Succession Planning for Medical Practices: Solo Practices
By Martin R. Glickstein, CPA
Whether you are a solo practicing physician or a member of a large group practice, you should be thinking about your business succession plan. In this two-part series we will discuss how advanced planning can lead to a financially beneficial conclusion and ease the transition of ownership. Part one will address solo practices. Look for part two, which covers group practices, in our next issue.
Attention all medical practices: Are you effectively using data to manage your practice? "Effectively" is the operative word here. The hardest part of effective management is benchmarking data that helps improve your practice-not just because that is what other practices are doing.
To choose appropriate benchmarks and evaluate them properly you must consider your strategic plan and how your facility measures success. Executive committee or partnership meetings should be used to determine what is to be measured and why. Do you want to track financial, operational or clinical metrics or a combination? Generally, practices will benchmark charges, collections, work-relative value units (RVUs) and the number of staff per full-time equivalent (FTE) physicians.
