Jack O'Brien & Peter Flynn: APA Workforce Consensus, Pay & Job Satisfaction | GYC Podcast E279

Can the truth about physiotherapy salaries surprise you? We uncover the actual employment conditions for physiotherapists as revealed by the latest APA workforce consensus survey. With most physios earning a fixed salary and a smaller fraction receiving a base plus commission, we take you through the intricate dance between job satisfaction and pay models. This segment reveals the often unspoken disparities between expectation and reality, highlighting the profession's high need for job security intertwined with opportunities for additional earnings.

Navigating the labyrinth of remuneration challenges, we compare the public and private sectors, scrutinizing how career progression and salary expectations play out differently in these environments. The dialogue illuminates satisfaction levels across various pay models and delves into factors like economic conditions and cost-of-living changes that shape perceptions of fair remuneration. We also provide valuable insights for private practice owners on fostering a thriving work environment through innovative pay systems and underscoring the intrinsic value provided to both clients and the business itself.

Get ready for candid conversations about the economic realities of running a private practice and handling remuneration expectations. We share actionable strategies for clinic owners to tackle salary negotiations and career progression discussions transparently and effectively. By discussing the benefits of internship programs and the potential for expanding revenue streams beyond traditional consultations, we offer pathways to enhance job satisfaction and retention. This episode champions the power of clear communication, mutual understanding, and collaboration in building a motivated and committed physiotherapy workforce. Tune in for a comprehensive look at physiotherapy remuneration and job satisfaction.

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Transcript

Jack O'Brien: 0:00

63% of graduates and students said physio is not what they thought it was.

Peter Flynn: 0:04

There's a bit of an onus on universities there to better educate about the realities of the job.

Jack O'Brien: 0:09

Often physios are simply blind to the fact that money doesn't grow on trees, and I say that with. This is the Grow your Clinic podcast from Clinic Mastery.

Peter Flynn: 0:17

I'd love to pay them all $300,000 a year. They'd never go anywhere else. They'd be super happy.

Jack O'Brien: 0:22

They'd be super fulfilled that idea of, like you want to work less and be paid more. Let's talk through how that's going to work. How can we help, articulate their frustrations and provide pathways to solve them? You become the employer of choice, or we can find the opportunity and make a difference, because this just screams opportunity to me.

Ben Lynch: 0:41

So the APA has just released the workforce consensus.

Ben Lynch: 0:45

We're going to talk to some of the findings and give our commentary context, opinions, as well as some advice or considerations people could have when it comes to some of these findings. So, just to set the scene here, the physio workforce consensus was conducted using an online survey of members from the APA, the Australian Physiotherapy Association. It was open for approximately three weeks, from October, the 9th to the 27th in 2023. And so the APA got an independent research agency called Survey Matters to do this with a couple of key objectives, and we're going to talk about the findings from those. But the key objectives were understand the workforce composition, measure physiotherapy employment conditions and remuneration, determine future intentions to stay within the profession or to leave, understand potential reasons for leaving, identify business priorities and challenges and understand physiotherapy students and their issues and challenges. People were given 45 questions, approximately 10 minutes to do it. The APA has about 28,000 members. They were all invited to do the survey. A total of three and a half thousand people replied to it, and so they came up with 20 findings.

Ben Lynch: 2:13

We're not going to go through all of them in this episode. Perhaps there's some sequels. Let's see how this lands. But we're going to start with point number seven, jack and Peter Flint.

Ben Lynch: 2:29

Most physiotherapies earn a fixed salary, with those in private practice more likely to earn commission. So we're talking about pay structures. And then point number eight is physiotherapists earn on average about $95,000. You can see it broken down into different years of experience, what the average, what the median is, in subsequent pages it's about 70 pages to this report. So we'll talk about pay, because this is a really important element, and we'll talk about job satisfaction soon because it's high, seemingly high satisfaction, but perhaps somewhat dissatisfaction with the ability to earn as a physio job. Let's kick it off with you here. Um, we can see that the majority of people earn a fixed salary in physio. Here it's got 64% of physios earn a fixed salary. With what's that? 19% earn a base salary plus commission as well. Let's talk to some of the models that you've seen and some of the findings here about the satisfaction with pay yeah, it's a very interesting observation.

