Pharmacy Plans Not Coming True?
Can you believe January is almost over? Do you ever make resolutions & forget them by the 3rd week? There’s nothing more frustrating than making the same resolutions over & over again, and not seeing them come true.
Tired of making plans for your pharmacy or department that don’t come true?
Here are the first 3 steps that most pharmacy directors or leaders overlook when creating a plan for the year. Doing these 3 steps BEFORE planning for action steps will juice up your vision & allow it to come true more naturally this year. It will not only inspire you, but your pharmacy staff also.
Download the simple worksheet here.
Write on one sheet the following:
1. Why you are doing what you are doing
Example: “I am a ________________ (ie, pharmacy director/contract specialist) because ____________(your “why”)
(I am a pharmacy manager because I want to run a pharmacy where patients are well-cared for & can count on us for getting the best mediation options they can get)
2. Your vision for your pharmacy/department by the end of the year.
Example: “We are helping # patients/mo by helping them quit smoking & breathe easier.”
3. Write down the things that worked well & didn’t work well last year. This is a great opportunity for you to reflect on all the things that went well & acknowledge yourself (and others) for. Then write down what you choose to maximize or minimize doing.
Maximize things that worked well, or contributed to your team getting along well with each other. Minimize things that didn’t support your vision. It can include habits like procrastinating, not keeping your word (however small), coming in late, or complaining. It’s small leaks in every individual (including yourself) that contribute to a bigger problem of things not working well in your pharmacy. You set an important example for your pharmacy with your actions, whether you realize the extent of it or not.
This 3-step process is very effective to write down, before you break your vision down into next action steps.
Fill out the worksheet this for yourself and ask your staff to do it also.
**Now don’t miss this final step (ok, so it’s actually 4 steps 🙂 ): Post this up on your wall. This is the key between you having trouble with reaching your vision, vs. it coming true faster.
Enter your name and email below to get instant access to the worksheet download:
#1 Reason for Communication Challenges in a Pharmacy
The #1 communication method that causes misunderstandings in pharmacies is….
You voted & the results are in from last month’s poll of pharmacy residency directors and pharmacy managers. The most popular answer was email. Face-to-face communication is currently in 2nd place. Do you agree?
What method of communication has caused you the most misunderstandings? If you haven’t voted yet, vote here & see the latest tally so your input is counted.
Tired of emails causing you frustrations with miscommunication? Here are 7 ways to prevent this issue from happening, including when & when not to use email.
Pharmacist Job Market Update
Here’s the latest pharmacist job market update:
More job opportunities are opening up for pharmacists, as pharmacies & companies are more interested in hiring, compared to late 2009. Positions are getting filled quickly in areas saturated by pharmacists, especially those that are staff level ones with desired shifts. It is refreshing to see some pharmacies ready to hire and quick to make decisions. Pharmacists are having to beat other pharmacists to the punch, because once a coveted position becomes available, pharmacies are being flooded with applicants.
On the flip side, I am seeing other pharmacies take extra care in waiting for the right pharmacist, more so than in the past. I know one hospital that waited 8 months to find the right critical care pharmacist. The pharmacy director chose not to look at critical care trained residents who had only one year of experience beyond residency, nor critical care pharmacists without a residency. Their minimum requirements were that the pharmacist had to be PGY2 critical care residency-trained and have at least 2 years of critical care experience as a pharmacist. And the pharmacy director was willing to wait for someone who met that criteria and was the right fit.
I know another hospital that has waited months for the right candidate for a clinical coordinator position. They have been waiting for someone who is cream of the crop. Even staff pharmacist roles are not immune to this type of extra selectivity and hiring managers waiting for the right person. One pharmacy in Northern California has had a staff pharmacist opening for a few months. Despite receiving many qualified candidates, they have chosen to hold off on hiring until finding someone who is the perfect candidate.
Clinical specialists that are in high demand are Read more
Out of the Fire
Do you spend most of your time in the fire? Are you putting out fires or helping out in the pharmacy on the line, leaving little time for high-level visioning for the pharmacy? Or do you spend most of your time doing high-level visioning, but receive complaints from your pharmacy staff that you are disconnected and don’t understand the main challenges they experience? For those of you who have budget crunches, being on the line may seem like a complete necessity. It is also easy to feel a sense of accomplishment when you are out there on the line helping patients and making a difference.
This is a tricky balance to achieve when you face the dilemma of being in a budget crunch where you need to make the best use of your time. When you are caught up in the day-to-day operations of the pharmacy, it is hard to be in the space of taking a step back to take a high-level view and consider what is best for the short-term and long-term vision of the pharmacy.
However, as a leader, you will “spin” less if you take time to step back to think of the bigger picture. It will help you make a difference in many more patients. How can you impact 500 patients vs. you serving them 1-on-1? These are questions you play an important part in answering, as the leader of the pharmacy.
