Mitch’s Blog

(originally published April 24th, 2005)

My wife went away for a conference this weekend; she left Thursday afternoon, and won’t be back until late Sunday evening.

One would think that, as a grown man, I would treat this time as if it were any other day. However, we have no children, I work for myself, and so I was free to do a few things I probably wouldn’t have done with her home, including eating some things I normally wouldn’t have had the opportunity to eat.

Why am I telling on myself like this? To prove a point, and to relate it to working with employees, who among us hasn’t felt like a great weight hasn’t been lifted off us at work when the person we report to isn’t there? Sometimes you treat it as a usual occurrence, but other times you’ll take that opportunity to do, or not do, something that you might not have done if that person was around. Sometimes you produce better work if you’ve been feeling pressure, sometimes you don’t work because you don’t have anything expected of you for that day; or so you feel.

As with everything else, if there are plans and expectations it’s harder to deviate from the norm. The plans don’t have to be all that rigid; for instance, if my wife had left and there was food I didn’t have to take a lot of time to prepare, I might have stayed home and cooked for myself; maybe not. At work, if you know you’re not going to be around, no matter how good your employees are, you need to make sure to set the goal and duties and standards you want to see from them when you get back.

Either that, or just know that your time off is your employees time off, and deal with it when you get back to the office, whenever that is.

(originally published April 25th, 2005)

My wife went to a conference this weekend, and because of circumstances she ended up taking the train. When we had looked it up online, it said that the trip should take 5 1/2 hours to NYC each way. However, it seems that the rail system has periods of construction, just like the highway system, where they’re doing construction, and they don’t have to announce it ahead of time. So, on the way down, the trip took 6 1/2 hours, after arriving here over an hour late. On the way back, the trip took her 8 1/2 hours on its own. Both ways, when she departed, there were no apologies, no courtesy services, no nothing; just goodbye.

Two years ago, I flew back and forth to Dallas for a consulting assignment for three weeks. Out of all those trips. only one of them was on time, and that was my first day, when I’d actually given up a seat and earned a free flight for anytime within a year and took a later flight. In each of those cases, the pilots apologized for the flights not being on time, but how many times can one be apologized to before someone decides it’s time to work on a solution so there doesn’t have to be so many apologies? Just to be fair, one of those times the flight was late was due to bad weather.

Last year my mother had a visit from her cousin, who took the bus from NYC to Rochester. The trip ended up taking two hours longer than advertised, and Mom’s cousin wasn’t happy at all. She said there were no long stops at all, just a miscalculation of how long the trip was supposed to take. And there was no one around to apologize for the length of the trip either; it was as if it was business as usual.

On the news there’s all this talk about companies such as these not making profits, with some entities threatening going out of business or raising prices. From a personal business perspective, why would I willingly wish to continue my associations on a regular basis if I knew I was going to lose money because of something out of my control? That talks to the train and bus issue; I’d be pretty much over a barrel if I had to fly somewhere, because the other options would take much longer, including driving by myself (has anyone ever made that NY to Vegas trip driving?).

Just asking, but if these particular types of service companies could tighten up their customer service a bit, as well as figure out a way to become more reliable with their times (forgiving weather circumstances), does anyone not believe that they might start attracting more regular customers?

(originally published April 21st, 2005)

Early this morning, I had to take my wife to the emergency room. The process that had to be performed eventually worked, and she was fine. However, having to go through such a process as the family member as opposed to being a patient or working in the emergency room is a terrible position to be in.

Though time gets away from you, and minutes can seem like hours, it’s hard to keep your composure when your loved one is going through any kind of distress. Now, because I’m like I am, I know precisely the time that my wife had to go through each stage of the process, and in her case it was hours a couple of times. When we got to the emergency room, it was 10 minutes before she was seen by triage. It was 5 minutes after that when she was seen by the registration person. It was 10 minutes after that before she was finally called back to a patient room.

It was another hour and forty minutes before a physician finally came to see her. This is the hospital my wife works for, so this proves that employees do not step to the front of the line. During this initial period, I had to fight my frustrations that no one had come to see her. As an assistant supervisor of emergency room at this same facility about 17 years earlier, and having been over other registration personnel at other facilities, you learn that during the evening emergency rooms usually have less personnel on hand. And those personnel will see patients based on criteria rather than first come, first serve, which is true during the day also, but seems to be magnified at times when it’s in the evening because there’s fewer physicians on hand also.