Jack O'Brien: 3:49

That's probably not how I would have guessed the numbers to come out, so it's. It's really interesting to see. And one of the things I find helpful from these is what's real versus what's perceived. You know, you mentioned that 95K average salary. I think many people might have overestimated that, but it's real that most physios earn less than 100 grand. That's the reality of it. And so to the base plus commission thing. I think what would summarize a lot of physiotherapists or the stereotypical physio is a high need for certainty. We often did very well at school. We feel like we're very well educated. I say we because I'm one of them.

Ben Lynch: 4:37

I'm not and you are not.

Jack O'Brien: 4:41

I still have a chip on my shoulder, and if you're not one of us, you want to be one of us, but nevertheless, and so that high need for certainty speaks to probably why the profession has lent itself towards fixed salaries. I think salary has to be one of those things or remuneration has to be one of those things that balances certainty with opportunity. And typically, when we talk about a base plus commission model or base plus rewards however we want to describe it we're trying to find that balance between certainty to allow someone to plan for the base case and opportunity if they want to niche down or really develop a high performance caseload and stretch themselves, that there is no upper ceiling, that there is opportunity. So it's really interesting that that's how it comes out that 64% of physios earn a fixed salary.

Ben Lynch: 5:37

One of the quotes they put front and center here is on page 34 from someone anonymous in private practice in Queensland. At some point in my career I realized there is a ceiling to how much a physio can earn. It is essentially a face-to-face service where you have to see a client to earn money. Pete, I'll get you in here at this point as we talk about, because this is a tricky conversation to have, jack to your point about. Like in reality, when you're actually having pay progression conversations, they're not always like the easiest conversations to have um pete, what's your take on the remuneration side of things here for physios?

Peter Flynn: 6:22

I've been taking a few notes actually, um, as we've been going and, and even just to what you said there, I think it's quite interesting um, how, how long does it take a physiotherapist to realize that, uh, our role is to see clients like, realistically, um, like the and if we think public system etc. There's more of a ladder to climb there into more managerial positions. In private practice we can create that. It's probably a little bit more challenging to create that with the same scale because we don't have a taxpayer funded business. So I think there's some challenges associated with that. But to the point there of going, well, that should be probably pretty obvious from early on in our study that when we're seeing clients, that is the work that we do. And, yeah, maybe there's a there's a bit of an onus on universities there to better educate physiotherapists or people wanting to become a physiotherapist about the realities of the job and the challenges and that it is a very physical job. It's not just something where you think with your brain. It is quite physical whether you're public, private, whatever it may be. But just on the salaries and how people get paid, 40% of the workforce works publicly, so not even private practice, so it makes sense that that portion of the workforce doesn't earn commission. They're typically going to be on salary, so to me that makes a reasonable amount of sense.

Peter Flynn: 7:44

Those sorts of numbers there, and then for the 95 000 again that's averages um be interesting to actually sort of see how the data was compiled here to have a really good look at. I'm sure jack o'brien is thinking the same as we're talking through this. Um, you know, was was this potentially skewed towards younger therapists replying more than experienced therapists, or whatever it may look like? If we had three and a half thousand out of 28,000, I think it gives us a rough idea, but without knowing that sort of distribution, as to how much weight we can put on it. But I think it is a common thing that we do here of going well, I got a TR of 99.5 or something like that, and so I assumed I would be earning huge money when I got out. And it was a little bit depressing to come out and start on 70, 75,000, including super, and really have to work my work my way up. You know when I although when I finished I had 58,000, including super, but I'll throw it to Jack, you got your hand up there mate.

Jack O'Brien: 8:43

Yeah Well, you know, what I found interesting here was of those who were on a fixed salary, 75% of those liked their fixed salary. And similarly, of those who were on a commission style model, 70% of those were happy with their commission model. So when I put my clinic owner hat on, I think about how do we reverse engineer a system, an ecosystem where people are happy, energized, engaged, satisfied with their arrangements, and that's probably going to differ from physio to physio, from health professional to health professional. It's our responsibility as clinic owners to create an environment that is win-win, where people can thrive and grow and that there is opportunity.

Ben Lynch: 9:29

It's a great point, JB, that people like the model they're on. A further finding down a little bit lower is only two in five physios believe they are fairly remunerated for the work that they do, which is really interesting. How do you sort of take that into consideration with the satisfaction on the model, perhaps that they're paid with Pete?

