My husband and I were at a continuing education retreat a few years ago. During the retreat we were challenged to perform a “quiz” of sorts that required communication skills and listening. Most of the other participants weren’t married so we had a distinct advantage since we’ve had to learn to listen to and communicate with each other for years. We breezed through the quiz. At our completion we smugly turned to the instructor bragging of our quick time to completion. He smiled and congratulated us and then said a sentence that I replay in my head over and over. He said, “Be careful…the arrogance can keep you from learning.” I am certain he didn’t mean for this to be a deeply moving statement or even something we’d remember 5 minutes later. Despite this, it was, and we did. It actually has made a huge impact on our practice and how we approach problem solving.

We’ve recently noticed that our quickly expanding offices have had some growing pains and we’ve been forced to examine the heart of our staff practices to find out why. One of the areas we’ve found lacking is in staff education. With new partners and new offices comes new staff. New staff can be invigorating to a practice but training them can also be draining to resources already struggling to keep up with the demands of a busy Optometric office. I decided that one day I’d take a video tour of my office and do some impromptu interviews regarding our services. I only interviewed senior staff to avoid embarrassing a newly hired staff member. I will admit that I entered this task with the same bravado that I entered that contest with my husband years ago. I was fully confident I would view an extremely well educated staff. After all, we always took the time to fully train our staff on all areas of the office, right? One topic I decided to touch on was the MPOD and why we use the technology. Since it has become an important talking point in all of my exams I was certain my staff would have followed suit and could easily spew the reasons we implemented this amazing technology into our offices. 

I started with my lead pre-technician and the simple question: “Why do we do the MPOD test?”

Victory! While at first patting myself on the back for proper training of my employees I am quickly propelled back to the moment my husband and I finished the quiz that revealed our distasteful superior attitudes. Still…my pre-tech did know the answer so perhaps in this case, I really did fully equip my staff with the proper education. I knew I’d have to leave the pre-tech area to really evaluate our training. 

With my phone/video camera in hand I next approached my billing desk. Surely we’ve equipped this department with the importance of all of our testing equipment so that they are fully confident in their ability to answer specific billing questions for our patients. Here is my lead billing specialist answering the same question:

Not good. This girl is smart and articulate and a powerhouse at the billing desk. Yet, she had no answer whatsoever to my question. Moving on. 

Undoubtedly my lead optician/assistant manager would nail this question. She knows everything going on the office. She researches on her own, she reads the trade magazines, and she is a rising star in our office. Here is her answer to the exact same question:

Do you hear my friend’s words as loudly as I do? “The arrogance keeps you from learning.” In this instance, it’s exactly what it did. We trained the pre-techs and may have mentioned it to the rest of the staff but they were sorely prepared for any questions regarding the test. As I sat and watched the videos of the blank expressions from the billing specialties and the optician I wondered how many patients had received that same look and with that look, had lost confidence in the technology we were providing. My staff is fully aware that I am posting their videos and have granted permission. After their initial embarrassment I assured them that the only one with red face should be me. The fact that they cannot answer the questions posed is because I never took the time to train them. I didn’t give them the tools to succeed because I so arrogantly assumed everyone would just pick it up along the way.

My advice is to use the tools provided for you from EyePromise to train your staff. If easy to understand and it is interesting. It has empowered my staff to be able to answer the questions with confidence. Even my pre-techs, who already knew the correct answer, have expanded their knowledge on the subject and are now able to explain the importance to the patient more fully. This is reflected to me with patients who want to discuss the findings when I walk in the room to examine them. Engaged and educated staff=engaged and educated and therefore LOYAL patients. Win, win, win.

Dr. Susan Lake is a native of Nebraska and a graduate of the University of Nebraska. She completed her Doctorate of Optometry from Southern College in Memphis. She is Board Certified in Vision Development and Vision Therapy and has a strong pediatric emphasis to her practice. She speaks frequently to parent and professional groups, sharing with them the importance of early recognition of vision problems. In her spare time she reads and contributes to her own blog discussing being a working Optometrist and Mom at Babyfocals.com. She and her husband share three Optometry practices and three daughters and they can all usually be found on a lake, in a boat and waterskiing.