Pharmacy Owners – What’s Your Time Worth?

About a month ago, I went to wake up my kids, and noticed that my little boys weren’t quite so little anymore. Feet sprawled over their toddler sized mattresses in every possible direction. There was no more avoiding it. It was time to upgrade to twin size mattresses and they’d need a matching bed frame to go with them.

After shopping and research, my other half and I had the brilliant idea to make our own loft beds. After all, plans are readily available online and it can’t be that hard right? A good solid weekend of work and we’d have our problem solved, and hopefully for less than purchasing something similar would cost.

To make a long story short, no one was hurt in the making of these bed frames. But many times, throughout the much more than a weekend long process, I caught myself thinking about how much easier it would have been if I’d just clicked that order button. How many less blisters would I have from sanding and how much less bright blue paint (yes, bright blue) would I still be trying to wash off my hands? Most importantly, what other things could I have been doing with my time, and was all that extra work worth it?

It can be tempting to look at the cost for something and decide that it’s not worth it. That money in the bank is worth more than the extra hours you spend on one task or another. Especially when it’s something we think of as a luxury, or at least less than a necessity. But what is your time really worth? If you ran the numbers, would they really look like you expect them to?

A single pharmacy point-of-sale system can automate and streamline dozens of daily tasks in your pharmacy; tasks that you currently spend your own time on or pay others to complete. Think about how much time you spend with accounts receivable, purchasing & receiving, updating product prices or digging up signatures for audits, just to name a few. Now do some quick math. How many hours a day are you burning on these processes? And what does that time cost you? At best, it’s the hourly rate paid to an employee. But maybe it’s your time. Rushed dinners and missed football games.

This time vs. cost discussion isn’t a new one. But it’s perhaps the biggest reason that investing in a robust, feature rich, pharmacy point-of-sale system is absolutely worth it. It goes beyond compliance issues, customer service implications and staff satisfaction. Time is something you can’t get back. So why waste it if you don’t have to?