Peter Flynn: 9:57

It's interesting, again, context. I'd love to know how do we define fair remuneration? What is that, to them, is fair remuneration? Um, what is that to them, is fair remuneration? Does it take into account the conditions, sort of like their work conditions, their hours, the structure of their week and all those sorts of things? Are we purely looking at pay? And I wonder, has that changed over the past, let's say, five years, since we've seen interest rates go up? A lot of these people are probably younger, I would say on average. I'm going to make an assumption here, which is true because it says the average is 38 years old.

Peter Flynn: 10:32

Yeah, definitely, definitely, and 50% below that right. So they're going to have large mortgages. On average, they're going to be feeling the pinch of interest rates. So is it that they feel like they're unfairly remunerated? Or are they unfairly remunerated in relation to what's happened in the economy over the past four years? And I'd love to know what was the change over that time? Were they pretty happy beforehand, pre-covid, and that's changed since, because of those external factors, and then, the cost of physiotherapy appointments hasn't kept up with inflation and interest rates.

Peter Flynn: 11:03

Just a few thoughts there, because I think with this data we could say, oh, all right, they're not happy with their pay.

Peter Flynn: 11:09

But I think when we start to think about all those other things coming in, it paints a slightly more complex picture, but a really interesting picture and one that I think about here going well, if people want to be paid more, especially if we're talking private practice, as Shane Davis says, what you get paid is a reflection of the value that you bring to your clients, to the business and to yourself, and so if you're providing an amazing service, can we introduce maybe a tiered system where you move into a senior physio role and you charge an extra 20, 30%.

Peter Flynn: 11:41

Now, if you're on a commission-based model, like probably most people in private practice are, it means you're getting a 20, 30% pay rise to do so, and what I typically find is physios are a little apprehensive to do that because they don't want to charge the client more, but they do want to be paid more, and there's a real big sort of like issue there of going as a business owner. I want to pay my team. I want to pay them all hundreds of thousands. I'd love to pay them all $300,000 a year. They'd never go anywhere else, they'd be super happy, they'd be super fulfilled and they'd feel really fairly remunerated. The problem is, if they aren't bringing in the revenue to justify that, we simply can't do that, and so I think if we do really want to be able to pay them more and they do really want to be more, I guess, fairly remunerated in their words then we need to look at how do we make that happen sustainably as a business, and to me, that is one option.

Ben Lynch: 12:35

You brought up a good point there, Peter. I'm interested, Jack, on these conversations you've had. You help other clinic owners have these conversations. When the team member comes and says some version of, I don't feel this is a good deal on my end. I don't feel fairly remunerated. Hopefully it's not at an exit interview and that was the reason they've left. But practically, how do you go about having that conversation? What are maybe some of the principles or practices you've used to address that conversation point?

Jack O'Brien: 13:06

Well, I've had physios, team members, who transitioned out of our clinic for remuneration reasons and for credit to them. We had a really respectful, open conversation for a number of months about what Pete just described the economic realities. Know, if you want to, in really obvious terms, if you want to earn three hundred thousand dollars but you only build two hundred thousand dollars, like the maths just doesn't add up. And for this particular individual, the his remuneration goals just could not add up with what he was able they were able to generate. And so we ended up helping them transition to find a more suitable, less clinical role where remuneration was much higher, and it was done very respectfully. You know, I find it really interesting to have those conversations and often physios are simply blind to the fact that money doesn't grow on trees, and I say that with respect, but it's true. Your remuneration has to come from somewhere.

Ben Lynch: 14:07

To your point. To interrupt, I think we see this a lot with the clinic owners that we work with in, say, the business academy or Elevate, that it's so second nature as a business owner to think about these numbers and we somewhat assume, well, the team understand that side of the equation or the behind the scenes, but often there isn't maybe the transparency. It's not that they're hiding it necessarily, but they're not educating their team on these realities. So just take the other side there, but keep going as you explain how you actually have those conversations.

Jack O'Brien: 14:44

Yeah, we sit down, we explain the numbers and it's probably an ignorance of such from young physios to open their mind and consider the more complex realities of private practice environment. Looking at some of the rest of the findings here, so many physios don't think that their studies equipped them for the real world, particularly in private practice, to that point before of why is remuneration unsatisfying or dissatisfying? It states in finding 14 that they're dissatisfied because the remuneration isn't commensurate with their expertise and skills. Basically, we think we're brainiacs and geniuses and we're not paid accordingly, or at least comparatively to other, say, brainiacs and geniuses in inverted commas, things like some of those really intelligent professions doctors and lawyers, and merchant bankers and investors Newsflash. We're not paid like a merchant banker or a lawyer or a doctor for that matter. We're paid orders of magnitude less and it's this dissatisfaction that our remuneration isn't commensurate with our comparative expertise. I think that's where it's coming from, pete. What do you think?

