Becoming the Ultimate Multi-Tasker: Advice for New Corporate OD Moms

It’s hard enough being a new mom and becoming responsible for an entire human being, now you have to juggle that with your career too? We’ve all heard of those “unicorn moms” who manage to have a great career and spend quality time with their children. But the truth is: they’re not that rare. While it is a bit of a balancing act, with the right planning you can also become a super mom. We’re here to share a little advice for new working mothers.

Going on Maternity Leave

Once you’re on maternity leave, it’s time for you to focus on pampering yourself and preparing for the new baby. You don’t need to be available for work calls and emails 24/7. Check them occasionally when you feel like it, but spend the rest of the time doing whatever you feel like.

Going Back to Work

New working moms tend to “freak out” because they’re new to being a parent and they need to start working again after being on leave for a few months. The key is to not be too hard on yourself.

Stay Calm

It’s okay to feel a little overwhelmed sometimes, but don’t let it get to your head. Just take a step back, give yourself time to refocus and get back up again.

Stick to a Schedule

You will temporarily have to give up some of your extra-curriculars and doing more than normal and focus on giving time to your child and getting used to being back at work.

This will mean that both parents will have to share responsibilities. Divide tasks such as who picks and drops the baby to and from the day care, who is in charge of dressing the baby in the morning and so on. Babies tend to wake up multiple times in the middle of the night so make sure you divide that to make sure both of you get some sleep.

Nursing the Baby

The choice is yours whether you’re breast-feeding, pumping or weaning the baby to get used to formula. Whatever you feel comfortable with is also likely to be the best option for your baby. You can even choose a combination of feeding methods if that’s what makes you happy. At the end of the day, if you’re happy, so is your baby.

It’s also important to see what fits your work schedule and how you intend to follow the feeding schedule during work hours.

Postpartum Problems Are Real

New moms may feel disoriented or experience postpartum depression, and it’s perfectly natural. Your entire life including your body has undergone a major change! Even just giving yourself some time to get used to all the changes can help you get back to feeling okay again.

Super Moms Let’s Get into Formation!

New corporate moms have a lot to take care of, but just stay calm, hang in there and overtime you’ll settle into your roles as a parent and as a career woman.

3 Ways to Ensure Patient Loyalty in Corporate Optometry.

Corporate optometry offices are successful in many ways on of them being by retaining customers. As a doctor, it is your job to ensure that patients return to your practice. You need to be their first choice every time they need a medical complaint addressed. Here are the 3 points in service where you can engage their attention and maintain patient loyalty:

1. Educate the Patient

Eye check-ups are not just a one-time thing. Regardless of whether your patients have serious eye injuries, wear glasses or have 20-20 vision, at some point in time, annual eye exams become essential. It’s up to you to explain to your patients, the necessity of this yearly exam. For the elderly, it is a way of combating early signs of eye diseases.

2. Stay in Touch

You don’t just need to educate your patients while they’re at your clinic. A phone call or a text message can alert your patients when they’re due for an eye test. They can instantly confirm their appointment. Use this communication throughout the year to promote your personal brand. Social media is a great tool to create brand awareness and present an authentic view of your practice to create patient loyalty.

Send monthly newsletters about your practice and valuable information about eye health. Personalizing emails to target a certain patient population can help create loyalty in corporate optometry. Using your ehr information to target dry eye patients and notify them of new technology in your office is a great way to impress patients and keep them loyal in your corporate setting.

3. Marketing is Key

It’s one thing to reach out to patients who you know will come back, but how do you reach out to those who never respond, or those who haven’t been to your clinic at all?

A great way is to spread the word about a promotional offer. Team up with your store manager to see what promotions can be created to help re activate patients to your practice and boost optical sales. Patients that purchase from the optical will continue to be loyal to your practice.

Newsletters, social media platforms (such as Facebook and Instagram), mass emails and automated phone calls can help spread the message about your new promotional offers.

A monthly newsletter can be circulated online with new information about research in the world of optometry. Articles by renowned doctors can also be shared. As long as you’re putting out consistent and relevant content, you’re on the right track. Personal branding is very important with patient loyalty, create a campaign that illustrates how you are different than other practitioners .

Stay Updated

Whatever your ways of keeping in touch with the patients, ensure that you keep up with your patients’ demands. Patient surveys and interviews can help you identify what sort of service patients seek and then you can provide it to ensure that your patients return to your office.

How to Stand Out from Other Optometrists

The optometry world is changing dramatically, especially with the increase in competitors. It is essential for practitioners to find new and unique ways of growing their practice and setting themselves apart from other providers.

