4 Tips to Achieve Success and Build Stronger Professional Relationships
Starting in a new setting or simply looking to renew your skillset? Whether just out of school, working in a new environment for the first time, or just wanting to refresh your connection with your career, it can be useful to take a step back and renew your focus on clinical education, teamwork, and workflows.
As a traveling therapist, I became an expert at being continuously successful no matter the changes going on around me. Here are my tips for success.
1. Bring Strong Clinical Skills
Patients and therapists love working with clinicians who are well educated and goal-oriented. Working with a strong clinical base and confidence can earn you the engagement of your patients and help to form strong bonds with your colleagues.
Continuing education, like MedBridge’s growing library of ASHA-accredited courses, is a fantastic starting point for building a robust clinical skillset. Accessible, interactive, and mobile courses are an engaging method for expanding your clinical skills to meet the needs of your new setting or patient population. With products like MedBridge, you have a wealth of education available anytime, anywhere, without having to spend the time and money to attend a live seminar.
2. Make Good Impressions
People make their first and lasting impression of you almost immediately upon introduction. Making a good first impression with co-workers and patients is fundamental to building mutual respect and trust.
To ensure good first impressions, arrive on time to appointments and dress professionally. When meeting people for the first time maintain good eye contact, good posture, and smile while introducing yourself. It’s important to keep a positive attitude and let your coworkers and patients know why you are excited to be working with them.
3. Ask Questions and Take Notes
Use any extra time to your advantage. If you’re just starting in a new setting or workplace this can be especially relevant. Do not be shy about asking for clarification or help around the facility. Keep a clipboard with extra paper to write down important details of the new environment such as:
- Security codes for doors
- Names of co-workers
- Important telephone extensions
- Pager numbers
Writing these pieces of relevant information down will make the adjustment to your new setting easier.
4. Be Flexible to Learn New Practices
Remember that every therapist or setting may do things differently. Having a preconceived notion of how things are “typically” done when going into a new environment or working with someone new is a fast way to form walls with colleagues. Be open and flexible to new procedures and new ways to complete tasks. To establish good working relationships with colleagues it’s essential to have this flexibility.
Embrace Your Profession
Whether you are starting in a new setting or refreshing your professional skills, remember that clinical strength, first impressions, eagerness to learn, and the ability to be flexible can go a long way in advancing your practice. Embrace your profession with a positive attitude and flexibility to learn, and it will pay off in the respect and admiration of your patients and coworkers.