Knowing this doesn’t make the process any less stressful for the family member or the patient, for whom distress seems to intensify 10 times over based on time. Me being me, I tried to help kill the time by reading to my wife and telling her a few jokes, trying to keep her talking to she wouldn’t notice the time all that much, which was hard since the clock was directly in front of her. And when the physician finally did show, and that ended up producing a series of adventures during the rest of our time there, I treated him, and the specialist who eventually had to come in, with courtesy as well, just glad both were trying their best to alleviate the worries and affliction my wife was going through.

When it comes to healthcare, customer service needs to be a two-way street. Family members need to realize that often there are other patients whose needs may be more critical than the needs of their loved ones. They also need to realize the stress physicians can be under in emergency situations. Healthcare personnel, on the other hand, need to be vigilant themselves as to the needs of their patients and their family members. Whereas I was trying to keep my wife’s mind off her difficulties as much as possible, during that hour and 40 minutes the nurse only came to the room once to see how she was doing; I’m thinking that wasn’t the best customer service in the world. Still, everything ended up fine in the long run, and that was the most important thing in the world.

(originally published February 27th, 2006)

Over the past few days I’ve had a few friends who’ve had epiphanies in their lives. The odd thing about each of them is that I knew what was coming, and felt that I could have told each person what was going on, but didn’t think they’d listen to me.

I wrote once before about listening to one’s intuition, and this is another case of the same thing. In each of these circumstances, when I started to talk to the person about their issue, each one indicated that they had a feeling something was going on, but didn’t want to address it and hoped it would go away. But really, how often do issues just go away because you try to ignore it? How many health issues actually go away because you decide not to deal with it? How many problems around your house go away because you decide not to deal with it?

If you’re a manager, you can’t afford to just let things go when you have a feeling that something may be off. Not only could it be detrimental to the organization, but it could end up costing you your job. Because, at some point, someone isn’t going to ignore and hope something goes away; they’re going to make something go away.

(originally published March 13th, 2005)

Hospitals in today’s world are not doing well financially. As much as most people think hospitals are bringing in money hand over fist, and they think the same about doctors, but it’s not the truth.

Thing is, a big part of why both entities aren’t doing well financially is our fault; rather, the fault of the patients. Most denials of payment have to do with bad information obtained from the patients themselves. It can be almost anything; bad address, bad date of birth, one bad digit in a contract or social security number, insurance that’s been changed or denied or delayed, wrong guarantor,…

Any number of things give insurance companies a reason not to pay a claim, and delayed claims can stretch out into months and years without being paid. Unpaid claims means cash runs low. Cash running low means prices go up, so that those claims that are paid help keep just enough cash coming in.

This is just a short lesson. I’ll admit that I’m one of those people who hates being asked those same questions over and over whenever I go to see a physician about anything. Now, you know one of the reasons why it must occur.

(originally published March 30th, 2005)

Earlier this evening I wrote my healthcare newsletter on the reasons for showing some compassion when people call up to talk about their hospital bills or physician bills. I stressed that, because healthcare is different than retail in that most people don’t come to us willingly, we need to try to understand the side of patients and their family members, especially when something critical may have occurred, when they call up and are upset about their hospital bill.

Insurance companies have it all wrong. They think that because many people have insurance, and because they’ve been given a book of their benefits, that they fully understand their coverages and how billing works. Well, I’m here to tell you, the initiated, what you already know; most of you don’t understand the process at all. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to explain to people what deductible or co-pay means. I can’t believe how many times I’ve talked to people and had to explain to them that they’re supposed to get authorizations for some services from their primary physician, or what that even means.

Here’s my thoughts on this, and it’s for those who aren’t in healthcare, who need to call because of a billing issue:

One, it doesn’t pay to be mad up front with the first person you talk to, because they’re not the ones who created the bill.

Two, if you don’t understand how it all works, start off by asking questions rather than being accusatory. Even though many healthcare facilities try to train their staffs on how to talk to upset people on the phone, they’re human also, and will be ready to defend themselves, even if that’s not what’s called for.

Three, if you don’t understand the answers, ask the question again, or explain which part of the explanation you don’t understand; sometimes, professional people in any industry get so caught up in their own jargon and terminology that they forget that not everyone understands it.

