57. A Simple System to Track Your Caseload

As I continue covering simple systems SLPs can use in their practice, today I'm walking you through my step-by-step process for keeping track of clients. 

Are you sick and tired of feeling overwhelmed by all the things? I can help. Schedule a free consult today.

Come join the SLP Support Group on Facebook for more tips and tricks!

Follow me on Instagram! @theresamharp

Learn more about Theresa Harp Coaching here.

Transcript

Hello podcast listeners. Welcome back to the show. I am trying something new today. So. I think I mentioned this during last week's episode. And that was true. I was trying something new in terms of my system for podcast recording. And now here I am about a week later. Trying something else. That's new. 

So. I don't really know how this is gonna go, but, um, if you're kind of wondering, like what's going on behind the scenes, I am trying out testing out different. Programs for how to streamline my podcasting because the system that I was using just overall, my system that I've created for the podcast was not really meeting my needs any longer. 

And so I wanted to spice things up a little bit. So I'm trying a new program, new tech, it's, it's just all different. And we're going [00:01:00] to see how it goes. So that's, what's happening behind the scenes. I just had a power hour, where I was focused on putting the finishing touches on the, the lunch and learn that I'm hosting, on Thursday, July 25th. 

So I'm going to talk a little bit more about that. I'm so pumped for it. It is. Probably something. It is something I shouldn't say probably it is something that I should charge for. I'm not charging for it. I don't know if I will decide to charge for it at some point in the future. But this information that I have planned for Thursday's lunch and learn is so good. 

It's so important. It's so good. It's so helpful. And it's all about time management strategies with the neurodivergent brain in mind. I'm excited. I think it's going to be incredibly valuable. I hope that you [00:02:00] will join. There is a link in the show notes to register. There will be a replay that's available. 

So if you are not available on Thursday, July 25th. At 12 Eastern. Then that's okay. Click the link, sign up anyway. You'll get the replay and trust me when I tell you, you're not gonna wanna miss it. Even if you are someone who does not identify as being neurodivergent or you don't have any diagnosis, the strategies that I'm sharing in this lunch and learn. Are going to help you no matter what so hope to see you there live. 

And if not hope that you can catch the replay. But enough about that today, what I'm talking about in today's episode. Is all about. A system for how to keep track of your clients. I want you to think about this for a second, whether you are an SLP in a school setting [00:03:00] or an SLP, who's a private practice owner, or maybe you're an employee or a contractor in a private practice or in home health, whatever it is, right. Regardless. I want you to think for a second about all of the clients that you have on your caseload and all of the moving parts for each of those clients. 

So. I know for me, I was lucky enough and strategic enough to work in settings where the caseload felt always for me, felt very manageable. And. I loved that. Right. I love that. However, even with a relatively small caseload, there's still so many. Pieces of the puzzle, so to speak for each client that I would be thinking about managing in my mind, sort of trying to remember or recall. And what I noticed was that all of [00:04:00] that. It was incredibly taxing, right? 

The cognitive load of that. Was heavy. It was heavy. And because I was wasting so much of that bandwidth. On trying to sort of keep track of who's on first and trying to remember, did I do this? Did I reach out to them so on and so forth? It really pulled me away from being able to provide quality care. So it was impacting the way that I was showing up in my sessions, it was impacting the sort of energy that I had in between sessions and with colleagues because constantly while I was at work, my mind was going a million miles a minute, thinking about the different clients who I was servicing. So, what I want to do is solve that problem for you. 

And I'm going to walk you through a very, very simple system. That you can use to lower that [00:05:00] cognitive load for yourself. So that's what we're going to be talking about today. We are going to be talking through a system to help track your caseload. 

Now, for those of you who are listening, or if you're watching this, because I am also recording this on video, if you are watching this or listening to the podcast, if you are someone who has a very high case load, Like I'm talking 80 plus. I want you to listen to this episode with an open mind and ask yourself, what can I take from this information and how can I simply. And realistically apply it. For my own unique circumstances, because I know there are lots of different people out there that are listening with lots of different circumstances. But I don't want you to write this off and push, you know, next or close the episode or close [00:06:00] the computer. Because you're thinking that this won't work for you. 

My caseload's too high. This will not work for you. What if it could work for you? What if it could? And I want you to think about how you might modify this so that it. Could work right. So that it might work. And that's the only way that you're going to know is if you're actually going to try it. Okay. So. Let me walk you through sort of each step of this process. 

