Pharmacy U news

A bane of my existence in an earlier part of my pharmacy career came around prescription transfer coupons. The company I worked for at the time would put coupons in the weekly circular to invite and entice new patients to transfer some (or all) of their prescriptions to our pharmacy. These promotions would have good results to bring new patients to our pharmacy, but we would struggle to keep them. Why do you suppose that was?

Hockey has been a big part of my life since the ages of VHS tapes and dial-up internet. While I no longer play competitively (or rewind my movies), I take pride in coaching my kids’ teams. It is here that I have come to realize a similar role hockey coaches and pharmacy managers play in enabling the difficult conversations.

What difference can five minutes make for you? Will your pharmacy business be different? How about the way you interact with staff and patients? Or the way you do the jobs you do every day?

To be able to show up purposefully during the work, we need to get purposeful rest. In a profession with countless shortages of personnel and growing responsibility it is extremely difficult to get the rest. The trouble is, if we do not, we will never adapt and be stuck rushing our workouts with little gains.

Dr. Idrees Mughal, known fondly as Dr. Idz, is an evidence-based educator and TikTok celebrity with millions of followers, as well as hundreds of thousands of followers on other social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. If you have never heard of him or watched his videos, you don’t know what you’re missing!

The entry point of an employee into an organization is an important time. Putting in work and patience in the time leading up to this is something a pharmacy leader needs to be meticulous and calculated about. Rush this process and mistakes can surface that are nearly impossible to fix.

It's an often-overlooked feature of high-performing workplaces, but good bosses know that fun can be a great stress reliever, team-builder and motivator. When you make your workplace more fun, you can foster higher employee engagement, which makes it easier to keep and attract staff.

The local pharmacy is a wonderful illustration of a place where leadership is required. Each member of the staff as well as each patient has unique needs. The leader recognizes the best way to serve each person is by tailoring the approach for each person and situation. This is definitely not a science, but an art form that develops over time as it is nurtured.