The first quarter of 2011 comes to a close today. Today is the future you’ve been creating for the past three months. How does it look? How does it feel?

I often have a discussion with our Rosen Chiropractic Coaching clients about a Magic Wand. I often ask our coaching clients if they’d rather have a Crystal Ball or a Magic Wand?  (We have a poll right now on Facebook if you’d like to vote!)

Many people say right away, “A crystal ball, of course!  Then I could see into the future of what will happen.”  After discussing the value of seeing what is going to happen to adapt or prepare for it, up comes the discussion of the Magic Wand.

What if you held, in the power of your heart and hand, the ability to create the future?  What if  you could waive your Magic Wand and, voila!

The reality is, you do hold the power in your head, heart and hands of a Magic Wand.  But instead of just waiving it, you have to get clear on what you want, set objectives and take consistent action and do the work to achieve it!

Sometimes when our Rosen Coaching clients get stumped by an obstacle or a roadblock, I love to come back to the Magic Wand.  I say, “IF you had a Magic Wand right now, what would you create, what would you do?” It opens up a world of possibility that wasn’t there before.  It’s not a stroke of coaching genius, just a simple way to see what is possible.

Oh, how I truly wish I had a real Magic Wand!  I’d waive it and make the world a happy, peaceful place where chiropractors are the recognized leaders of true health care and the wellness revolution.  A world where people trust in their bodies, and in life itself.  I’d make every chiropractor’s office as busy as they could handle!

The reality is, I have the power of a Magic Wand to envision what I want to create and the dedication and drive to do what it takes to get there.

Do you want to borrow my Magic Wand? It’s simple, but not easy.

What will you create for your future next quarter?

Tags: Chiropractic Coach, Chiropractic Coaching, Chiropractic Consultant, Chiropractic Practice Success, chiropractic profession, Crystal Ball, future, Goals, Magic Wand, Rosen Chiropractic Coaching, rosen coaching, Success, wellness chiropractic practice management

So the New Year is upon us!  We have a reflective perspective of last year and what we accomplished or didn’t. And we have a vision, hope and goals of what we want 2010 to be like.

Have you taken the time to do an inventory of your life? Where in your life are you incongruent or not performing and leading how you’d like to? Paraphrasing Dr. Patrick Gentempo, the level of incongruency leads to a proportionate level of destruction. As chiropractic coaches, we at Rosen Coaching help chiropractors reach new levels of success in all areas of their lives, including how to thrive in a true wellness model.

I speak to chiropractors day in and day out. And I truly feel it is time that our profession stand up and lead by example.  Are you the epitome of health, energy and vitality?  Is your diet full of rich, whole foods? Do you exercise daily? Do you live a healthy, vitalistic chiropractic lifestyle?  If you don’t, it’s time. And don’t try and hide it – take a stand to share with your office the lifestyle changes you are making. The time is now to create excellence in YOUR health. And ask them to join you.  If you do, good for you! Set some new goals and ways you can push your healthy lifestyle to the next level.

Excellence, leadership and health are not created by chance, but by choice: Every day and in every moment.  Choose to be a true leader in your community who leads by example. Actions are so much more powerful than words covering incongruence.  Be the change you want to see.  This is your year to lead your community to health and wellness!

Tags: Certainty, Chiropractic Coach, Chiropractic Coaching, Chiropractic Consultant, Chiropractic Practice Management, chiropractic profession, Congruency, Goals, Health, Leadership, rosen coaching, Success, Wellness Chiropractic

September 18th, 2009 is chiropractic’s 114th birthday!  On that day, Daniel David Palmer made the connection between the spine, nervous system and overall health and well-being. And the trusting deaf  cleaner Harvey Lillard allowed DD to adjust him, which resulted in his hearing being restored.

We’ve come a long way since then: chiropractic is a household name, from the original Palmer Chiropractic schools there are now dozens around the world including Australia, New Zealand, U.K and most recently Barcelona Spain! We’ve done a great job getting our name out there.

