Many medical offices I see are not clean. Although some people might relax standards for their homes, most agree that of all places, medical facilities should be clean. Patients form impressions of your office–whether consciously or not–before they ever meet you. As the CEO of your optometry business, the cleanliness of your facility needs to be a high priority.
Here are three actions to make sure your optometry business is delivering a pleasant perception:
- Appointing a staff member or doctor – Determine by observation or personality profile who your most detailed clean freak is and put him or her in charge of cleanliness. This person is responsible for evaluating your office with a magnifying lens and reporting to you or your manager when actions need to be taken.
- Hiring a cleaning service – This is a good place to start. There is not a cleaning service in America that will clean like you need your office cleaned. Yes, they will do a good job on the overall cleanliness of the office, but they will not clean base boards and dark corners on their hands and knees. Frankly, it will cost you too much. Hiring a cleaning service is good, but not good enough if you want to leave patients with the best impression possible.
- Observing your facility – Taking five or 10 minutes per week to walk around the office to see what patients observe will change how you manage your team. I sat in the reception room the other day for five minutes and made a list of “first impression” areas that we need to improve on.
The little things are what makes some offices continue to grow exponentially while others are left wondering where all the patients have gone. Cleanliness is one of those important fine details. Patients come into your optometry office with active, observant minds that eventually will give them an overall impression of their visit. Perception is reality.