On the flip side, if you spend all of your time visioning, managing budgets, project management, patient satisfaction/quality improvement, as well as hiring/firing, you may lose the pulse of what is happening among your pharmacy staff and what is important to the patients. Regardless of what side of the coin you are on, there are things that you can do right away to make sure you focus on the bigger vision even if you’re busy.
Stay tuned for an article coming up about 4 steps you can take today to focus on the bigger vision, even if you are busy.
In the meantime, if you are a pharmacy manager or director, share below how frequently you are in the fire vs. stepping back to focus on the bigger vision and make plans. What has worked & hasn’t worked for you? What are some obstacles you have to reach a balance between working with your pharmacy staff vs. on your pharmacy?
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Pharmacy Directors- Biggest Management Challenges?
Share your biggest management challenges being a pharmacy manager by commenting on this blog or click here. I will answer the most commonly asked questions here. Also, stay tuned for a multi-speaker pharmacist/pharmacy manager telesummit event within the next year that will address your main management challenges.
One of the most common challenges mentioned by pharmacists about their management is managing expectations and communicating expectations clearly.
One way to communicate expectations clearly is to conduct set performance reviews.
Here’s a pearl on having performance reviews that inspire your staff’s performance. Something you may not be doing currently: Include the pharmacist rating him/herself on measurable factors, in addition to you as the pharmacy management evaluating the pharmacist. Allow the pharmacist to participate in the creation of some of those measurable factors as well.
Stay tuned! I will write on other ways to communicate expectations effectively in another blog article.
“I Don’t Want to Spend Time Training”
This article is for Indian Health Service pharmacy directors only.
This is one of the most common comments pharmacy directors share with me, both for training new hires and relief pharmacists. A way to save you time to train is to hire slowly for the right hire and screen for pharmacists who have as many translatable skills as possible. If you have a relief pharmacist coming in, select someone with IHS experience. At the same time, there will always be new procedures and strategic direction unique only to your facility.
Training is an area that is easy to shortcut. The most common excuses are: “I don’t have time”, “Things are always changing around here; just ask other pharmacists how they will handle this.” Read more
How to Hire the Best Pharmacist, Not the Best Interviewer
Pharmacy directors & hiring managers, when have you hired someone on who did so well in an interview, but didn’t perform for you after the interview? “Hire slowly, fire fast” is a motto managers are often told. Here are 3 strategies to hire the best pharmacist for the position, rather than the best interviewer:
1. Check references thoroughly by asking insightful questions. This means checking all references consistently. Ask open-ended questions and situational questions, such as ones that delve deeper into what may not have gone well & how it was handled.
“Tell me about a time when [something didn’t go well]. How did he/she handle it?”
“What is [pharmacist]’s approach to handling conflict?”
“What advice do you have for someone who may be managing [pharmacist] in the future?”
Read on for the rest of this article & 2 other strategies to hire the right pharmacist. Read more
I Hate Pulling Other People’s Weight
Have you ever worked in a pharmacy where you felt like you had to pull other people’s weight? That other pharmacists didn’t have the same view as you regarding workflow?
I was just having a conversation with a pharmacist who is experiencing this: prescriptions piling up to be handed out while another pharmacist he works with seems to prioritize differently & may spend more time reviewing patient records than noticing that prescriptions are piling up to be handed out. And that this person doesn’t necessarily do it intentionally, but is perhaps one-track minded & unaware when he gets deep into reviewing patient records.
I have observed this myself while practicing in a pharmacy, noticing pharmacists have different viewpoints about what is acceptable workflow priority and speed. I have seen pharmacy staff become frustrated with each other at varying levels. It comes from the belief that a particular priority is the right one & in being upset that someone else isn’t matching up to how you feel priorities should lie.
With my experience in practice, this is a conclusion that I’ve come to–that just like a spouse or a family member, you have no control over what someone else perceives & chooses to do. What you do have control over is influencing someone. As a leader too, you also don’t ever really have control over anyone; you can inspire others to do as you request & there may be consequences to them perhaps not meeting your expectations, but no person can be controlled.
What you do have control over is stepping up & encourage others. You have the ability to use your leadership skills even if you are not the designated leader, by asking them to help you out where you feel the workflow priorities are, if they appear oblivious. Do the best that you can in your role and in your encouragement of others; then let go of the rest. Otherwise, it can only create frustration in you.
If it is to the point where you feel that another pharmacist’s workflow priorities are impacting your workflow substantially, approach your pharmacy director or direct manager and have a conversation about how they feel the workflow priorities are to be.
Pharmacy managers, consider setting clear cut workflow priorities that are both verbally expressed to the whole group and written, so it becomes a standard and there are no questions about what expectations are for everyone.
What is your advice when you’ve encountered this situation? What has worked or hasn’t worked for you?