Peter Flynn: 16:02

Just to jump in on that. The doctor one I found really interesting. I had a friend who graduated as a doctor and did his rounds his first year, etc. He earned 93 000 plus super his first year, so call it, you know, roughly just over 100 000. But he worked about 55 hours a week and he was doing shift work and so I think if we compare on a like-for-like basis I was probably earning more than him on a dollar per hour basis, on a dollar like.

Peter Flynn: 16:29

Close to it like, yeah, when you start to take out like the you know him doing not maybe seven days straight night shift or something at one point, like some, some crazy sorts of things that that they were doing, so I think we you know, and at the time I didn't see it that way. At the time I was like this is a stitch up, this is an absolute stitch. And just coming back one step as well, I was taking a note here that when I was a young physio, in the six weeks that I worked for someone else, I actually was really resentful that I was getting paid 40% commission and the business owner was taking 60% and I thought she must be buying a private jet next week, then she's going to get a Ferrari, and then she's going to get a new house the week after because she's taking 60% of everything I make. And it was just a lack of understanding, a complete lack of understanding, and not saying that ever talked about through university, not saying that anyone had ever told me before, and so I was very ignorant at that stage. And so I have a lot of compassion for physios who are ignorant there and at the same time I then go well, as business owners.

Peter Flynn: 17:30

It's our role to be able to have that conversation in a positive, meaningful way, not to say, hey, you're a burden and we don't make that much money, but to actually explain that we provide this amazing facility for you and these great experiences. And we've got admin out there doing all of this work for you. You've got all the professional development development, you've got people mentoring you, all of these things. Out of that extra, you know 60 it's not 60 profits sitting on top of that, uh, and there's a game, game and activity. You you went through uh one time with us jack. That I thought was really good. What does every dollar go right? And I thought that was a fantastic exercise to do with the team.

Jack O'Brien: 18:12

You know, I think that comparison amongst professions is super interesting. You mentioned the doctors. I also have a doctor friend who is describing some of his additional study learning practices and then their pathway towards specialization. And that's all done outside of work hours, unpaid, it's done in their own unpaid time and they pay thousands, if not tens of thousands of dollars to go down the path of a registrar. And I'm reading here in finding 13, where particularly young therapists state that access to mentoring and support and learning and development is important to those early in their career. And almost every private practice clinic that I know of provides that mentoring and learning and professional development in paid time and often with additional allowances. That is extraordinary. That doesn't happen in other professions and so it's important for us to. Now here's the challenging part and I'm interested, ben or pete, how you tackle this. How do we help our teams to understand this benefit without it feel like bragging? You know you should know, young whippersnapper, that no one else gets what you get. How do we, how do we communicate that?

Ben Lynch: 19:29

you're up, then I think I think the fact that, as an action point, what I'm taking from this conversation so far is being able to proactively have more open conversations to help practitioners understand that may not mean that they stick around, but it's at least a good approach to providing the environment where we can explore pathways and progressions, etc. It's better to be more open and transparent than less, it seems, because the feeling I get from this is like a lot of people didn't realize, oh, there isn't the pathway or progression here and I'm dissatisfied with it. Obviously, every clinic and clinic owner is going to be different, run it through their filter, but I think the fact is you've got to have the conversation.

Jack O'Brien: 20:19

We must Again finding 14 that the reality of physiotherapy is not what students and graduates expected. 63% of graduates and students said physio is not what they thought it was. So when I hear that I think, oh geez, what on earth are unis churning out and do better?

Ben Lynch: 20:38

Well, the uni experience, I know, and a lot of people have spoken about it, gears you up to work in the public system, correct?

Jack O'Brien: 20:46

So if you come out of, private practice.

Ben Lynch: 20:47

You're not used to seeing 45 clients in a week.

Jack O'Brien: 20:50

You know, maybe the public system's seeing 20 right, so so, like I would say to that, we can get down the uni system, or, if I'm a clinical, I'm going. What an opportunity to educate. You know, let's, let's attract students, let's attract graduates and show them. You know, uh, pete, you might be able to tell me when you can articulate someone's problems better than they can themselves. They attribute the solution to you, right. And so, as clinic owners who are employing these young graduates, how can we help articulate their frustrations and provide pathways to solve them? You become the employer of choice. Like, what an opportunity. Let's not whinge about a workforce that is ill-equipped and doesn't have the context. Let's equip them, let's provide them the context and let's employ them meaningfully to help them make an impact, like they say is important to them impact and work-life balance, pete.

