You're running a business. Act accordingly.

Hey there! This week we're sharing some golden nuggets from my recent conversations with Jerry Durham.

He is a former PT and now the Owner and CEO of the Client Experience Company.

If you haven't encountered Jerry before, he's a former PT and the no-BS voice in healthcare business that calls it like he sees it. Get ready for some straight talk that might just transform how you run your practice.

Jerry pulls no punches when talking about healthcare and business. During our chat, he dropped this truth bomb about practice owners:

“First, there are physical therapists who effectively created billing companies that happen to provide patient care. Second, there are practices that provide physical therapy services and happen to do billing.”

Ouch, right? But he's onto something. This mindset affects everything from how you adopt new tech to how you structure your patient care. Jerry's big on challenging that old-school thinking that "business doesn't belong in healthcare." As he sees it, if you don't understand business basics, you're actually limiting how well you can serve your patients.

Your Front Desk: Secret Weapon or Money Pit?

Jerry sees your front desk as way more than just appointment-setters. According to him, your front desk staff should be wearing three different hats:

1. Sales pros: Turning "Can you help me?" into "I'll be there Tuesday at 2"
2. Customer experience wizards: Making patients feel like VIPs
3. Back office ninjas: Handling the paperwork stuff efficiently

He's obsessed with what he calls the "pre-arrival" process—everything that happens from first phone call until your patient is face-to-face with a clinician. Get this right, and you've set the stage for the whole relationship.

"The better you manage people upstream, the less they cancel downstream."

Jerry's hot take? "Most front desk teams are overstaffed because they got filled with tasks" instead of focusing on what actually creates value. Oof.

Stop Counting Visits and Start Measuring What Matters

Most clinics are obsessed with visit counts. But Jerry says that's looking at the wrong end of the telescope. Here's what he thinks you should be tracking instead:

The Numbers That Actually Matter:

• Lead-to-arrival rate: How many people who call actually show up
• Cancellation rates: How often patients bail on appointments
• Drop-off rates: How many ghost you before finishing treatment
• Plan of care completion rate: Who actually finishes what you prescribe
• Lifetime value: How much revenue each patient relationship generates

Ready for a wake-up call? Jerry shared this bombshell:

"The dirtiest secret in all of physio is only about 30% of people who start a plan of care complete a plan of care."

Yikes! If you're ignoring these metrics, you're missing huge opportunities to improve both outcomes and revenue.

Wait Lists = Lighting Money on Fire 🔥

In a recent live stream on LinkedIn with PT practice owner, Tony Moritato, Jerry didn't hold back about wait lists:

"I think a wait list is a waste of time, energy, and money."

Jerry compares wait lists to "hedging your bets" in a way that guarantees minimal returns. Think about it - you spend all this money advertising how amazing your care is, then when people actually call, you basically say, "Yeah, we're too good and busy to see you now. We'll call you... sometime."

Ditch the Wait List: Try These Instead

Tony shared some seriously smart alternatives:

• Jump on telehealth: Tap therapists who are on leave or working part-time to do virtual evals
• Share helpful content: Give patients exercises or education to start their journey while they wait
• Use RTM platforms: Keep patients engaged digitally until they can come in

OK, So Now What? Try These 5 Things

Ready to shake things up? Here's how to start:

1. Track Your Real Numbers: Block off 2 hours this Friday to set up tracking for your lead-to-arrival rate. Have your front desk log every new patient call and whether they show up for their first visit. After 2 weeks, calculate your conversion rate. If it's below 75%, you've found your first improvement opportunity.
2. Secret Shop Your Practice: Call your clinic Tuesday at 10 AM and again at 4 PM (peak busy times). Ask about starting PT for back pain, and note: How many rings before someone answers? Did they ask about your insurance before your symptoms? Did they offer you a specific appointment time? Score each call out of 10 and share the results with your team.
3. Front Desk Deep Dive: During your next staff meeting, have your front desk team track every task they do for one day in 30-minute blocks. Look for patterns - are they spending more time on paperwork than patient interaction? Identify three tasks that could be automated or eliminated. Common culprits: manually calling insurance companies, double-entering patient info, or playing phone tag for scheduling.
4. Ditch The Wait List Experiment: Pick the easiest win from Tony's list - set up 3 telehealth evaluation slots per week using your part-time staff. Test this for 30 days and track how many wait-listed patients you can convert to active patients. Bonus: measure their satisfaction levels compared to wait-listed patients.
5. Customer Service Safari: Visit your local Ritz-Carlton or Apple Store (or any business known for service). Spend 30 minutes observing how they handle: customer greetings, wait times, problem-solving, and follow-up. Write down three specific practices you could implement in your clinic next week. For example, if they use customer names three times during each interaction, start doing that with your patients.