The energy was palpable!  These were old friends.  They shared challenges and discussed solutions.  They explored innovative technologies and the latest ideas.  They listened intently and reacted with enthusiasm to our keynote speakers.  They shared their performance benchmarks with transparency, exploring ways with their partner practice owners and managers to improve results.  Watching our clients come together with hugs, smiles and kind words was heart-warming.  Such was the atmosphere at our recent Cleinman Performance Network meeting in Dallas. 

For many, the pandemic brought isolation.  And that isolation has had a profound negative impact on our society.  Fifty percent of our population reports that they are experiencing loneliness and social isolation.  And drug-related deaths have more than doubled in the past eight years.

This impact is felt not just on the personal front, but on business as well.  Fully thirty-five percent of all U.S. workers now do so exclusively from home.  In our own case, eighty percent of our team works from home. 

This cultural shift has had both positive and negative results. While seemingly not a significant issue for optometry, that’s not really the case.  Indeed, the challenge of hiring has been exacerbated by the work-from-home movement.  Eligible workers are now choosing jobs that provide flexibility of location, further straining the available workforce for your jobs. Indeed, work from home can be seen as your primary employment competition. 

Our recent Network meeting experience drove home, for me, the resilience of the foundational strategy that we employed way back at the turn of the century with our first Network gathering.  In simple terms, you can’t beat a face-to-face meeting.  While digital meetings are now in vogue, the result of the Pandemic, our return to live experiences has underscored a core belief.  One that is as important for business meetings as it is for patient care.  John Naisbitt said it best in his 1982 bellwether book, Megatrends.  “High tech, High Touch,” Naisbitt said.  The more technology enters our lives, the more we need face-to-face interaction.  While coined 40 years ago, the impact of his prognostication is only now coming into reality.  The pandemic brought live meetings to a screeching halt, but now, they are returning with fervor.  The reason can be traced to Naisbitt’s vision…”high tech, high touch.”

Ours is a dynamic marketplace.  Change is happening at warp-speed.  Time is becoming more and more precious.  That’s why Cleinman Performance Network meetings are so successful.  We pack our experience with learnings that can have both immediate and long-term impact.  As but on example, our clients were introduced to remote exam technology a decade ago.  We began discussing practice specialization over fifteen years ago and have brought many game-changing technologies to our clients well in advance of the competition.  Cleinman Performance Network partner practices out-perform others because they’re surrounded with meaningful support, both from the organization and from their fellow partner practices.  The focus of the Network is on improving performance to improve the lives of our Network partners.  In simple terms, coming together twice per year in a concentrated and facilitated business development atmosphere delivers results…both short and long term.  That’s why our partner practices outperform the average on a scale of 4 to 1.

Time and again, partner practice owners and staff tell us that their participation in the Network has changed their life.  But don’t take our word for it.  if you’d like to experience one of our meetings, there are a limited number of practice development grants available to cover your investment.  For a no-obligation exploration, reach out to us today.    

Don’t be an isolationist.  Indeed, as Stephen Covey says, “take time to sharpen the saw.”