Becoming a “Gun Physio” is not something that happens overnight.
It won’t be achieved by listening to a single podcast or reading a couple of blogs.
It’s not something you learn on a weekend course or can pick up by listening in to the room next door.
It takes a major commitment and the first step requires a paradigm shift.
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The Fallacy within the Cycle of Sacrifice
In an earlier blog I discussed the cycle of sacrifice.
- It starts by sacrificing personal time to do additional work
- This leads to resentment of the work itself.
- This leads to pushing back against work hours and future opportunities.
- Which leads to an inevitable guilt and lack of overall fulfilment.
It’s a vicious cycle.
The fallacy within the cycle of sacrifice exists thanks to what I call having an “employee mindset”.
This isn’t intended to be offensive to employees.
I’ve been an employee for 80% of my working career.
However it is an example of what happens when you have self-limiting beliefs.
This is because the habits you build early in your career compound over time.
And in the not too distant future you might want to mentor someone else or be looking to start your own practice.
And without developing the “core skills” early on, your destiny will be limited to mediocrity.
The Employee Mindset
As an employee you generally exchange your time for some sort of reward, usually financial.
In this game there are fixed rules.
Rules that are usually set at the start of the game, within an employee contract.
Psychologically this provides a baseline with an agreed equilibrium.
ie. I earn $40 per hour.
This is great for HR purposes and creating equality.
But where it comes unstuck is it leaves very little incentive for personal growth.
When an opportunity presents that could potentially lead to $1000’s of income, but said opportunity runs at a high opportunity cost, it is often denied.
For example attending professional development courses.
When I started my career this was an expectation but now it is so often considered optional.
With a finite mindset you might look at this as both a financial cost and a time burden.
To do a Sports level 1 course it likely costs close to $2000 and would take up an entire weekend, 16 hours.
Plus the opportunity cost of both the money and the time:
“I could finance my next overseas holiday.”
It is often hard to see how this would be net beneficial.
There is just no way that a single course is going to lead to 5K back in revenue for an employee (eg. 40% commission).
So… don’t expect to break even on these expenses within 12 months.
| Attend PD course | Flights, accommodation and expenses, Trip to Bali | |
| Fee | $2000 | $2000 |
| Return on investment | Updated clinical skills, better client outcomes | A well needed break, an opportunity to refresh and enjoy time with friends |
The First Step to Becoming a “Gun Physio”
But what if you were to look at this idea through a different lens?
What if every PD event, every tutorial, every course you attend is in fact a building block?
Like an intricate collection of skills being pieced together.
And at the beginning, the blocks that are being laid down don’t appear to be doing a lot.
However, over a longer timeline the returns begin to compound.
This early investment positions you to become both a better clinician and a more confident person.
Your journey towards being a “Gun Physio” will only be as long as you can maintain your own health and engagement.
This engagement needs to hold you strong through the hard times.
Our industry experience means lower wages and at times poor work-life balance.
This is particularly acute for those first starting out but I can assure you it gets better.
Nothing in life comes easily, and the concept of achieving success without some level of pain or sacrifice is completely ridiculous.
Unfortunately, time and time again, we lose great clinicians for want of money, better job satisfaction or more “impact”.
Becoming a “Gun Physio”
To be the best, you have to beat the best.
You need to develop a skill stack which contains all of these 3 things:
- Clinical skills – including the interpretation and understanding of complex problems
- Commercial skills – including sales, relationship marketing and understanding basic finances
- Personal skills – meaning strategies that help you to be your best self on a day-in-day-out basis
Currently, I feel there is an enormous stress on skill number one (clinical), a little bit of focus on number two (personal) and a complete lack of focus on number 3 (commercial).
When you work in the service industry, your job is to serve.