And four, if all else fails, don’t get mad, just ask to move up the line to the supervisor. And I mean the supervisor; jumping to the director doesn’t always serve you because, in some cases, they don’t work medical claims all the time, so they may not be able to fully satisfy your question, and jumping to the CEO level will just delay satisfaction because, trust me, they don’t know how the process works either.

Healthcare is like most other businesses that have customer service people; most of the people really are trying to help you and satisfy your question. Give people a chance to help you.

(originally published July 28th, 2005)

I love taking surveys. For some reason, I get a rush out of being asked my opinion on things and then giving it. Maybe it’s because, most of the time, I go out of my way when it comes to giving my opinion on how some of my friends live their life when I’m asked.

Anyway, one of the ads that I saw pop up on my page was a survey company saying you could make big money by taking surveys. If you go to the page, you read all this copy that tells you how you can make big money by taking surveys, sometimes as much as $150 an hour. I mean, it sounds intriguing, doesn’t it, being able to sit at home, take surveys, make as much money as you feel like and work whenever you want to, right?

Well, if it’s such a lucrative business, why do you have to pay these people $34.95 for the right to do it? How many jobs do you have where you actually have to pay someone else money in order to work for, or with, them? I do remember back in the early 80’s where, sometimes, you had to pay the employment company if they found you a permanent job, but those days are long gone.

I’m not saying this is a scam, but there is a point to this conversation. There are times when something of possible value smacks of ludicrous because something just doesn’t sound right. Kind of like all the flyers you see on poles telling you how much money you can make by sending out letters just by calling ‘this number’. If the gig was so great, why does someone have to go around posting pieces of paper on poles? Or what about those things on TV that cook meals, and they tell you if you buy now they’ll throw in, ‘absolutely free’, some gadget that probably cost them 50 cents to make? Do you really believe you didn’t pay for that in the $300 dollars you just paid for this item you’re only going to use once or twice, then relegate it to your next garage sale?

In your business whether you’re a business owner, or a manager of a department, do you constantly promise things that you can’t deliver on? Do you make it sound so enticing that the person would feel like a fool not to sign up for it, but not allow them time to think about it because you know they’ll figure out just how stupid what you’ve told them is? Do you really believe that’s good business practice or sense, or that it won’t impact, in some way, what will happen down the line? Or do you care?

I’ll answer that last one with this little story. Back in college I worked in what we called the rec center; it was a combination bowling alley and pool hall. It only had 8 lanes, but we maintained them and they were pretty nice. One night, this guy comes in with his girlfriend and says he wants to bowl. I told him all the lanes were taken, but one would free up in maybe 10 or 15 minutes. He got belligerant, and I knew he was acting out for his girlfriend; maybe it was a relatively new relationship. I took a sheet and tore it off the pad, gave it to him, and told him to go up to the second floor, where we had our second set of lanes, and tell the guy up there that I sent him, and he could also get his shoes up there. With that, the guy was satisfied, and left. Of course there was no second set of lanes, and I never saw this guy or his girlfriend again.

In his case, he had promised his girlfriend a bill of goods he couldn’t deliver, and ended up with egg on his face. In my case, I had solved an immediate problem, would have been prepared to deal with him had he come back, and didn’t care one way or another if he did because I was willing to make happen for him what he wanted, without having the means to do so. He took the risk and lost; I might have lost if I was worried about losing his business, but I wasn’t.

We don’t always need every person’s business; we do, however, want to continue getting business from those people we do want business for. And we want to keep a good reputation by delivering on promises we may make when we’re working in business with others, or for others. Sometimes, those memories will last a very long time.

(originally published September 5th, 2005)

I guess it’s my turn to talk a little bit about the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Over the past week there’s been lots of talk about the destruction of this thing, and the devastation it’s left. There’s been talk about the slow response from the federal government, the looting, the possible racism, etc. In essence, there’s been lots of blame going around, and I really can’t decipher what’s right or wrong or accurate. I do know two things, though.

