We briefly touched on this topic last month in the Keys to Greatness segment of our newsletter, but the concept is worth repeating.  Success or failure for many pharmacy initiatives is based on the approach to implementation.

Part of our initial and ongoing engagements with our clients is long-range analysis and planning.  We like to have our clients think about and anticipate the needs of their business by the end of the quarter, by the end of the year, or even next year.  We want to work to anticipate possible disruptions or take advantage of opportunities.  We also like to start our planning for new projects or initiatives by looking at the big picture and the ideal state:

  • What is the overall goal of implementing this project?
  • How will it benefit the pharmacy in the short and long term?
  • What will it look like when we’re done?

This approach can be very helpful for owners and management to brainstorm ideas and to achieve big things.  This process can also anticipate potential pitfalls before they happen.    However, when it comes to implementation, presenting a plan in this way to the staff can often create a sense of overwhelm and lead to frustration or paralysis.

When it comes to implementing changes in the pharmacy, regardless or size or scope, we find it best to present a new process in small, easily implemented steps. 

  • What needs to be done? 
  • How will it be done? 
  • When will it be done?

Even though the owners and managers are thinking about what needs to happen in the long term, the staff in the pharmacy are thinking about what they need to accomplish this week, this day, or even within the next hour.  They need to prioritize their workflow to achieve the necessary throughput to keep the pharmacy running efficiently.  Consequently, big ideas often end up being either overwhelming or frankly unimportant in the scheme of the size of the stack of baskets on the counter. 

I distinctly remember the negative effects of this BIG thinking as a young pharmacist.  At the time I was working for a large chain.  They made a very public announcement of the goal of having their pharmacists administer 1 million flu shots for the upcoming flu season.  This was in the early days of pharmacist-provided immunizations, and most of the pharmacists were already nervous about vaccinating.  This announcement added an extra layer of anxiety around managing this additional responsibility in workflow.  The result was a state of panic all around my store and within my district.  No one could imagine how we would administer 1 million flu shots in a 3-month span.  However, the reality was that 1 million flu shots divided by 5,000 locations equated to approximately 200 doses per store over 3 months.  Each pharmacist needed to figure out how to incorporate 2 vaccines per day.  That was manageable. 

Another real world example to offer – a pharmacy wanted to grow and develop their medication synchronization (medsync) program.  The pharmacy already had the med refills of approximately 50 patients being managed this way.  The owner, after hearing how impactful this program could be for pharmacies that had a much larger number of patients “under management” wanted to rapidly grow the pharmacy’s medsync program.  The owner wanted to reach 500 medsync patients within the year - a growth rate of 900%!   When the owner shared this goal with their staff, the staff were not as excited.   The staff felt that number was unrealistic – how could they get from 50 to 500 in one year?  Where would they find the time to do the extra work needed?  As a result, without the staff’s buy in to this bigger picture one year goal, the project didn’t start well and medsync growth was minimal.  

When we got involved, we helped re-frame the owner’s medsync growth goal in a different way.  After reinforcing the importance and value of a larger medsync program (including how the staff would benefit), we asked the staff what a more reasonable growth target would be – suggesting an average of 2 patients added to the medsync program per day.   The staff quickly accepted that they could manage that number – 2 patients added to medsync per day (focusing on converting existing pharmacy patients with regular med refills).   Then we shared with the staff and ownership what would be the result if the pharmacy could continue at this medsync growth rate of two patients added per day.   Each week would represent 10 additional patients added to the medsync program.  Continuing at this rate over a full year (52 weeks), the pharmacy would be able to achieve the owner’s goal of reaching 500+ patients in the medsync program, while keeping the work at a manageable level for the staff.  

In our Blog last month, Getting Ahead with Clinical Services: A Community Pharmacy Case Study, we  wrote about implementing clinical services at a community pharmacy.  The implementation using this small focus approach worked very effectively.

Furthermore, when implementing changes in this way, you allow the staff to see success early and help them to address problems that come up before the process becomes too big.  Perhaps you had a small goal, but you find that even that goal isn’t being achieved.  It gives everyone an opportunity to look at the process in more detail and try to identify barriers that are making the goals unachievable.  Perhaps the planning process failed to account for a variable that was mostly unknown to management but is apparent to the staff on the ground.  Before frustration can set in, roadblocks can be identified and processes can be changed.

Once you have the small goals achieved, you can adapt, scale up, rinse and repeat the process.  Change snowballs and efficiencies grow.  And success on the part of the staff builds confidence that they can achieve what is needed for the pharmacy to be successful.

Lastly, this approach is effective for owners who plan at a larger level.  Yes, there are many winning strategies in the world of pharmacy but often, it is the details of the implementation regarding the time, energy, and commitment necessary that might make a particular strategic decision positive or negative for a given pharmacy at a given time.  So, we take the “small” approach with the owners and managers to get them to understand all of the small steps it will take to make the win big.  To see if the juice is worth the squeeze.

 

The PEAK Solution

PEAK Pharmacy Solutions is ready to help you take the necessary steps so your pharmacy can thrive in 2026.  This is what we do - helping pharmacies upgrade and transform their business to meet today’s challenges and succeed.    We have relevant pharmacy-related knowledge and experience working with community pharmacies, including many top performing pharmacies.   Let PEAK help you take your pharmacy performance to the next level.