Start and Grow a Private Advocacy Practice

Ripped from the Headlines…. a Warning for Health Advocates, Too

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A kidnapping and murder last weekend raises questions for all professionals who work one-on-one with strangers…. If it can happen to a real estate agent, it can happen to a health advocate, too. I’m referring to the headlines about Beverly Carter in Little Rock, Arkansas. She was a real estate agent who had gotten a call from a stranger to show a home she had listed for sale. And then she disappeared. Her body was found several days later in a shallow grave. See that second sentence? “She was a real estate agent who had gotten a call from a …

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You’re Not Charging Enough, and It’s Hurting Our Entire Profession

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What is it worth to find someone who can save your life? What is it worth to find someone who can provide quality to a life that has little or no quality because of health problems? What is it worth to find someone who can save you tens of thousands of dollars, or to prevent you from going bankrupt? What is it worth to find someone who can alleviate your fear, and provide peace of mind? …………….. I can tell you what it’s worth based on what I read in the press, in the APHA Forum, in my email and …

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The One Thing That Will Cause Your Private Advocacy Practice to Fail

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Here are samples of some inquiries I have received from people wanting to be advocates. See if you can guess what they all have in common: I want to help Medicaid patients find doctors who will take their insurance. We plan to help children with mental health issues find the help they need. I want to help young girls who find themselves pregnant find the social services they need to get them through their pregnancies. I want to work with churches and senior centers to help their members and attendees understand their medical care. I want to help lymphoma patients …

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Henry Ford, Mary Kay, Success and Patient Advocates

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It’s a holiday week, a quieter time for many businesses, and for that I hope to leave you with some food for thought to ponder your success as an advocacy practice owner… One of my favorite quotes is one that has been attributed to two well-known people. Henry Ford said it first:   If you think you can do a thing or think you can’t do a thing, you’re right. Then Mary Kay Ash (as in cosmetics) put it more eloquently: If you think you can, you can. And if you think you can’t, you’re right. Of course, the translation …

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Teaching Your Clients to Fish Starts by Leaving the Rod and Reel at Home

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“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”? (Maimonides) As a former classroom teacher, and now a teacher of advocates, I’ve always embraced the “teach a man to fish” concept. It’s part of my core. It’s in my DNA. It’s what I do with both my patient empowerment and my patient advocacy work. Many of you have been beneficiaries. And my great reward has been to watch you go off into the waters to successfully fish on your own as your practices grow and …

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Oh, It Was Nothing, Really

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As advocates working for clients with grave medical problems, or clients who battle their insurance companies to get what they need for their care, or could lose their entire financial foundations due to overwhelming medical bills, our work results in lifesaving and quality-of-life saving outcomes every day. That’s what we do. And then, when someone thanks us, way too many of us deflect the compliment. “Oh, it was nothing, really.” Nothing? It’s as if we are embarrassed to have been thanked, even though we are – secretly – pleased. This disconnect in our response to being thanked and recognized came …

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Asking WTWTTCH Helps to Overcome the Paralysis of Analysis

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Having just returned from the APHA Business and Marketing workshops in Tampa, and in reviewing my notes and questions from attendees, I’ve come to a new conclusion about why many people have so much trouble pulling the trigger to actually SAY they are in practice – the formal hanging of their shingle, as it were…. Regular readers know I call this the “paralysis of analysis” – that inability to take the last steps. I’ve written about it here, and I’ve made recommendations here, and in both those cases, I’ve made a pretty thorough case for why advocates should not be …

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