Then we're going to talk about some of the benefits of already touched on them indirectly, but we're going to talk about some of the benefits of a system like this. And then we will wrap that up at the end. I will summarize things for you with some key takeaways, so you'll have some very clear next steps. 

Okay. So make sure you listen. All the way to the end so, you know exactly what you have to do. First. Okay. Once you're done listening or watching this episode. All right. So the very first step that I want you to do in order to create a tracking system for [00:07:00] your caseload is to brain dump all of the important information. With regards to your caseload. Okay, so you're going to sit down, you're going to grab a piece of paper and a pen, and you're just going to empty your brain. Of all of the pieces, all of the factors or variables or characteristics or key pieces of information. That have to do with your clients. 

So you might need to sort of start by thinking about specific clients. And if, if this helps you try then to think of one or two clients in particular, Who stand out for you and ask yourself, okay, what do I need to know about these people? What do I need to know? What are the important pieces of information I need to track? Here are some examples. To get your wheels turning. 

Okay. Obviously name or initials. De-identified [00:08:00] information. You're going to want to make note, I would imagine of the date of birth. You probably going to want to take note of their current age. Um, although, you know, if this is going to be, uh, a document or a system that you're using for the longterm, that's obviously going to change over time, their age, but date of birth would be more important. You might want to make note of their diagnosis or their diagnoses. 

You might want to make note of their caregivers first name. So, you know, very quickly. You know who their, uh, what their parents' name is, or if you're working in a school setting, which teacher they have, or what grade they're in. You might also want to note, depending upon your setting, the insurance carrier. 

So if you are in a private practice and you do billing then, and you bill insurance companies, then you're going to want to know who is their carrier. You might also want to keep track of the important dates. Okay. So these are [00:09:00] going to look different depending upon your setting. If we're talking about insurance while we're on that sort of topic. You're going to want to know when is their current authorization? 

What's what's the start and end date of that authorization. What is the information that needs to be submitted to insurance for reauth reauthorizations right. That's going to look different depending upon the insurance carrier. If you're in a school setting, or maybe you're in a private pay private practice where you're not necessarily dealing with. Insurance, but you might want to keep track of dates. 

Like when is the, when was the initial evaluation? When are they due for a reeval? When is the next IEP meeting date? When is the next progress report? Do. Okay. So these are the sort of key dates that you're going to want to track. And then you might [00:10:00] also include names or contact information of related professionals who are working with those. Kit's on your caseload. 

So for me, When I was working one-on-one with kids, with hearing loss, I was very closely connected with, for the most part, with their audiologists. And so I would keep track of who what's the name of their audiologist. At what is their email address or however, I was communicating with them at the time I'm smiling because in the early days I used to be faxing them things. 

So I would have a line or a column for, um, the fax number. Yeah. And some of you probably still do that because I know certain places that is the way that they are still operating. Right. So keeping track of all of those key details in one central location, that's the goal, that's the vision. But right now we're just brain dumping, all of those key pieces of information. 

All right. So hopefully that [00:11:00] gets the wheels turning in terms of what you might want to write down just in that initial step of your brain dump. Okay. A couple of, uh, just words of wisdom or pieces of advice for you as you're doing this brain dump, do not worry about whether or not the information that you're writing down is actually relevant. Don't worry about if it's going to be hard for you to track or hard for you to obtain. 

If it's information that's hard to obtain, if it pops in your head, just write it down, don't filter it because we're going to go back and we're going to edit this. And so you'll have plenty of opportunity for you to sort of. Ask those questions, like, is this really important? And could I even track this so on and so forth? Okay. All right. 

So once you've got through that brain dump, The next thing you're going to do is the editing process. So you're going to look at what are the pieces of information that I, [00:12:00] that I wrote down. And what I would encourage you to do is grab a green highlighter or a green pen or something that's colorful. And you're going to make note of the things that you absolutely want to track. 

Like, yes, this is. This is important. I need to know this. Okay. Start there. And then any of the others, I might just sort of make a little question mark next to, or some sort of annotation that lets me know like, Hey, this might be important. I'm going to come back to it just in case, but it's still there. So that you don't have to worry about, you know, forgetting it. 