But where we’ve failed miserably in chiropractic is letting the public know what we do. I dare you to go outside your practice and ask 100 people what chiropractic is. What would they say? Neck pain? Back pain? Check out this video of someone who braved the streets and dared to ask:

What about inside your practice?  If Dr. Rosen and I sat in your reception area and asked the next 100 people who came in, “What are you hear for?  What is chiropractic?” What would they say?  If you don’t like the answers you are hearing, it means they don’t get the whole story.  You might be educating them, but they way you are educating them isn’t working. If they can’t articulate the whole story themselves, we’re in trouble. Our practice and our profession.

We feel there is a communication crisis in that the public does not know what we do. And our profession is stuck at a minimal percentage of the population utilizing our services. And the ones who do don’t really know that we are health and wellness doctors. They think we ‘crack bones’ to help back pain.

So what can you do to celebrate chiropractic’s birthday? How about commit to yourself to clearly define your Certainty as a chiropractor?  How about learning how to communicate the simple chiropractic truths in a way that people ‘get it’ and stay, pay and refer?  It is time for chiropractors to become the leaders of TRUE healthcare.  If you’re interested, we can help!  We are committed to helping the profession grow to lead the wellness revolution and transform the way the public perceives chiropractic care. We want you to THRIVE in a TRUE wellness model!

Tags: chiropractic, Chiropractic Coach, Chiropractic Coaching, Chiropractic Consultant, Chiropractic Practice Management, chiropractic profession, chiropractor, communication, Leadership, Wellness Chiropractic, wellness re

We hear again and again that our profession has an identity crisis, but from our perspective, we have a communication crisis!

What chiropractors know (no matter if they practice in a pain-based model or a wellness-based model) is that we help people have better lives! We’ve surveyed hundreds and hundreds of chiropractors around the world, and no matter how they practice, they all recognize that we can not only help people with their pain and symptoms, but also with improved function and a better quality of life!

Our problem as a profession is that the message that we’ve communicated and marketed to the public isn’t unified or clear.  Not like the tequila marketing sign above.  The public thinks that we help with neck and back pain and we know we help people get healthy and stay healthy to essentially have a better life!

As a profession, what we’ve been doing for communicating the chiropractic message isn’t working. Otherwise, at this 114th birthday of chiropractic, we’d be seeing more than 8-10% of the population.  If people understood what we do, because our communication and marketing was working, we’d be a lot further along right now.

If you are interested in finding out more about how to communicate in a true wellness model, in a care vs. scare approach, we encourage you to check out our LAASR program and seek out the support of a coach.  Lecturing and telling people until you’re blue in the face isn’t working. We need to figure out what people really want and then show them how to get it.  Let’s find a better way and start to move our profession into the position of leadership in the wellness revolution we deserve.

Tags: chiropractic, chiropractic birthday, Chiropractic Practice Management, Chiropractic Practice Success, chiropractic profession, communication, communication crisis, identity crisis, LAASR, Leadership, Wellness Chiropractors, wellness model, wellness revolution

It’s easy to be mediocre.  A mediocre person, a mediocre mother, a mediocre friend, and certainly it is easy to be a mediocre chiropractor.  Look around, most everyone is doing it.  Mastery however is difficult.  Mastery takes hard work, dedication and keeping a big vision in the forefront of your mind and the stamina to follow through.  To be an overnight success takes 10,000 hours of work.  It means you have to push through The Dip. 

What does it take to be a master in the art, science, and philosophy of chiropractic? Even more importantly is what does it take to be a master of communication about our truth of health, healing and chiropractic?  As a start you need to understand personality types and communicaiton/behavioural styles of people. You need to LAASR your Visit 1, Visit 2, Daily Interactions, ReAssessments & ReReports communication to lead people forward.

Do you know what the common denominator of all successful chiropractic practices have? Chiropractors with certainty.  They are clear on their vision and how they are going to achieve it.  They know what they bring to the table.  And they speak their truth boldly and in a way that people can hear them.

