WHEN IS THE SALE OF A COURSE ATTRIBUTED TO THE THERAPIST?

There's a very good reason why I don't support attributing the sale of a course to therapists at the time of the purchase and it’s important your team understand and appreciate the logic behind the reasoning.

The true work is in the delivery of the treatment. A therapist can sell a course that is made up of 6 treatments but if they deliver 4 of the treatments and the other two are delivered by a different therapist, then that second therapist won’t get any of the credit (and maybe financial reward) for their work as the credit has already been granted to the first therapist, even though they’re the one who did the work on two of the treatments. This often happens if the first therapist is away on annual leave or personal leave and of course if the original therapist leaves the business.

Here’s another problem that’s more common than one might think. A therapist is gung-ho about selling a course of treatments but moves the ‘delivering’ of the treatments into someone else’s column. It’s relatively easy to sell a course but there’s no integrity (or fairness) if the person who sells the course is financially rewarded and the therapist who does the work is not.

Further to that, here’s where it gets unreasonable for the business owner...

Let’s say a therapist sells a course of 6 treatments for $1,500 and delivers the first treatment at the time of the sale. That week’s productivity for the therapist is exaggerated if the entire $1,500 is included in the therapist’s total productivity figures.

Think about it, if their target for the week is $5,510 ($145/hour x 38 hours), they only need to sell 4 courses and nothing else that week to exceed the target and receive a financial reward for that week. This is not a true reflection of their productivity.

The reasonable allocation of the $1,500 sale is $250 for every treatment delivered by the therapist who delivered it, at the time it is delivered.

Let’s Look at Some Other Unfavourable Logistics:

1. Short-term Focus: Offering upfront incentives to therapists for selling courses of treatments may motivate them to sell more in the short term, but it could lead to a lack of focus on delivering a quality service. If therapists are incentivised on the ‘sale’ of the courses, they may prioritise the sale over what’s best for the client
2. Client Trust: Incentivising staff to sell courses could undermine the trust that clients have in the business. Selling a course of treatments is absolutely best for results but if not done with integrity, clients will feel the sales pressure which could damage the reputation of the business in the long term
3. Financial Risks: Prepaid courses of treatments can create financial risks for the business if clients are unable to attend all the sessions. If a client requests a refund for unused sessions, the business ends up being out of pocket if the therapist has already been paid an incentive for selling the course
4. Team Morale: This could all create competition and conflict within the team if they’re fighting for who the credit belongs to, leading to resentment and bad blood among team members, which negatively impacts the overall performance of the business

It’s important to focus on delivering a quality, results-driven service to clients and building trust with them. Incentivising therapists on overall ‘performance’ which invariably leads to the right results for the client is a win/win/win for all.