Taking A Mental Health Moment

 Whether you work in a medical office, retail store, or factory, it really doesn’t matter when it comes to needed that 5 minute breather or what I call “a mental health moment.”  Things do not even have to be hectic or stressed in order to take one of these “mini trips.”  Take for instance today; I was trying to get several insurance contracts taken care of for my physician and if you have never done a physician re-credentialing packet I can assure you that paperwork can be pretty overwhelming with redundancy, and it seems that all of the insurance companies send these out at the same time each year.  It wasn’t like the work was hard, it was just filling out forms with information that the insurance company already had and then copying all of the licenses and documentation that the physician was “legal” and up-to-date with their credentials.  This is just one of those jobs that is tedious, but very necessary.  So, in getting back to my point, after getting the third packet done I just needed to take a step back, close my eyes and take several deep breaths to loosen the knot between my shoulders and get ready to go back to work.  Now I only took 5 minutes at the most, but I felt great after stealing myself away to regroup.  In my office I have pictures of my family and the trips we have taken over the past several years.  So when I take my break I like to just look at some of my pictures and take a quick trip down memory lane, just remembering what was happening when the picture was taken.  This works for me, and I can come back feeling pretty good and pick up where I left off.  We are all different, but if you can find what it is that you can focus on for just a couple of minutes so that you can “escape” from work, some thought that makes you feel good along with a few deep breaths, exhale slowly and then return to reality, this can really help smooth over the rough spots in your day.  Not only will this help you get through your day, but it is healthy for you, as it can reduce your blood pressure.  So remember when you get strained, stressed or stifled, find your happy thought and take a much-needed and deserved “mental health moment” you will find that it will make you a much better employee and coworker.

The link below has some great tips on mental health breaks at work and at home.

Mental Health America; finding balance

Technorati Tags: Mental health at work,happy thoughts at work,stress at work,dealing with bad days at work

Is It Time To Make A Change?

 This past weekend I had the opportunity to lecture in N.Y. to a wonderful group of Podiatric Medical Assistants.  One of my lecture topics was how to be successful in making changes in your life, and understanding why change is so difficult.  Everyone could relate to this topic especially since it is the beginning of the year,when many people make resolutions to change something in their life and the realistic impending failures of not keeping them. My lecture covered the understanding of how our brain works and to be successful with changes we must appeal to our emotional brain and feel good about the change we want to make because if we do not, we will not follow through and make the change.  

What I found very interesting and what I really want to address, is that not only did I lecture about how to make changes to better our life, but two other speakers that day also did (to my surprise).  Each lecture was a different and what was amazing is where one speaker left off the next one picked up.  Now none of us knew what the content of each of these lecture was going to be prior to the conference, which made it even more interesting.  One of the speakers was a few lectures before mine and as she spoke I was wondering if her lecture was going to cover the same content that my lecture was, but it didn’t, it lead right up to where mine would begin, like a springboard for my lecture, it was pretty amazing to me.  The third lecturer was a couple of lectures after mine and his lecture touched a little on both of the previous lectures but then his direction turned to the importance of change to able to fulfill our life desires, love what we do and that we need to really take care of ourselves, understanding that we are valued and in the end we need to be able to live with who we are. 

The last lecturer did not hear the two earlier lectures in the day, so he had no idea of what had been presented prior and the audience also knew that he had not heard the other two lectures and they were amazed that all three lectures were woven together with the theme of “change in our life, how to do it so that we can be happy and lead successful lives.” By the end of the day the attendees were very motivated and inspired and a bit amazed at the fact that these three separate lectures by three different speakers were like one continuous lecture on how to bring about the changes that you would like in your life. 

I would like to thank Paula Hollister, PMAC and Dr. Hal Ornstein for their inspiring lectures that gave our attendees something to really think about and be inspired to do.

The last lecturer, Dr. Hal Ornstein, handed out a card with the poem “The Man In The Glass” on it and I have attached at link to it at the end of this post.  Also if you would like a copy of my lecture outline it is available on our website which is linked below.  Just click on the home page where it has a link to our free e-booklets that are available.  The title is “This Year I Will” and it is based on the book that I have blogged about before by M.J. Ryan. 

“Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending” ~ Maria Robinson

The Man In The Glass (Mirror)

Practical Practice Management

Technorati Tags: practice management,time to change,office management,leadership,practical practice management,self improvement,lectures on change

Don’t Let Rude People Ruin Your Day

It never ceases to amaze me when people are rude in the office or anywhere in public.  I wonder what is going through their mind that they can justify their behavior.  But more so, how can we “the recipients” of this behavior not let it affect us?  All to often we let these situations that happen to us to “stick” with us and bother us all day and night.  We try to figure out why it happened and was there something we could have done to prevent it.  Such as the situation that happened today in my office, a patient was accidentally scheduled for yesterday, which was a holiday.  The patient was called yesterday morning and was told of the mistake, we apologized and gave her an appointment for today at 11:00.  She called us this morning and asked for a later appointment due to a service for a friend, so we told her to come in at 4:15 and we would work her in, as our schedule was full.  When the patient arrived we were running about 1/2 hour behind, not the norm for our office, but it does happen.  The patient was roomed around 4:45, and at 5:00 our front door flies open and in walks the patient’s husband yelling at our front desk person “where is my wife who had a 4:15 appointment?”  I looked up and this man had the meanest look on his face, if I didn’t know him, I would have been frightened and I think my front office person was in shock.  I told him that we were running behind and she was next to be seen.  He proceeded to yell and tell me that our office made a mistake and this was our fault, rambling on and shaking in his anger.  I replied “yes you are correct we made a mistake, but were willing to get her in today”.  I did not even mention that they had changed the appointment from this morning to this afternoon as it would not have mattered.  Once I agreed with him and told him that his wife was next, in a very calm manner, he just looked at me and I smiled.  He turned and walked out the door, and we all just looked at each other wondering “what was that all about?”  We will probably never really know what was going on with this man for him to react to us in this manner.  The interesting thing is his wife was okay, not happy, but okay that she had to wait, go figure.   The important thing is that we need to be able to handle these situations knowing that maybe we triggered the behavior, maybe not, but let it go once it is over.  This is easier said than done sometimes.  Tomorrow is a new day and when I think about it, people who behave like this in the office are the 1% and I think we should be able handle that.

http://www.ehow.com/how_2112304_deal-rude-customers.html

Calculating What Your Time Is Really Worth

Have you ever really evaluated what your time is worth in dollars and cents?  You may be quite surprised if you do.  It is a fact that many business owners do daily routine tasks that their employees would happily do and do them well, but they just cannot give them up for some reason or another.  These simple tasks could be costing more in time than what it is worth.  Taking the time to evaluate what you do, how much time it takes, and whether you can have an employee do the task for less is important for business owners to do. Having checks and balances in place to oversee certain tasks that you delegate to your staff is important, but carrying them out can be done by someone other than you.  When you figure out how much your time is really worth, you start to see things a bit differently and your time becomes more valuable.  Take for instance, you have a large yard that needs mowing each week and this tasks takes 2-3 hours total time to finish, and you have calculated your time to be worth $50 an hour, wouldn’t be wiser to hire someone to do this job for you?  It is actually costing you $400-600 a month in time.  Another interesting thing that happens when you figure out how much your time is worth per hour is that you begin to structure what you do and how you do it in a more efficient way.  Take e-mail versus a phone call, you can shoot out a quick e-mail in seconds and if you picked up the phone to talk to someone it could turn into minutes.  Or when you get in your car to head out you will start to think about everything you need to do while you are out, the best route to take, how much time you will spend doing it.  No one really wants to waste time and how we look at it will determine a lot about what we do with it.  There is one factor about time that is important to keep in mind and that is not one of us knows how much we have been given, so make the best of it no matter how you do it.  It really is valuable.

