Have dream … will prevail

Physician Executive, Nov-Dec, 2006 by Philippa Kennealy

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Changing course

Most physicians enjoy the actual practice of medicine to the extent that, for many of us, our personal identities become entwined with that of being a doctor.

It is daunting to picture walking away from the huge investment of time and money we have made in our careers, despite the many pressures we face as practitioners today. It is even more disturbing to imagine the feeling of no longer being a "real MD."

But for the restless physicians who yearn for something more, these feelings of loss are counterbalanced by the stronger urge to create something, shape a new adventure and build a path toward the expression of both a professional and a personal lifestyle.

For Reynolds, it was the coincidence of both business and personal challenges that necessitated her taking stock of her life. She paused long enough to recognize that she was finally ready to give up clinical practice and take advantage of a new opportunity that had arisen--to develop a national physician executive practice for an international executive search firm. She had reached a point of no return in her professional journey to entrepreneurship!

During the seven years of working as an independent physician executive search consultant under the auspices of a large firm, Reynolds once again suffered a "passion drought."

Her work was interesting, but not enough to give her the deep professional satisfaction she sought. However, what she did discover early in her new role as a recruiter was her talent and a love for coaching physician executives and educating them about the leadership roles they were seeking.

Fueled by her own experiences, some on-the-job-training in coaching and extensive reading on leadership, she responded to her longing to experience career passion again by exploring an idea for a business focused on physician leadership development.

She began by examining her needs. Being a seasoned self-evaluator by this time, she heeded her own lifestyle desire to be a "hands-on" single parent and to limit the demands for business travel, as well as her delight in going to nice resorts in wonderful locations.

She formed the Institute for Medical Leadership at the beginning of 2002, an executive coaching and physician leadership training company. She developed the curriculum and recruited a prestigious faculty for her medical society leadership development programs as well as for "chief of staff boot camps," which are held in nice resorts. Her business is thriving and so is she.

What do you really want?

The place to begin tackling the decision to go into business for ourselves begins with a hard and honest look at what personal and professional lifestyles we really want for ourselves, what we are capable of (far more than most of us can imagine) and what sacrifices we are willing to make.

Reynolds' experiences reinforced three key insights for a business start-up:

1. Have an exit strategy before you even launch your business. Create options for how to get out of your business if and when you desire or need to. Plan to sell the business, partner with someone, shut it down and walk away with sufficient savings set aside for that "rainy day" to enable you to start again, or keep working on the business until it dies its natural death. Reynolds now has such a plan for her current business, something she learned the hard way when her emergency room venture failed as a result of the unanticipated natural disasters.