Peter Flynn: 21:41

I love that and I think part of the challenge for clinic owners thinking of the APA business owner event we went to last year was resoundingly clinic owners in physiotherapy. They believe that students or physios are coming out ill-prepared which then puts an economic burden or a financial burden on them. Having to upskill these people over a 6 to 12 month period. It's not a it's not a quick thing. Now, coming back to sort of seeing a full-time physio should be seeing 50 to 60 clients a week. Realistically, like we should be helping that many people per week, depending on appointment length. Let's say, 60 minute initials, 30 minute follow-ups. That's quite reasonable, I would say, for someone who's got some experience behind them.

Peter Flynn: 22:25

In my university days I would see two to three patients a day. Right, that was the expectation, and so I think maybe there's an opportunity for you needs to bridge the gap a little bit and actually challenge people a little bit more so that when they come out they're a little bit more prepared to be able to do that and have a bit more of an option for private practice, because not even all physios in my year level had a placement in private practice and most of us spent most of our time in aged care homes making sure people didn't have socks on when they walked. So why?

Jack O'Brien: 22:57

is that pete like? Why aren't private practice placements available?

Peter Flynn: 23:01

you know I don't have the answer to that. I wonder is it that it's hard for universities to create those relationships with private practices for them to look after and, I guess, run those for students? Because when I have talked to private practices that have done it, it hasn't been a very profitable thing to do. They might get paid a very, very small amount.

Jack O'Brien: 23:24

I'll interrupt you, though. Define profitability.

Peter Flynn: 23:28

Yes, yes, I guess, if they're looking at, can we hire these students at the end of the day. And look, we ran our own internships. We tried to create our own essentially placements in order to be able to hire the best of the crop. So it definitely can be done and it depends on what the end outcome is.

Jack O'Brien: 23:45

Right. So like I would counter that because again I'm channeling the um, the cynical physio, which probably defines most of our workforce it says it's not profitable to take students and I can say that from experience. In the short term it may feel like it's not. I think our clinic at the time was paid 30 a week to host a student like please.

Peter Flynn: 24:03

That hardly covers the tim tans, the tim tans and the tea bags cost.

Jack O'Brien: 24:05

Don't spend it all at once. The Tim Tams and the Teabags cost more than that, particularly for students. Nevertheless, I would suggest it was an incredibly profitable experience. Why? Because I had a constant pathway of students come through who we could help to educate, provide context, ultimately indoctrinate in the positive sense, and we had a constant stream of new graduates ready to work for us who could hit the ground running and were at their billing capacity in their first three months, meaning their new graduate year was at least break even, sometimes profitable for our clinic.

Jack O'Brien: 24:41

So you know, define profitability when so many clinics may be run at a loss on the first two years of a new grad because there's so much development and learning and case building. For our clinic it was absolutely a profitable exercise. We had on culture, on brand, on values, motivated young graduates who were working with us from the day that ARPRA number came through to help provide value and impact for our community. That's a profitable exercise. So again, we can whinge and clinic owners, physios particularly. We're top of the tree when it comes to whinges sometimes. Or we can find the opportunity and make a difference, because this just screams opportunity to me.

Ben Lynch: 25:20

Yeah, absolutely. In terms of biggest driver of job satisfaction that is mentioned here is the ability to make a positive impact, most people saying this is the most important thing for them. I think there's a really great opportunity to explore that in conversation with team members, as we kind of link well, how utilized are you? How many people are you helping? Do you really want to?

Jack O'Brien: 25:47

make an impact. Do you really want to make an impact?

Ben Lynch: 25:49

do you really want to make an impact, um, and how are we measuring that impact? Nps scores, you know appointments per day, utilization rate, and it connects so beautifully with your ability to earn more, provided the place you're working at has those options to them. I think there's so much a part of this that is around the communication and packaging piece. We're back sort of the start of the conversation, comparing public with private. In public there is much more of a structured. You know these are your progression points, not only in pay but in your role. You know these are your progression points, not only in pay but in your role. So often we see a lot of clinics that don't have them. Maybe they're making them up as they go along or haven't even entertained them. But just a valuable piece of the conversation is where do you want to go in your career? What does your week look like, what does your remuneration look like? And working towards that in a proactive sense rather than an exit interview.