How To Price Your Time

Avoid Burnout With A Healthy Work Life

I read a very good article, which I have attached below for your reading, by Martha Beck for the “O Magazine” titled “10 life lessons you should unlearn.”  It caught my eye because I am always on the look out for information on health, happiness and the pursuit of life and this title seemed to fit.  I was right it was a great article with lots of pearls of practical wisdom that almost everyone could benefit from.  All 10 lessons were very important but the one that I really liked was “it is important to stay happy.”  It is so true that most of the time we can find all kinds of things that we are unhappy about, but we do not take enough time to look at how happy we really are.  Everyday things come our way that can throw us into a well of unhappiness and we allow ourselves to drowned in the well instead of climbing out and looking around at what is good today and why we can be happy.  Reflection on happiness is a good thing to do and making it part of our daily life either in the morning or evening can change our outlook for tomorrow.  Taking our “happy thoughts” a step further could be to carry or put a picture up in your office of something that reminds you of what makes you happy, for me it is pictures of my family and when I am down in the well, I can just look at them and it brings a smile to my face and a reminder of what is good in my life.  When I am happy and smiling at work I can make a big difference in the lives of those I work with and those I serve.

“Being happy doesn’t mean that everything is perfect.  It means that you’ve decided to look beyond the imperfections”  ~Unknown   

http://www.oprah.com/spirit/10-Life-Lessons-You-Should-Unlearn-Martha-Beck-Life-Coach-Advice_1

Betrayal In The Workplace

When you take a job, you usually feel like you are there to do what you are being paid to do, which is correct.  But as relationships develop with coworkers many times “not so nice” things can happen, especially when one employee is being looked at as a better worker than another by management, or there are personality conflicts.  There are many reasons why workplace conflict arises, but in many cases it brings betrayal of trust along with it. Betrayal is a tough thing to get over no matter what the situation is.  Working with someone who betrayed your trust is extremely difficult to work through and to remain employed. The parties involved need come to the realization that “as long as we live on this earth with humans we are going to have trust broken”.  Hurt has to be worked through and that will take time, open communication and the willingness by all parties involved to move forward.  Easier said than done.  Trust takes time to be rebuilt, if at all.   The betrayer needs to understand that even though the betrayed may have forgiven them or are being willing to move forward, they have not forgotten what has transpired.  Betrayal comes in three types: unintentional, premeditated, and opportunistic.  Rarely is the relationship the same depending upon what type of betrayal has taken place.  The link below has some good information on how to handle workplace betrayal and realistic expectations.

Betrayal in the workplace

Management Qualities….Lead Like A Dragon

I subscribe to a blog called Management Craft, which always has great posts about business management and related topics.  I recently came across a  post that was about the attributes of dragons and relating them to personal leadership.  Since it is Chinese New Year today, and the beginning of “the year of the dragon” I felt it most appropriate to make it the topic of today’s blog.  The post was short, sweet but to the point and I found it quite interesting and have posted the link below.   The author points out that “Dragons are proactive and protective” and relates it to leaders stating that they need to do whatever it takes to help and support others and to ensure alignment in the workplace.  I totally agree with this philosophy of management leadership, if there is something that is out of alignment in the office as management staff we need to sift through the issues, find out what the problem is and fix it in order for the practice to continue running smoothly and efficiently.  I have talked to people who work in offices where the alignment was off and nothing was being done to fix it and the office environment eventually became pretty toxic as a result. 

Think about when your car tires are out of alignment, when you drive it shimmies, shakes and heads to one side of the road instead of being “centered and smooth”, which is how you want your office to be running.  Staff members take notice when office management supports them and they are more willing to bring issues up quicker knowing that they will be resolved.  When office management sweeps issues under the carpet hoping they will go away or resolve on their own, staff members become distraught, distracted and disappointed in their managers and work culture environment, which only leads to further problems. 

Are you a dragon? What dragon attributes can you bring to your office to make it a better place to work?  Leave us a comment we would appreciate hearing what you have to say.

