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Home » topics » Managing the office
YOUR CAREER

Tick those unpleasant tasks off your to-do list

December 13, 2022 by

Avoiding something unpleasant is the main reason people procrastinate. Try one of these four approaches when you face an unpleasant task: Do it. There’s an adrenaline rush from knowing you’ve completed an unpleasant task. Finishing something you’ve been putting off will energize you for the rest of the day. Don’t do it yet. If you’re not sure what to do, putting off an unpleasant task may be wise. That’s prudent postponement. Perhaps a better approach will surface once you sleep on it. Ditch it. If the task has been hanging over your head for a long time, maybe you don’t really need to do it. Delegate it. Delegation can be a great way to procrastinate less. If you’re someone who feels that you need to do things yourself to get… . . . read more.

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PRODUCTIVITY

5 ways to make standup meetings work for your medical office

November 26, 2022 by

A daily standup meeting can be a highly effective way to keep your staff motivated and moving on important tasks. This 10-minute meeting, used in a variety of workplaces, provides an opportunity for a quick check-in on the day’s priorities. As the name implies, participants stand up—a posture that discourages long discussion. Here are ways to make the meeting work for your medical office Schedule the meeting at the same time and place deal. The start of the shift, after staff arrives and gets settled for work but before the office opens to patients, is one common time to schedule the regular standup meeting. You can use the time to review ongoing projects such as processing claims. You can remind your team of unfinished job from yesterday, such as loading… . . . read more.

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MANAGING STAFF

5 lessons employers can learn from Elon Musk’s Twitter crises

November 26, 2022 by

By Lynne Curry When multi-billionaire and Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk acquired Twitter on Oct. 27, he assumed leadership of a company that hadn’t earned a profit in eight of its ten years, By Nov. 4, eight days later, 1.3 million users had fled Twitter. Revenue dropped dramatically as advertisers, Twitter’s main revenue source, pulled out. One could feel sorry for Musk—except Twitter’s crises resulted in part from Musk’s own “I wing it” actions. His mistakes provide valuable lessons for other employers. Don’t alienate those you most need to survive Musk’s own tweets and heavy-handed actions alienated Twitter’s employees and stakeholders. In his first eight days, Musk fired massive numbers of Twitter’s full-time workforce, throwing remaining employees into survival mode. Remaining employees heard about the mass layoffs but didn’t learn… . . . read more.

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COMPLIANCE

What to do when an employee uses FMLA to cover drinking

November 10, 2022 by

By Lynne Curry Question: We suspect one of our employees of using intermittent FMLA leave to cover her abuse of alcohol. We see a clear pattern. She takes leave two to three Mondays a month. Prior to her requesting FMLA leave, she claimed occasional sick days on Mondays. Other employees have noticed her leaving early on Fridays as well. With this fact pattern and given the rumors now circulating, may we start asking her to bring doctor’s notes each week to justify her need for Monday leave? Answer: While a Monday absence pattern may indicate alcoholism, you can wind up in legal hot water if you ask for weekly doctor’s notes from an employee using intermittent Family Medical Leave. In a landmark case, Oak Harbor Freight Lines v. Antti, the… . . . read more.

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CMS

Reminder: 2023 MIPS self-nomination closes Sept. 1

August 27, 2022 by

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) would like to remind you that the end of the 2023 MIPS Self-Nomination for Qualified Clinical Data Registries (QCDRs) and Qualified Registries is Sept. 1, 2022, at 8 p.m. ET. The Self-Nomination form on the Quality Payment Program (QPP) website will lock at the deadline, and users won’t be able to make additional edits. You need to ensure that your 2023 MIPS Self-Nomination form is complete and then click the Submit for Review button on the QPP website before the deadline. You can only submit the Self-Nomination form for review after all required fields are complete on each tab. Each tab has a vertical progress indicator on the left side of the form that shows your progress. A green checkmark shows you’ve completed the tab,… . . . read more.

