Most, if not all, physician group leaders would say that protecting their practice from competitors involves looking outward, that is, toward other providers of their specialty services.

So, if we were talking about, for example, a radiology group or an anesthesia group, group leaders would commonly be thinking about protecting the group from another group in the local area, from across the county, or even from across the country, any of which might potentially seek to displace the leaders' group as the provider of services at its facilities. These days, group leaders would likely also be focusing on the national staffing services functioning as "national groups" who are on the prowl for opportunities nationwide.

As a result of that focus, group leaders who understand the issues would be doing all they could to create an experience monopoly for their group's patients, referral sources and facilities. And, they would be taking other action to create barriers to block entry into their market by those outside competitors.

To diagram this in a very simple fashion:

As much as this is extremely important, erecting this type of barrier does nothing to protect the group against a second category of extremely potent competitor. Let me use two examples from outside of healthcare to illustrate this second category of threat, the first example from national defense and the other from industry in general.   

The country can take great efforts to protect military secrets or even physical access to a military base by, among other things, erecting barriers, both physical and virtual, to outside intrusion. Similarly, industrial concerns spend countless millions of dollars protecting their essential trade secrets from competitors. But that's only part of the story, because as much as the military and industry have to be concerned about protecting their secrets from someone who's on the outside, they have to be equally concerned about guarding against espionage from someone who's already on the inside -- by someone who is thought to be "on the team."

Protecting against competition from within is a weak point for many medical groups. But the reality is that most groups don't fail because of competition from an outside competitor; they fail from within due to the actions of, and sometimes competition by, members of their own group who break off to directly compete with their former group or who facilitate an outside group's ability to displace it.

By adopting a wide range of protective measures, groups reduce, and if possible, prevent, competition from within, whether it's actual direct competition by group members or their facilitation of direct competition by a third party to whom those group members hand the key to the group's economic engine.

Focusing on threats from without is hardwired into most group leaders. Those leaders must be as diligent in focusing on threats from within, as well.

*COMPLIMENTARY*