If you're struggling to meet daily production goals in your independent pharmacy, finding the reason for that frustrating problem means evaluating your pharmacy workflow – the way your work gets done – step by step. Doing this isn't as simple as it may sound, which is exactly why workflow problems often linger unnoticed long enough to have an impact on production, as well as other important aspects of your business – including your bottom line. To help you accurately identify inefficiencies in your everyday workplace routine, we've put together some basic tips on how to evaluate your pharmacy workflow.
Why Evaluate Pharmacy Workflow?
Chances are you're pretty sure you already know exactly how work gets done in your pharmacy. However, being right in the middle of that process on a daily basis can actually make it hard to spot inefficiencies, since we tend to focus on getting things done rather than the mechanics of how they are done. Upon evaluating those mechanics, many independent pharmacists are surprised at the little things they're missing, small inefficiencies in the process that can really add up in terms of the quantity and quality of work done throughout the day.
Break Your Dispensing Process Down
Getting a handle on just where those inefficiencies are is done most easily by breaking your workflow process down into individual steps, from order entry to delivery of the finished product into the patients hands. That means taking a step back and observing your workflow as if you were an outsider. Better yet, enlist the help of an outsider – an impartial friend, family member or perhaps even a consultant – to help you evaluate your daily routines objectively. Once you've documented each small step in the overall process, evaluating just how efficiently each one of them is being completed is your next task.
Key Areas of Pharmacy Workflow to Examine
While it is important to look at each step of your pharmacy workflow with a critical eye, there are some key areas to which you'll want to pay special attention – areas where inefficiencies are common. Traffic flow within the workspace is frequently the biggest issue in terms of lost time and production potential, so chances are that spending a little extra time evaluating this aspect of your operation will pay off in greater efficiency.
Creating a flow chart that depicts movement patterns in the workplace is a great way to get an accurate overview, helping you answer important questions about those patterns, such as whether there is a lot of unnecessary back and forth for supplies, or if traffic is bottlenecking in certain areas. Perhaps there are frequent delays as employees search for supplies in poorly-organized storage areas, or too much time spent traveling for those supplies due to poorly-equipped workstations.
Other common workflow problems are steps that are out of sync with the process, causing work to pile up, rather than moving along smoothly to the next step. Perhaps prescriptions are piling up awaiting verification, for instance, or order entry is taking more time than it should due to outdated technology. Maybe more staff should be assigned to certain steps to keep things moving along, or perhaps you simply need to clarify exactly who is responsible for completing each step.
While this isn't the complete guide to evaluating pharmacy workflow, these tips can certainly help you get started. Each small inefficiency that you find and resolve will shave a bit of time off of the overall process, a step in the right direction when it comes to making meeting those daily production goals easier.