Like any other small business owners, an OD has to be liked and respected by their customers. If you are an independent OD who is looking to give yourself an edge, here are some simple tips to consider for standing out from the crowd:

Use the Power of Technology

This might come as a surprise to you but most patients are impressed and amazed more by the advanced instrumentation that an OD has set up in their exam room more than the OD themselves. They consider all optometrists to have the same level of skill and expertise. Therefore, a good way to differentiate you is by using the power of technology.

Tools like retinal camera allow you to impress the patients, provide them with premium-quality care and give a boost to your revenue at the same time! This kind of technology doesn’t only let you stand out but also allows you to get faster, efficient, and more error-free results.

Communication is the Key

While advertising your practice, always remember, communication is the key. You really want to communicate with your patients and make them understand the work you do. Get the right message across; use pictures to illustrate the value of your practice, be transparent about the hours you are willing to accommodate to your patients. Make sure that your advertisement is catchy enough to grab the attention of a potential customer.

Even the most ideal location won’t do you any good if you fail to get your point across to your prospective patients.

Customer Satisfaction

Have you heard that in the business world a customer is always right? Same goes for your optometry practice. You need to hire staff that is friendly and considerate of the patients. As an optometrist, you should be very easy to talk to. Patients never like to be rushed, especially when the matter is about their eyes. Try to ease the patients into a conversation. Ask them how they are doing and make them feel as comfortable as possible.

The most important thing you can do to satisfy your patients is to listen to them and their needs carefully. Provide them with all the possible, safe options and treatments available to them and answer as many questions of theirs as possible.

Give Suggestions

Give suggestions where required. This practice will not only make your patients feel that you are going the extra mile to provide them the best service but will also be beneficial to your revenue. Moreover, this conversation won’t take up much of your time so it’s a win-win solution!

Use the above tips to grow your practice and stand out from other optometrists in your community!

What Good Leadership looks like in Corporate Optometry.

While being a leader comes naturally to some people, for others it’s not that easy. 71% of companies don’t feel like their leaders have the ability to help their organization reach new heights. So what are the traits that distinguish a manager from a leader who has the ability to influence the people around them and engage the ODs?

1. Be Passionate

You can’t fake your interest in your work. Global legends like Steve Jobs and Jeff Bezos didn’t amass corporate empires because they liked their work. In order to take your company’s name to the top, you have to be willing to stick with it through the tough times. Leaders are passionate about their jobs that they know different aspects of the business and are willing to continue to learn.

2. Communicate

People in leadership positions tend to talk more but not listen to their team enough. Communication is a two-way road. Listening to your team’s ideas, providing constructive feedback and allowing them to express their creativity is essential. Give the people around you the comfort that you’re always available to help. Good leaders in corporate optometry listen to their ODs. Decisions are based on best interest of the ODs and their patients.

3. Be Ready to Make Decisions

Leaders may display hesitation when making decisions, especially if there are risks involved. But that’s what makes a true leader: the ability to make a decision, no matter how high the stakes are. Corporate Optometry leaders should not be afraid to question the norm or do something different.

Indecisiveness leads to endless discussions and by the time your company implements that decision, your competition may already be ten steps ahead. This can affect Corporate OD subleases.

4. Empower Your ODs

Gone are the days when companies followed a hierarchal structure and employees not at the top followed orders blindly. It’s okay if your team occasionally colors outside the lines. Empowering your ODs will strengthen their sense of loyalty towards the company and help them perform above and beyond what is required of them. ODs should be empowered to explore their strengths and be able to openly discuss issues that need to be addressed.

5. Be Charismatic

Be the leader in corporate optometry that aspire ODs to grow and to become successful over their career. With your words alone you can move mountains and take your organization to the top of the ladder. After hearing you speak, your employees should be motivated to take initiative and think of ways to deliver more than just what will keep the company stable.

6. Be Competent

It’s not enough to know the basic skills of your job. Those technical skills need to be combined with the right people skills to make you an inspiring leader. Be the leader your organization will remember for a lifetime by understanding every aspect of the company. Know how to get the best out of every OD and make the cogs of your company run faster and rust-free. Understanding the optometric side of the business to help sublease and employed ODs is very important, being a leader many ODs look to that person in that role to mentor them and guide them to personal growth and career advancement.

7. Be Accountable

Being a corporate leader won’t always be smooth sailing. In fact, after having spent a few years in the industry, you’ve probably dealt with your fair share of disasters and failed concepts.

Rather than ignoring them, it’s important to learn from them and make sure they don’t happen again.

If you were the one in charge, don’t thwart responsibility. Take the failure head-on and be a role model for your team. Show them how well you handle the failure and how you use it to push even harder towards success. Blaming others and not following up with solutions didn’t make you a leader just because you have a title.

Being a leader doesn’t mean keeping an organization stable. Stability means stagnancy which will eventually make you obsolete. The aim is to constantly aim to reach new heights. Leaders in corporate optometry have the trust of the ODs.