Reference article: http://www.managementcraft.com/2010/11/your-dragon-within.html

Give Yourself A Time Out

Lately is seems that there just is not enough time to get everything done each day.  At work we are implementing a new software, which has taken more of my time that I had imagined.  When I get home there are 101 things that I need and want to do, but before I can get to half of them its time for bed.  The other night I allowed myself to watch a couple of television programs, which I rarely do, and I felt guilty the next day because I should have been doing other things that I needed to do instead of letting myself “veg-out” a little by just watching something that did not require thinking or effort, sound familiar to you?  We have such busy schedules trying to fit in work, family, relationships, daily chores, exercise, etc., that we are like a pin-ball in the machine that bounces from one point to another back-and-forth and when it tries to land at the bottom for rest, it gets hit right back up into the game bouncing around again, and we become exhausted.  As I was thinking about this vicious circle and what to do about it, I began to think about when my children were small and they would be so tired but did not want to stop and they would then become cranky and start whining, they were beside themselves because they were so exhausted.  So, what did Ido?  It was time for them to have a “time out.”  I would gather them up and have them lay down on their bed for 10 minutes, and guess what?  More times than not they fell asleep or they would just look at a book or play with a toy alone quietly.  They needed the time out just to “veg-out” from all of the stimuli of the day. 

When you think about it time outs would be a good thing for us busy adults to put in our “to do” schedule.  It is healthy to give yourself time alone just to think, read, write or whatever you need to do to escape for a little while even if it is just a couple of hours a week.  Once you schedule it start thinking about what it is you are going to do and before you know it you will be looking forward for the time to come.   

For further reading the link below has some good tips on how make your “time out” 

How to give yourself more time

Self-Evaluation A Key To Being A Better Manager

Self-evaluation is the key to becoming a better office manager, this is not always an easy thing to do because at times we are “so deep in the forest we cannot see the trees.”  You can start by watching and listening to your staff members that answer directly to you, how do they react to you when you are interacting with them?  Are they comfortable?  Do they smile at you? Ask yourself what type of relationship do I have with my staff members, what do you know about them and do you really care?  Evaluate yourself throughout the day asking “would I like to be managed by me?”  Being an office manager can be very difficult as our staff may think that we can make decisions about work issues on the spot and we cannot.  We not only have to work with our staff members closely but we have to answer to and work closely with our employers.  Many times we get tossed back and forth between the two and it can be quite a challenge.  We need to make sure that when we say we are going to do something for a staff member that we do it, there is nothing that can sour relationships quicker than not holding up to commitments and promised made.  Make sure that they know you “have their back” and are watching out for them and will stand up for them whenever necessary.  Communication is the key to keeping your relationships growing in a positive way.  As much as staff meetings can be non-productive, they can be productive when you keep them short and to the point, but allowing everyone to participate.  Another good point for staff meetings is it is a time when everyone is together, facing each other and connecting as a team, this is hard to do unless you have a designated time for it.  Managing a team of people is an ongoing learning experience, I do not believe you can ever know how to do it perfectly, as people change and grow and so must we. 

 

http://www.compensationcafe.com/2009/07/building-trust-during-the-repression.html

The First Line You Deliver Sets The Tone

Have you ever really thought about how you sound to others, especially your customers?  It is the tone of our voice that sets stage for those we are encountering.  Just think about when you have encountered an employee at either a store, restaurant, or office, who you could tell was either having a bad day, or just didn’t seem to care how they came across when encountering you, their customer.  I know for myself, there have been times that I was really busy, or dealing with other problems in the office when I needed to stop and either answer a phone call from a customer or encounter a customer face-to-face and I was just a bit off from being as pleasant as I normally would be and I could tell the customer was a bit put off by my less than cheerier welcome. 

From past experience, I have learned to take that extra second (maybe two) to gather myself together and re-focus before saying “hello” or “how are you doing.”   It is my encounter with our customers that can make the difference as to whether they stay our customers or leave.  If they stay, the chances are that they will refer others to our business, and if they leave it is a for sure thing that they will tell others why they should not come to our business.  Studies show that a person who likes a place of business will tell about 2-3 people about it as a good reference and if they have received bad service they will probably tell about 10 people not to come to your business and why.  So you can see from these facts that it is very important how you set the tone from the beginning of your encounter and how you treat your customers overall, everytime.

A good thought to have each time you are about to encounter a customer is “The first line I deliver sets the tone, mine is friendly and helpful.”  You cannot go wrong when that is your primary goal with your customers.

“Choose to deliver amazing service to your customers. You’ll stand out because they don’t get it anywhere else.” -Kevin Stirtz

Great Customer Service Rules