Are you the best chiropractor you can be?  Are you communicating chiropractic to the people in your office and community so that they ‘get it’?  Can you turn people on to a healthy lifestyle that includes chiropractic care for them and their families for a lifetime?  Write down what having mastery in your chiropractic career would look like. Then write down the things that would need to change or improve to get there. What support do you need?  A coach?  A consultant?  Practice management tips?   An action plan? Accountability?

Most people get successful ‘enough’ and help ‘enough’ people.  They hit a plateau and get comfortable.  Are you pushing yourself towards mastery?  It’s your life. It’s your practice.  You get to choose. Let us know if we can help. There are too many people sick and dying in your community because they don’t know what you know.

Tags: 10000 hours, Chiropractic Coach, Chiropractic Coaching, chiropractic profession, coach, communication, consultant, LAASR, Leadership, mastery, mediocre, mediocrity, Motivation, Practice Management, Success, The Dip, wellness chiropractic practice management

 

 

A More Effective Swine Flu Vaccine

When it comes to the newly-hyped media craze of swine flu, how are you communicating it in your chiropractic office?  Are you part of the chiropractic profession getting caught up in the fear tactics propagated by the government and media or are you grounded in your chiropractic principles?  How is your certainty as a chiropractor?  It’s easy to talk about chiropractic and immune function when people are well, but what about when faced with the proposed ‘Swine Flu Pandemic’?  Can you keep yourself together, use your emotional intelligence skills and not allow the panic to hijack your amygdala?  Can you keep your critical thinking about cause and effect, and your common sense approach to health, wellness and disease to lead your community through this challenge?

My friend, Alain Desaulniers, D.C. has used this photograph and made a poster for his office that says at the bottom, “Chiropractic Care Strengthens Your Immune System. Stay Well Adjusted!”  (He has given permission for other chiropractors to use it, so email me if you would like it).

The last time Swine Flu made an appearance was 1976 and the government quickly pushed through a flu vaccine (doesn’t this normally take time to manufacture “safely”, if there is such a thing?), used fear to mass vaccinate and 25 times more people died from the flu vaccine than of the flu itself. Congressman Dr. Ron Paul’s video on Swine Flu recalls this event and states, “The government shouldn’t be in the medical business”.  This time it is an interestingly more complex virus, a recombinant H1N1-H5N1 avian/human/swine flu virus never to be seen before.  My microbiology might just be rusty but I can’t help but wonder if this is natural genetic evolution or a laboratory virus gotten free?

Let’s look to chiropractic’s history and originating philosophy to on understand the cause and effect of disease, especially infectious illness:

“One question was always uppermost in my mind in my search for the cause of disease.  I desired to know why one person was ailing and his associate, eating at the same table, working in the same shop, at the same bench was not.  Why? … This question has worried thousands for centuries and was answered September, 1895.”    ~D.D. Palmer, The Chiropractor’s Adjuster (1910)

Dr. Fred Barge continued on this theme when he used to say, “Do rats cause garbage or does garbage cause rats?”  Dr. Kevin Donka of Chirothots has continued Dr. Barge’s message with a twist, “Flies don’t cause garbage!”  

Common sense tells us that rats and flies are attracted to dirty places where there is decaying matter to feed upon.  Just because rats and flies are present at a garbage dump or a dirty restaurant doesn’t mean they caused the garbage, they are an effect of the garbage!  So why do some people get sick and some people stay healthy? It depends on the cleanliness of the body’s environment!  If your body is weak, your resistance is down, and your cells are decaying, doesn’t it make sense that the germ scavengers would find home, food and shelter there?  Of course it does!  The germs don’t cause the disease, they are present when disease is!  It is your internal resistance of your immune system that determines whether you get sick or not. Keep in mind it is called the ‘Germ Theory’ not the ‘Germ Fact’!

