Five questions turn a bad week into the next good decision.
A new hire resigns after two training sessions with you.
You spend the next few days replaying it.
If you run a physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech, or mental health practice, you have had a week like that. Replaying it feels like thinking, and it rarely teaches you anything.
The training that went wrong
In a private coaching call, I walked an owner through a week that had just gone sideways.
She had trained two new clinicians herself. Both told her they felt special to be trained by the owner.
Afterward, both felt they had not been trained well. One resigned and said she did not like how the owner had spoken to her.
The owner’s first instinct had been to take it all on. She told herself she could handle it.
I asked her to debrief it with me instead.
Reflection pays back more than extra hours
Researchers at Harvard Business School found that trainees who spent the last fifteen minutes of each day reflecting scored almost 23 percent higher on the final test than a group that kept working. The group that kept working had put in the extra time every day.
Harvard Business Review’s study of the Army’s after-action review found that these reviews often catalog mistakes without improving the next attempt.
A debrief earns its keep in the last question.
Five questions to debrief a hard week
A debrief is a reflection on one event, one experience, or one stretch of time, even the last thirty days. Ask the questions in order.
Start with what went well
It is easy to jump straight to what went wrong. Starting with the positives moves your brain into a better frame before the hard part.
The owner found the training sessions enjoyable. She also learned how onboarding actually works in her practice, which she had never watched up close.
Name what you would do differently
She had not set a boundary when one new hire got extra friendly. She saw another struggling with the technology, gave direct feedback, and kept going when she should have handed the training to someone else.
I put it to her this way: the owner shouldn’t be cooking the burger, working the register, and holding the sign out front.
Look at how you handled it
Diving in to fix things is the mantra of every owner.
She had also told herself she could work harder. In her head, the solution was more hours from her.
Write down what you learned
The urge to jump in had felt like helping, and it left two clinicians feeling untrained.
She also saw a pattern of agreeing in the moment and absorbing the upset later.
Write the lessons down. You will be tested on them again.
Choose what changes next time
This is the question that makes the debrief worth the time. She decided to stay out of onboarding unless a direct report needed her.
That rule protects her, the new hires, and the managers who own the process.
Habits change by replacement. I told her that if you want to stop brushing your teeth with your right hand, pick up the brush with your left.
Once a habit forms, it takes willpower to hold back the triggered response, and a tired person tends to repeat what they have always done.
Give the urge a different move. Ask the manager, “Is there anything you need me to do?” and let them answer, “We’ve got it.”
I have been this owner. I once trained new hires myself and covered maybe forty percent of what they needed, because I don’t know half the details. What I wanted all along was someone to tell me they had it, and once I got clear on that, they could.
Debrief the last thirty days
Pick one hard event from the last thirty days.
Write the five answers on a single page and spend the most time on the last one. If a rule comes out of it, tell the people it affects.
Are you heading to PPS in Colorado Springs?
We’ll be at the Broadmoor in Colorado Springs for PPS, November 11 to 14. Find us at Booth 820, right next to Prompt.
Stop by and ask us what your practice is worth.
If you want special access to something we’re putting together during the event, email Grace at grace@practicefreedomu.com. Spots are limited.
Got a story? I want to hear it.
We’re starting to record the next round of Freedom by Design.
This series is all about PT, OT, SLP, and mental health practice owners who’ve crossed $1 million, grown to multiple locations, or sold their practice.
If that’s you, you’ve done something hard. And somewhere out there is an owner stuck right where you used to be. Your story could be what gets them unstuck.
No script. No pressure. Just you and me talking about what you went through and what got you to where you are now.
If you’re open to it, the form takes a couple of minutes:
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