Ben Lynch: 26:55

Jabi, to answer your question before, so that I'm not off the hook here around the packaging up, we talked about in our recruitment immersion this version of a proposal that you would be giving somebody for working at your clinic.

Ben Lynch: 27:11

You've worked your way through a series of screening and interviews, et cetera, and you're pitching essentially that team member, prospective team member, to join and you are packaging up all of the awesome things you've noticed about them and why they're the candidate you want to welcome to the team, as well as what they're going to earn, their pathways, as well as all the sort of extracurricular stuff that comes with it, whether that's equipment, cpd budget, et cetera.

Ben Lynch: 27:44

So I think it's absolutely worthwhile calling out those things and putting a tangible value on those things. A really practical example a lot of people will have a CPD budget it's a thousand bucks a year and whether there's a co-contribution or not, et cetera but they'll call that out. So I think it's really valuable to do that, especially on the front end when recruiting, to articulate the value beyond just the salary. The second part is why not do it with your existing team members? Why not do a version of hey, the next 12 months is going to be the best 12 months in your role here at the clinic, and I want to collaborate with you on how we make that happen, from your caseload to your workflow, to your remuneration, et cetera. How can we do this together and I want to make sure they feel heard.

Jack O'Brien: 28:39

Yes.

Ben Lynch: 28:40

And I think a good way to do that is document it. We like to use something pretty like some Google slides or canvas slides right To package and articulate it. So often they're going back to their spouse or their parents or whoever like look at this, look at the polish on this document most people already doing that. They just haven't been able to articulate it and communicate it, so I'm a big advocate for that specifically I love that notion of collaboration.

Jack O'Brien: 29:07

Right, I'm looking here at finding 13 and 14. One of the key drivers of satisfaction is work-life balance, aka let's call it for what it is wanting to work less, and one of the key drivers of dissatisfaction is remuneration. So you know, I think that idea of, like you want, you want to work less and be paid more. Let's talk through how that's going to work, because at some point there's a clash or things don't line up, and so we all talk about wanting to make an impact. But an impact doesn't come without cost and effort. I don't know.

Jack O'Brien: 29:43

I know plenty of people who make a massive dent in the universe and not one of them are average, ordinary people. They pour their heart and soul in this. You want to make an impact. You better be prepared to make an impact. That doesn't come by like rolling out of bed, sleeping in, getting to work late and going home and watching Netflix and ice cream on the lounge. That's what we think of work-life balance sometimes, but we want to make an impact. Then we're going to count the cost and be ready to make an impact. So to your point, that collaboration of not just telling our team how it is going.

Jack O'Brien: 30:16

If you say you really want to make an impact, let's talk through what that looks like. You want to adjust your remuneration? What are your ideas to make it happen? I can tell you the economic side of things, but how do you think we could make that work in a win-win environment? So one of the things I wonder why physios often lack the skill of insight and the ability to find a win-win, or to put themselves on the other side of the table or the other side of the spreadsheet, as it were. Why do we struggle with this skill I think that's a skill that really helps physios stand out from one another is compassion and the ability to see context. Pete, have you seen that play?

Peter Flynn: 30:56

I think so. I think so, definitely, I'd say so. It does seem to be whether it's a lack of insight or a lack of even wanting to understand or seeing the world, as we all do, through our own perspective and we talk about empathy in healthcare, and empathy is being able to see the world through someone else's perspective. I think we do that really well with our clients, but how can we bring that into the conversation with our colleagues and with clinic owners? Because I think there's the opportunity there? It's a very different conversation when a team member comes to you and says, hey, I want to pay rise $5,000 a year, $10,000 a year, whatever it may be Okay. Is that okay if we look at how we can make this happen for you? Very different conversation to somebody who comes in and says, hey, I would like to be able to earn this in 12 months time. I'd like to be able to earn an extra $10,000, $15,000 over the next 12 months. What would I have to do in order to be worth this to the business? Or here are some ideas of ways that I think that I can add some more value to the business. Can we talk through these as a clinic owner?