The first thing I know is that this has been a terrible story that’s taken on an interesting life of its own. Many are equating it to what occurred on September 11, 2001, in NYC, and I think that’s unfair because one was manmade and deliberate, the other of natural causes, and one can’t take motivation out of the equation. The overall coverage hasn’t been quite fair either, not because New Orleans isn’t important, but there are many other areas that have been devastated by this hurricane, in other states. Last night, a friend shared pictures of the destruction of the house of a friend of his in Biloxi, Mississippi, totally destroyed, as shown below:

The second is that the local powers that be have known for many, many years that the levees weren’t all that stable, and that with one big hit the city could be flooded, yet have done nothing about it. I did hear that they blamed the current government for turning down extra funding to shore the levees up, but that only holds water if you believe previous local administrations did everything they could to fix things. Indeed, I read a Clive Cussler book that talked about this very thing in a fictional accounting, so you can imagine my surprise, not being a resident, to discover just how real the scenario could have been (Chinese and explosives notwithstanding).

At this juncture, it’s time for blame to end, and for solutions to occur. Will New Orleans ever be the same? Is NYC the same? Is either Hiroshime or Nagasaki the same? Is Germany the same? Not a chance. But can it be repaired, strengthened, and regrow? Only time and effort will tell; I’m betting the American spirit will overcome great difficulties and make it so. Good luck, New Orleans.

(originally published August 16th, 2005)

I know my field fairly well, thank goodness. As a consultant, to be successful you need to know a lot, but not everything. What you do know, you need to know very well.

One of those things that sometimes catches me off guard is how things that are very simple to me seem to be so difficult for others, especially people you know are fairly intelligent because of their degrees, not necessarily their positions. I work with many people who had to get specialized training many times, and had to pass many tests to be allowed to do their jobs. Yet, I present my concepts to them, things I figure they should easily pick up, and it just doesn’t happen.

Many people become managers, supervisors, etc, because of what they know, rather than any particular leadership skills. They could easily find ways to make themselves better managers if they could figure out how to teach those who now report to them what they know. But most people who find that they know something very well and picked up on it easily often fail when it’s time to try to teach someone else the same thing.

Why is this? I like to use my example of playing piano, and learning it when I was 10 years old. As I got older and met more people who learned that I knew how to play, I would have many people ask me to teach them how to play. So I would try, but when they couldn’t even grasp where middle C was every time, I would get very frustrated and give up the ghost. I just couldn’t figure out why I got it, and the musical concepts, and they couldn’t.

And that’s basically the thing. When it comes to the job, it’s imperative that leaders and managers learn how to pass their knowledge on to others. That’s really the most important skill that’s needed for you to be effective, and your employees will value that almost as much as anything else you could ever do for them.

So, work on finding ways, no matter how easy you need to make it, to educate your employees. Everyone who gets better makes you look better, and helps your department become more productive.

(originally published August 18th, 2005)

I have a couple of friends who are having some difficulties dealing with organizational authority figures recently. Both are in similar situations, but their positions are much different. One is the direct employee of the person giving her grief, the other is a consultant who doesn’t even report to the people giving her grief.

All of us sometimes have to deal with difficult people in our lives. Many of us have to deal at least occasionally with difficult people where we work. Sometimes, that person is someone you report to, or in a position of leadership. If we want to get by in life, or succeed in life, we have to take the good with the bad, so to speak.

As it pertains to work, or employment, every person has two choices. One, you can leave; two, you can figure out what you may need to do in order to make it work for you. Sometimes you can’t fully change another person, but you may be able to modify some things. Sometimes you can at least change the circumstances around you. Sometimes you can’t do anything, and you just may have to decide to leave; it’s always up to you, no matter what your financial situation may be.

The one thing I always recommend to people who decide to try to stick it out is to try one thing first. That one thing is that they need to try to establish how they’re going to be treated. I often say that we teach others how to treat us. No person should be a willing doormat in a work situation. We’re all adults, and adults deserve at least the respect to be treated fairly and not be bullied or yelled at, especially in front of others.

One needs to try to get that taken care of before anything else. This is the one thing that will tell you whether it’s worth trying to stay at that position or move on. If your employer isn’t at least willing to change how they treat you, and you can’t get any recourse from an entity such as human resources or your union, then you might as well start looking for other work while still employed, because you’re going to be miserable and end up getting fired at some point anyway. If you can at least get across to them that they need to speak to you in a reasonable manner, then maybe there’s a chance for you to work with your employer to learn just what they need from you so that you can do your job without worry.

Think about it and give it a shot; what do you have to lose at this point?