Veterinarians are busy. You see patients most days and you manage a team of people, and a business. In order to optimize your business, keep it simple. Work with an accountant to keep your financial statements up to date. Review them regularly and frequently on a schedule, and create a short list of key performance indicators (KPI's) that will help you monitor the most important indicators of the health of your business. KPI's are meant to help you monitor very important indicators in your business regularly and frequently. Some crucial KPI's include:
- Total revenues
- Labor expense (your highest expese category)
- Cost of professional services (inventory, radiolgy, lab services, feed, bedding, and related services)
- Number of transactions
- New clients and patients
- Accounts receivable, if any
- Available cash
This short list won't tell you all that is important to your business, but it will help you identify any major areas that are not behaving in a positive manner. If you detect a negative trend in any of these categories, then you should dig deeper. Detemine the source of this negative trend and fix it.
Use a short list of KPI's to ensure the health of your practice.
