How to find the manual workflows in your practice

Manual work is rarely on anyone's list, because it is invisible to the person doing it. Here is how to surface it.

Operations · 6 min read

Ask a better question

“What takes too long?” produces vague answers. “What did you type twice today?” produces specific ones.

Ask each team member the second question at the end of a normal day and write down the answers verbatim.

Follow one patient through

Trace a single new patient from inquiry to first visit and mark every point where information is copied, re-keyed or printed. Each mark has a cost in minutes and an error rate.

Prioritise by frequency, not annoyance

A small irritation that occurs forty times a day usually outweighs a large one that occurs weekly. Frequency is the variable practices most often overlook when deciding what to fix.