Whether or not the U.S. Homeland Security is appropriately given the power to make decisions about the health of Americans, (a political discussion of its own), what are chiropractors doing to coach the people they care for about strengthening their body’s own ‘Homeland Security’?  As a Wellness Chiropractic Coach and Consultant at Rosen Coaching, we coach chiropractors to not only communicate and educate people about the 3 Dimensions of Stress and what causes subluxations, but to provide ongoing communication about the ingredients for a healthy body, first and foremost clear nerve system communication.  What else can people  do to strengthen their immune systems and promote health? Proper nutrition, vitamins and minerals including high doses of vitamin C, movement and exercise, hydration, rest and relaxation, fresh air, sunshine/vitamin D, mental clarity, stress management, emotional peace and fun!

As a chiropractor looking to lead your community to health and wellness, to have practice success and growth as well as to have the life of your dreams you need to stand up, tell the truth and show people there is another way! Let us know if we can help!

Tags: Amygdala, care tactics, Cause and Effect, Certainty, Challenges, Chiropractic Coach, chiropractic profession, communication, Congressman Dr. Ron Paul, Disease, Emotional Intelligence, Fear Tactics, Germs, Immune System, Internal Resistance, Leadership, rosen coaching, Success, Swine Flu, wellness chiropractic practice management

  VS.   

If you are a chiropractor still practicing in a pain based model of symptom relief, I hope you will realize (soon) that the future of the profession lies in wellness care. Like dentistry realized fifty years ago that waiting to pull rotten teeth from people’s mouths with toothaches is antiquated, our chiropractic profession is starting to see the light.  Treating people’s backache’s and using adjustments like expensive aspirin isn’t keeping up with the times.  It’s time to think different. 

People want wellness, look around! From organic food, to fitness gyms people are looking to get well and stay well rather than wait for a crisis.  Our culture is in the middle of a wellness revolution ~ don’t get left behind!  It is time for the chiropractic profession to lead this wellness revolution.  It is up to each one of us.

At Rosen Coaching, we look at two key stats as a litmus test for a wellness practice: your retention or PVA (patient visit average) and the percentage of internal referrals.  You may think you are running a wellness chiropractic practice, but if your PVA is below 60 and your internal referrals are low ~ it tells us that the people in your practice don’t ‘get’ chiropractic like you think they do. If I sat in your reception room and asked the next 100 people through the door why they are there, what would they say?

So what are the symptoms of practice not succeeding and not congruent as a wellness practice?  Of course, low PVA/Retention and low internal referrals as mentioned above.  But what else?  A wellness philosophy for how you manage your practice is key. Do you have systems and a communication model that is reactive as opposed to proactive?  Do  you wait for the number of new people to drop down before you do any marketing or do you have a perpetual, balanced approach marketing calendar?  Do you wait to have staffing issues or do you spend time each week cultivating a Dream Team?  Do you wait for people to drop out of care before addressing their concerns, or do you listen between the words and identify the symptoms of when a person receiving your care is unhappy?  Are you afraid to address their concerns and sweep them under the rug with an assertive or non-assertive ‘brush off’, or do you address them right then and there?  Want some more examples? Disorganization, stress, lack of income, lack of new clients, people don’t ‘get it’, clients don’t follow your recommendations, they don’t sign up for care, they don’t keep their appointments. The list can go on…

Truly the biggest difficulty I see in the profession is the amount of scare tactics that are propagated by some of the biggest chiropractic practice management companies out there.  I truly believe that there is no place for fear and manipulation in a wellness practice, as it is completely incongruent with the very nature of a wellness philosophy.  It’s time to think different and start using trust, hope and truth to help people see what is possible for their well-being. If you are going to have a wellness chiropractic practice, leave the scare tactics at the door.  And start to use a proactive congruent wellness approach in your systems, communications, and practice management.

Tags: care tactics, Chiropractic Coaching, chiropractic profession, communication, future, pain based model, rosen coaching, scare tactics, wellness model, wellness practice management, wellness revolution