A Complete Guide for Medical Practice Start-Ups (Part 2)

Creating Your Business Plan

Before you begin your practice, it is essential that you have a business plan in place. Any successful business starts with a business plan that is based on forward-thinking, and is thorough but simple. For a medical practice, your initial plan needs to be sufficient enough to cover and evaluate all important aspects of your business, and to communicate this information to all stakeholders involved.

There are several fundamental considerations to keep in mind while creating your business plan.

• The structure of your practice
• SWOT analysis
• Location and property leasing
• Setup requirements and costs
• Fixed and variable costs
• Operation plan and procedures
• Licensing and other legal policies
• Insurances
• IT infrastructure and data security
• Recruitment and staffing
• Finance and accounting
• Target audience and demographics
• Detailed billing structure
• Marketing plan

Master the Basics

A successful practice stands on strong basic planning. If you get this right, chances are you will be prepared for most challenges thrown at you later. Decide whether your practice is going to be a tradition practice, a visual practice, or an associateship. It is imperative that you get business advice before settling on this, along with analyzing your own potential and aptitude. Following this is a through SWOT analysis – a detailed overview of the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. This will help you identify the benefits as well as the gaps, while also preparing you for the competition and devising a plan on how to tackle it.

A good SWOT analysis should give you a sturdy blueprint you can build your practice on. From there on, it is a matter of making sure your plan is detailed and strategic, and that you start off with your practice fully equipped. Even if the planning stage takes time, remember that this is worth it because it is only with a well-thought and thorough plan that you will be able to achieve great outcomes and satisfied patients right from the beginning.

Create Simple and Fast Processes

Remember that they key is not to create complex but straightforward and comprehensive processes. When this principle is applied to a medical practice, you have to make sure your processes are agile and simple. Ideally, create processes that are extremely easy to understand and learn, since this will define how smooth the training processes for your staff as well as patients are.

Understand the Market and the Selling Position

For any business to survive amidst rigorous competition, it is imperative that they find and recognize their unique selling position. Before you kick off, research and understand the marketplace that you are about to step into. Know your competitors, and decide what you are going to do differently or better than them in order to stand out to your potential clients – patients looking for quality healthcare.

Don’t Start Without Cloud Software

Gone are the days when medical clinics and hospitals could be effective with paper-based patient records. Now, with practices in the entire country switching to EHR programs, it is absurd to start a new practice without one. The efficiencies that cloud software provides your practice with are unmatched. With the right software and effective implementation, you will find yourself with streamlines operations, excellent internal and external communication, minimal time wasted, well-managed financial operations, and overall better care delivery.

Business Planning Mistakes to Avoid

In the process of creating your business plan and ensuring that you equip it with everything that it requires, keep an eye out for these common pitfalls to save your time, effort, and money.

• A poor or incomplete business structure
• Only short-term goals, with no long-term vision in mind
• Not considering all stakeholders, like banks and investors
• Underestimating the business and leadership skills required
• Overcomplicating your business plan
• Not planning early enough, or not spending enough time planning



At this stage, providers must remember that their primary goal is to create a business plan that is comprehensive and future-proofed, so that the practice comes into being with processes pre-streamlines and risk analysis and strategies prepared in advance.