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MANAGEMENT

Workplaces slow to get well from COVID-19 damage

August 20, 2022 by

By Lynne Curry You’ve heard that “long-haulers,” individuals with long COVID, suffer persistent COVID-19 symptoms that erode their quality of life. Anyone scanning the workplace soon realizes that some employers suffer from “long COVID”. A few refuse employers treatment, expecting to get well on their own. Three symptoms signal an employer suffers “long COVID”. Difficult to fill vacancies and continual turnover Job openings outnumber available workers by 5.46 million. So many potential employees have left the labor market to become self-employed, or gig and contract workers, that employers with vacancies continue to fight talent wars. Desperate to fill their positions, long hauler employers hire hastily, hoping the “best of the worst” will work out. Some new hires don’t last a day. Others leave without notice within their first four months,… . . . read more.

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RISK MANAGEMENT

What you should know about new COVID-19 guidance

August 20, 2022 by

CDC is streamlining its COVID-19 guidance to help people better understand their risk, how to protect themselves and others, what actions to take if exposed to COVID-19, and what actions to take if they are sick or test positive for the virus. COVID-19 continues to circulate globally, however, with so many tools available to us for reducing COVID-19 severity, there is significantly less risk of severe illness, hospitalization and death compared to earlier in the pandemic. “We’re in a stronger place today as a nation, with more tools—like vaccination, boosters, and treatments—to protect ourselves, and our communities, from severe illness from COVID-19,” said Greta Massetti, PhD, MPH, MMWR author. “We also have a better understanding of how to protect people from being exposed to the virus, like wearing high-quality masks,… . . . read more.

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YOUR CAREER

Recession fears: Here’s how to avoid being laid off & what to do if you are  

August 11, 2022 by

By Lynne Curry After months of talent wars triggered by the great resignation, the job market has again shifted, with business growth slowing and recession fears looming. Despite low unemployment rates, 3.5% nationally,1 over 60 percent of the 750 CEOs surveyed by the business research firm Conference Board expect a recession in the next 12 to 18 months1. Another 15 percent of surveyed CEOs report their region is already in recession.1 Multiple employers that bet large on a post-pandemic boom have transitioned to layoff status. Re/Max slashed 17% of its national workforce. Peloton, Carvana, Ford and Better have each laid off thousands of employees. Walmart, Wells Fargo, 7-Eleven, Shopify, Netflix, and JPMorgan have all cut large numbers of jobs.3, 4 The number of #OpentoWork banners on LinkedIn profiles have hit… . . . read more.

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STAFF TRAINING

14 tips for improving your training content

June 27, 2022 by

You have to make someone responsible for keeping content current. Use titles and not names in your documentation, so you don’t have to update when people leave your firm. Find a quiet time of the year to do an annual review of training content. Be careful with holding onto out-of-date training content. People will find it! Content needs to be accessible from anywhere. You can have fabulous content, but it’s useless if no one is using it. Advertise! If you have an enterprise search tool, why haven’t you indexed your learning content there? People search in different ways. Some look for a search box. Some never see it and look for a menu. It can seem overwhelming, but just pick a pain point and start developing your content! Consider a… . . . read more.

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MANAGING THE OFFICE

4 day workweek: Is it in your future?

June 26, 2022 by

By Lynne Curry If you’re an employee, you’re immediately interested. If you’re an employer, you’re doubtful—yet you keep hearing about this new strategy that might make a significant difference in your company’s ability to survive and thrive. It’s the four-day workweek, though not the compressed 4/10’s workweek that oil patch and similar companies used. Employers adopting this four-day workweek ask each employee to work 8.5 hours four days a week, providing them full salaries for 34 rather than 40 hours weekly. Forty U.S. and Canadian employers are trying out this strategy in a pilot program run by 4 Day Week Global.1 Another 32 U.S. employers have adopted it.2 The concept asks employees to maintain 100% productivity for 100% of their pay while working only 80% of the time. It requires… . . . read more.

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