Peter Flynn: 32:03

That first one. It does roll you up a little bit the wrong way around. Okay, well, where's this money gonna come? Like? I want to pay you more, don't get me wrong. I always want to pay my team more. But where is that going to come from? From, you know? Is it coming out of? You know, someone else's salary? Are we getting rid of someone? Are we decreasing expenses? Is it just all coming out of the profit? If we pay everyone an extra 10 grand, what happens to the clinic? Does the clinic go under? There's all these sort of questions and things that go through your mind. But then you flip that and you look at the other one and you have someone who's coming and they're coming with solutions, they're coming with wanting to provide value for that, and that's that win-win that we talk about. And if there's any physiotherapist listening to this one, when you approach that conversation in that way, the chance you're going to get what you're after is extremely high. So just consider. That is all I would say.

Ben Lynch: 32:55

It's a great point. I think part of that J-O-B is an inability or people are not willing to be vulnerable. Because you actually ask some of those questions, you might hear something that you're not, you don't feel prepared to deal with. You know you've got to improvise on the spot. They asked for 180k and they're currently on 90. How am I going to deal with that? I often hear clinic owners say that what if they asked for this? What do I do? And I think so much to your point there, pete of it's like okay, well, what would need to happen for that to be true and possible?

Ben Lynch: 33:35

And then we're collaborating and our job is to educate them on. Well, these are the realities. We can absolutely do that, but this is what needs to happen in order for that to occur. And I always tell clinic owners never feel like you need to solve it then and there, like on the spot. I think they so often feel the pressure of like ah, deer in the headlights, it's like take it on board, yep, understand the context. Oh, why 180K in this example? What would that mean for you? What are you working towards, et cetera, et cetera. And then just say is it okay if we meet again later this week or next week and we pick it up? That gives you time to think, do calculations, whatever it may be.

Ben Lynch: 34:15

So I think being able to ask the question requires some vulnerability. And perhaps there's also that element of, if I say no or can't make it happen, are they going to leave? And now I've just opened myself up here so I can empathize in that sense. But it's like do you just not talk about it and hope that everything goes all right? So much of this conversation for me is just highlighting again and again the importance of trying to have proactive conversations about career progressions, which includes financial in, very importantly, includes financial progression for team members as well and helping them understand both sides.

Ben Lynch: 34:58

The other point, jb, that that you prompted, as you mentioned, that was the quote that I read out a little bit more, where someone was like, essentially it's face-to-face, I can't do any more. In that it is a good challenge to say, well, how can we, what could we explore? There are definitely clinics doing a variety of things beyond face-to-face that open them up to being able to make a bigger impact, generate more revenue in sort of non-traditional ways or traditional ways. They change the funding source of the clients they see and they're able to access different clientele, or they're running CPD courses, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So I would challenge those people to say, okay, what creative solutions do you have?

Peter Flynn: 35:47

Or even the let's keep it face-to-face Like where can we find evidence of someone earning what this person wants to earn, working 38, 40 hours a week? Right, where can we find evidence of that? Because there is no shortage that I can find pretty quickly on my phone right now of physiotherapists who would be earning $150,000 to $200,000 because they're absolute weapons of what they do. They've really gone down the rabbit hole in one particular niche. They've built a name and a brand for themselves and they charge much higher rates, but they charge it because they're worth it and they charge it because they know they're worth it and the market knows they're worth it. And there's always going to be a ceiling. But I think the ceiling a lot of people have is based on the people that they see within five minutes of them, five minute drive of them, right? Yes, that's the thing I think we can change is going there.

Peter Flynn: 36:47

There's plenty of other ways we can do this and I think there's opportunities for us to take that to the next level. And it's not easy. You can't just say I'm charging, I'm going from charging $100 appointment to $250 at employment overnight because I want to earn more money. That's not how it works. We have to think about how do we provide the value so that someone looks at $250 and goes that's a no-brainer?

Peter Flynn: 37:09

I think it was Warren Buffett that said price is what you pay, but value is what you get. And when people perceive that they're getting more value than what they pay, they'll continue to pay for that. When they feel like they gain less value than what they pay, they'll cease paying for that. And if we take that into what we do as physios, I think you know how can we get people to the result faster? How can we make it easier for them, more effortless for them? How can we give them more certainty that they're going to achieve their result? If we start to tick off those things from Alex Somozy's value equation, I think there's a really amazing opportunity for us to increase the value of our consults, and that's when we can charge more, be paid more and you may still be seeing clients, but you can earn a lot more.

