Money can be a hard topic for therapists to discuss. Plenty of practitioners would, if they could, make it so money was not an issue, so that everyone, regardless of budget, could benefit from the important guidance that therapy can offer. This is, of course, not the world we live in. Therapists need to earn a living as much as anyone, and the economic disruption of the past few years has strained practitioners, practices, and everyone else. Price increases have become as inevitable at the therapist’s office as at the hair salon or on the grocery shelf. Practices do what they can to keep from passing price increases along to clients, but some of the moves they’re forced to make like shortening appointments or closing the office on particular days, impact client care nevertheless.
There is, however, at least one element of any mental health clinician’s practice that, if streamlined, can keep costs down for practices and for patients.
More inefficiencies than you might imagine, ones that cost practices and clients time and money, begin with the onboarding process. Using the right, innovative solution to get both clinicians and clients up to speed on responsibilities and expectations before their first day can go a long way in helping a practice tighten up its budget. The solution? Virtual onboarding. Here, we explore how it works and why it’s the only real way for practices to address a laundry list of hidden inefficiencies in their operations to keep costs down–both financially and in terms of time–and value up, for clinicians and clients.
Saving time and money by virtually onboarding your clinicians
When therapists begin working at a clinic, there are many day-to-day operational things they need to get up to speed on, things that may differ significantly from clinics where they worked previously or that may be entirely new to them.
It’s easy to think of these as second-tier concerns—therapists are, after all, hired for their expertise in helping clients, not their operational acumen—but a smooth-running office enables quality therapy; operational confusion works against it. Completely innocuous and apparently minor mistakes, as simple as incorrectly filed clinician notes or taking a laptop home from the office without checking it out, take time to identify and to fix. Time spent on addressing operational mix-ups is time not spent on therapy. Depending on the pay structure, a practice could find itself paying people to re-do administrative work at the expense of doing what they were hired for, which reduces value for everyone. If a therapist is an independent contractor, being asked to address such issues on their own time can lead them to lose their enthusiasm and seek other work. Replacing a good therapist comes with its own huge costs attached.
Virtual clinician onboarding creates a workplace where none of this is necessary, because with virtual onboarding, therapists aren’t set up to make costly operational mistakes to begin with.
Virtual clinician onboarding consists of providing video content, crafted by skilled subject matter experts, to incoming clinicians. Therapists receive a link to a one-stop repository of instructional videos containing everything they will need to know about the ins-and-outs of what to do and how to do it. Therapists can focus on learning these best practices and office procedures in an easy-to-absorb medium, and can return to view the content if they encounter an unfamiliar situation. All the small financial losses that accrue in therapists’ offices where people are confused about processes, are replaced by the financial gains of a workplace where everyone can focus on what they’re there for—the clients.
This is only one side of the onboarding equation. Clients themselves can also benefit from well-put together video onboarding content—and that means saving money for you, and them, as well.
Saving time and money by virtually onboarding your clients
Therapists all know that outcomes are better for those clients who actively engage with the therapeutic process. This means setting goals, having the right expectations, and understanding the unique boundaries of the therapist-client relationship. Misunderstandings can severely diminish how much improvement in their daily lives clients can expect. When clients spend time and money on a service that they are not using to its fullest, it feels like a waste for client and therapist.
Doing therapy right takes some work, and virtual onboarding solutions for incoming clients show them what they have to do.
With virtual client onboarding, mental health practitioners can offer incoming clients video resources before their first day of therapy. These resources, which are created by experienced clinicians and delve into every aspect of the therapist-client relationship, give clients a clear vision, from day one, of how they will be working together with a clinician.
Clients with this clear vision get more value for their money. Therapists who have clients who are benefiting from therapy, keep their clients coming in. So with virtual client onboarding, business thrives because service is good, and the service is helping clients to live better.
A little preparation is priceless
Therapists should be set up for success before they start work. Clients should be set up for success before they start therapy. This may sound obvious, but it is not always intuitive how practices can make these things happen. Virtual onboarding, for clinicians and clients, is how it’s done.
Virtual onboarding for clinicians lets therapy practices tighten up their operations, so that they can offer the same quality and volume of service without having to raise their prices or take a hit themselves. Virtual onboarding for clients lets people pursuing therapy improve the value of their experience, every appointment, so that therapy is a vital and productive part of living well, not a questionable expense like an unused streaming service subscription.
This adds up to saving time and saving money, and makes therapy not just more cost effective, but more effective overall for everyone—client and clinician.
