER_00: You've given, you know, so much great valuable tips and advice to people in so many different areas as well.
• 1:11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Before we wrap up, where can people find you and follow along with what you're doing and learn more about working with you?
• 1:11:16
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely, yes.
• 1:11:17
  SPEAKER_01: So I am on Instagram.
• 1:11:18
  SPEAKER_01: My hands are Yugita Bauer, so at Yugeita Bauer, that's my personal Instagram.
• 1:11:22
  SPEAKER_01: The invisible business partner is www.tivp.co.uk, so that's my mentoring website.
• 1:11:30
  SPEAKER_01: But you can Instagram me.
• 1:11:32
  SPEAKER_01: I'm on LinkedIn as well with my name, so and the website.
• 1:11:35
  SPEAKER_01: So feel free to contact me, even if it's just an informal chat.
• 1:11:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um, there's no you know obligations, it's just discovery call and have a chat.
• 1:11:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I'll always be very honest because as I said earlier, one of our values is very much being about honest.
• 1:11:48
  SPEAKER_01: And if there isn't something I can help but someone else is better placed, I will always recommend my colleagues and people I know.
• 1:11:55
  SPEAKER_01: But if I can, I think it's been really valuable for those that don't have that business support.
• 1:12:01
  SPEAKER_01: And my goal is always with everyone I work with, is to empower, have these tools, gain the knowledge, learn the systems, put these things in place, and then you're free to do.
• 1:12:13
  SPEAKER_01: I don't expect to work with people for years and years and years.
• 1:12:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's very much a short-term mentorship to give you those skills and tools, put help you put them in place in your clinic, because that can be quite hard and a daunting task.
• 1:12:24
  SPEAKER_01: And eventually you can do that on your own because that's a really great place because your clinic is your own, and my job is to help people get that control and understand where the business elements fit and how important they are for that success story, because putting more hours in doesn't always necessarily equate to the success people want, and I just really want to help people achieve that.
• 1:12:46
  SPEAKER_01: So that's how you can find me, and I'd love to talk to anyone.
• 1:12:49
  SPEAKER_01: I hope it's been useful today.
• 1:12:51
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 1:12:51
  SPEAKER_00: No, it certainly has.
• 1:12:52
  SPEAKER_00: So everyone go and check out Yogita.
• 1:12:54
  SPEAKER_00: I will also put all of your details in the show notes as well, so people can go find you easily.
• 1:12:58
  SPEAKER_00: So if you are looking to go and have a conversation with Yogita, just have a look in the show notes below, and you should see exactly where to find her.
• 1:13:05
  SPEAKER_00: But thank you so much for coming on.
• 1:13:07
  SPEAKER_00: This has been, like I say, an amazing conversation.
• 1:13:09
  SPEAKER_00: I've learned, I feel like I've learned so much as well.
• 1:13:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I probably could have sat here and and asked you many more questions and talked to you for hours.
• 1:13:16
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you.
• 1:13:17
  SPEAKER_00: No, thank you.
• 1:13:17
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's been a pleasure, and thank you for having me on.