More with less?!? How about more with more?

I have had several conversations with colleagues over the last couple weeks and a particular theme began to emerge. In general, a topic that seems to come up is that our pharmacies are being asked to do more. There is an increase in demand for services and there is an increase in demanding services. While I truly hope you do not often have to deal with demanding customers, I trust you know what I am talking about. 

So, on one hand, we have an increase in demand. 

In the other hand, we have less. Less of everything. Less help, less time, less margin, perhaps even the appearance of less agency to be able to change your situation.

In short, we are all being asked to do more with less. Sound familiar?

You get to the end of the day, and you have quite a list of things that you had high hopes of getting to but did not. You have more work than one day can absorb. 

What's even worse is when you find yourself dealing with the same problem day after day. And if it isn’t the same, you find problems that are eerily related. 

That was my life for years! 

When I served on the clinical team, we found ourselves doing everything we could to participate in every “clinical” opportunity that came down the pike. Allow me to explain why I put “clinical” in quotes. At that time, anything that did not neatly fit into the traditional dispensing model was labeled as “clinical” and it came to our team to oversee. If there was a grand opening event, and we had a nurse on site doing blood pressures and finger stick blood tests, it was clinical. If it was a group promoting education to prevent diabetes, it was clinical. If it was immunization services, it was clinical. If it was testing refill synchronization, it was clinical. If it was remote temperature monitoring for cold chain products, it was clinical. And if it was comprehensive medication reviews, it was clinical.

One of our co-workers at the time observed that our clinical programs were “a mile wide and an inch deep.” Truth be told, he was right. We had to evaluate our opportunities to see where we had the greatest likelihood of gaining some traction. In those days, the biggest opportunity was in expanding immunization services. In the first few years, I am sure the gross revenue generated by these services did not even cover the payroll for our department, but there was improvement.

A major step we took was in offering flu clinics to employers. This became a great way of moving larger amounts of product and serving more people in a shorter time. But it also opened the door to all kinds of problems. Each time a problem came up, we tried our best to solve the problem based on the information we had available. This was exhausting! 

If you were to ask me at that time if I was a good leader, I would say “yes!” As I look back on my leadership in those days, I believe average would have been a strong overstatement of the reality of my leadership.

What has changed? I learned that I could learn to be a better leader. I also learned that there are principles and systems that we can use to propel us forward. Perhaps the most important thing I learned is that I need complete control over me to become a better leader. And that is where I started. I started with me. Immediately, I started to improve. My team started to improve. We got better at solving problems. We got better at preventing problems. So many good things started happening. It was a truly an enjoyable environment.

I don't know where you find yourself today, dear reader. But if you find yourself in a situation where you feel that you are being asked to do more with less, allow me to encourage you. You can become more. You absolutely can! My mentor once told me to never wish it was easier. I should endeavour to become better instead. Do not wish for fewer problems. Wish for more solutions. You, my friend, are more than capable of coming up with more solutions!

Between Christmas and New Year’s, my daughter wanted to watch the Lord of the Rings trilogy of movies. If you have ever seen those movies, there is a scene in the first movie where this odd band of heroes is arguing over who will accept the task of destroying the One Ring. The argument is settled when Frodo steps forward and says he will do it. His only pause is that he does not know the way.

Perhaps that describes you. I know it described me. There is a major journey you need to take, but perhaps you do not know the way.

When we meet next, I will begin to share with you the four foundational principles that you can use to help you find the way. You can use these principles to become a better leader. You can also use these principles in any other area of your life advance yourself.  If you want to become a better pharmacist, they will work. If you want to become a better parent, they will work. If you want to become a better partner, they will work. If you want to become financially independent, they will work. If you want to become physically fit, they will work. I can say with a high degree of confidence that whatever area of your life you want to grow and improve in, these four principles will help you.  We will begin the journey in just seven days!

Until next time

Jesse McCullough, PharmD

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