Expanding Job Market For Physicians

by Robert Priddy

Put another way, most markets have plenty of room for expansion and growth, and that includes you as a new entrant.
 

About half of my clients want to move into an entrepreneurial endeavor as their transition from clinical practice. That’s great because I have found that physicians can be very effective entrepreneurs, if they make the right business choices.
 
However, the first choice is, what business? Most clients aren’t buying foundries, some do consider franchises, but most focus on the intellectual capital they bring directly to the table. Whether in public health, disease specific advisory, organizational knowledge, etc, their focus is on what they know – a smart move. Once decided, the statement I almost always hear is this, “I know there are some people already doing this, maybe I need to think of something no-one else is doing.” Wrong. There is virtually no area of consulting or advising that is so crowded that one more practitioner cannot enter.

When I’m hit by this statement, my first move is to a spreadsheet. The simple questions, how much can you charge, how many clients can you work with…. followed by, look how small a market presence you need to be successful. Do the math yourself if you have these thoughts. Most physicians can comfortably charge in the $300-$600 per hour range for special knowledge and skills. Plug into the hourly rate reasonable annual work hours, or billable hours – say 25% of a regular FTE or 520 hours. At the hourly rate midpoint of $450, that translates to $234,000 billed. If you think about work in project terms versus hourly billing, you’re looking at one to two projects each month consuming between 20 and 40 work (billable) hours .
 
I won’t get into the nuance of consultative billing practices, but let’s just say, that’s not an unreasonable goal. I’ll leave further What-if’s to you. The bottom line, there is plenty of room in the market-place for you.
 
If you’d like to learn more, don’t hesitate to contact me for an initial, no charge, Hallway Consult…720-339-3585 Voice or Text or RFP@thirdevo.com.