Ben Lynch: 37:52

That ceiling can increase a lot further talked about later in the findings that as remuneration grew, so did satisfaction and stickiness, and also that when you niche and you become really good in an area, you also earn more. So there's a good link there, Pete, in the findings to exactly that point. As we start to put a bit of a wrap on this, I'm interested in your sort of key insights and or actions that you would prescribe people do here. Of course there's more that we could dive into some of the data on this report and really go down the rabbit hole. Of course every clinic has its own unique context and nuances unique context and nuances. But for the purposes of this, always run it through your own filter and look at how could I apply that or something like that today or tomorrow, as you go to your clinic, have your conversations with practitioners, JB, as you sort of zoom out and distill a lot of these findings. What is your sort of summary and call to action for the clinic owner or practitioner listening in?

Jack O'Brien: 39:05

Yeah, really good question. So much of this happened. All of this, in fact, happens in the context of relationships, conversations and leadership, and so when I think about the conversation that we've just had the last 45 minutes or so really the onus is on us as clinic owners to grow in our leadership and communication. How can you learn from what other leaders are doing? How do we have these challenging conversations? Often we talk about difficult or tough conversations. I like the framing of like challenging conversations right, getting used to positioning information for people that otherwise were not willing to hear it. Or, to your point of, how do we collaborate and find creative solutions To your point, peter, talk me through when there's examples or evidence of this happening. So much of these conversations are leadership conversations and leaders are learners. A leadership development for a clinic owner is a lifelong pursuit and it's a sacrificial pursuit, but it's a worthy pursuit, and so clinic owners invest in your leadership and capacity to develop people and so much of this becomes solvable.

Ben Lynch: 40:24

Yeah, very nice. Well said, it's a continual challenge for us, never going to be perfect. We're always getting better. Pete, as you sort of summarize for the listener here, what is your call to action for them?

Peter Flynn: 40:38

Probably it's hard to follow that of Jack, because I think he summarized it very well.

Peter Flynn: 40:43

We'll cut you off now the cut me off right now, please. A key message here is don't be afraid to have that challenging conversation and don't be afraid to be the party that actually initiates it. Don't be afraid to get out there and actually start these conversations with your team, but map it out, understand. How am I going to have this in a positive manner? Because what we don't want is we don't want our team to be feeling like we're talking down to them, that we're condescending, that we're telling them that they're a burden and we can't pay them more because they're not good enough.

Peter Flynn: 41:13

I think we've got to think about how can we frame this towards positive, how can we link their financial goals to meaningful goals as well, so it's not just money for the sake of money. I think there's a lot of opportunity there to do this in a way that builds the relationship between the clinic owner and the team member rather than eroding it away. And in this current challenging hiring market, we could say which is one of the points of this point 20, we want to be making sure that we're putting deposits in that emotional bank and not pulling them out. And there's some really good opportunities here for anyone who's listening to this or has read this document to think about how can you continue to build and move forwards with your team as you grow your clinic?

Ben Lynch: 41:57

Love that Better bring the team along the journey with you. My takeaway is very similar to both of you is that ability to have those conversations. It can feel awkward, challenging, vulnerable. It's the right thing to do and we've got to get better at doing it and collaborating along the way it and collaborating along the way, making these decisions and conversations from a place of abundance rather than scarcity. Are they going to leave? What's going to happen? Am I going to get several paid conversations now? I've opened a can of worms. I think. Take each conversation as it happens. Don't need to make decisions on the spot, and I think being able to have your team members engaged and aligned with you as you grow is just going to make it so much more sustainable for you so such an important thing to do.

Ben Lynch: 42:52

Um, so we know what it's like to be in the trenches as business owners. It is tough, but, as you said, uh jb, far more eloquently than I am right now, it is tough, but, as you said, job, far more eloquently than I am right now, it is a worthy pursuit.

Jack O'Brien: 43:06

What else would we rather do?

Ben Lynch: 43:08

What else would we rather do? Amplify your impact. That is the way to do it, Gents. Thank you so much for your commentary and insights. For those that are listening in, please come join us over on the YouTube channel Hit, subscribe, stay across the podcast and all the awesome content that's coming out tips and tricks as to how to grow your clinic sustainably. All the show notes are over at clinicmasterycom. Guys, I think this has been really fruitful and we should do another one because there's so many great findings in this report and we're here to help those people out there navigate some of the complexities and challenges of growing their clinics. So we'll see you on another episode very soon.

Speaker 3: 43:54

Thanks for tuning in to the Grow your Clinic podcast. To find out more about past episodes or how we can help you, head to wwwclinicmasterycom. Forward slash podcast and please remember to rate and review us on your podcast player of choice. See you on the next episode.