Right. You can always come back. Okay. So you're editing, that's what you're doing right now. You're editing. So you're highlighting the key pieces of information that, you know, you want to keep track of. And then everything else is just going to sort of stay in a parking lot, so to speak. Okay. Then the third step. Okay, I'm [00:13:00] going to share with you the third step. 

I'm going to talk about the fourth step, which is in my opinion, the reason why so many people. Uh, our unsuccessful with their systems, but the third step is to actually create the system and start using it. So I'm all about simplicity. I, in my opinion, think that the absolute simplest way, this is for me personally, the simplest way for me to track this is in. Google sheets. 

It's the easiest. Right. And we know that you, there is, um, you do have the option of using Google drive. Um, With HIPAA compliance, staying in, in alignment with HIPAA compliance. Um, if you don't know how to do that. That's a topic for another day, but you can Google BAA google drive HIPAA compliance and it will come up. 

It'll walk you through how to do it. If you did not know that there is a way yes, there is a way. Okay. So once you have your. Once you have your key pieces of information, what I would do is put it into a Google sheet [00:14:00] and I'm just talking. Bare bones top of the spreadsheet across the very top row. I'm inputting the green highlighted pieces of information, client initials, date of birth. Um, date of initial treatment next due date for progress report, you know, so on and so forth, the things that I have identified for me in my practice, that would be most important. 

And that will look different for you. Okay. Super, super simple. Yes, you can do this in many other ways that are way more creative and fancy and flashy and snazzy. And if that works for you. Great. So I'm thinking about things like Trello or a sauna, or actually, I don't even know if those are HIPAA compliant now that I'm thinking about it. Um, Or, uh, in your EMR, I know there are certain electronic health records that have this. Ha [00:15:00] capability, right. But for me personally, Those things are just distractions. 

They just pull me away from working on the key pieces of information that I need to focus on. And they actually wind up costing me more time and energy than something as simple as a spreadsheet. So that's what works for me. You have to figure out what works for you. And that brings me to the fourth and final step, which I said to you earlier is the piece that I think is where this sort of falls apart. 

Why people struggle with any system is that once you start using it, you need to go back and review. So. In order to really design an effective system. That's going to work for you. You have to try said system. And then review what worked, what didn't work and what do I need to change? Because the only way that you're going to actually be able to answer those [00:16:00] questions is if you are using the system, so you have to actually try the system out. 

And I would suggest trying it out for at least two weeks. I think that's like bare minimum. It's depends on what kind of a system we're talking about. In this case, if we're talking about a system for caseload tracking, I would say even more. Even longer than two weeks would be helpful because think about it. 

You're only seeing if you only see a kiddo once a week, that gives you at most two sessions to test this out. Um, and I just don't think that that's enough. So. I think you should go a little bit longer. And um, so once you've tried it out, see what you like about it, what you don't like about it and what you need to modify. 

What do I need to do differently? And that's when I would go back to that initial brain dump where I was sort of editing. And then I was editing with the green things that, you know, green highlighted things that I definitely want to include. And then. The question [00:17:00] marks of the things that I'm not so sure. You can pull from there and say, okay, well, is there anything in there that I didn't initially include in this tracking system that now I think I need to. Okay. 

That's a great place to start. You can also look at the things that you did include in the tracking system. And ask yourself, I'm confirm. Do I need this? Am I using this? If you're not using it, if you don't see any. You know, any value for tracking that particular piece of information, get rid of it because it's just a distraction. 

It's just going to pull you away from what you really need to be focusing on. And that is your caseload. Okay. So. That's the very simple. Easy in my opinion, realistic way that you can create a system for your caseload. Okay. I want to, um, Summarize those [00:18:00] steps for you one more time so that you have it. 

And then I want to talk through what some of the benefits are. And, um, also point out some of the ways that you might need to individualize this. So I said, in the beginning, step one, Brain dump. Okay. You're doing a brain dump of all of the information that you think you would want to, or need to track for your clients. Step number two. You're going to edit, look at that brain dump and identify what are the things I am going to move forward with in this system. 

And what are the things that I'm going to hold off on? Step number three is you start using the system. You want to start using this system for at least two weeks, if not longer. In this case, since we're talking about a caseload, I would say give it a good month. Okay. And then step number four, the piece that everyone overlooks is go back and review. 

What about this system is working, what isn't working [00:19:00] and what do I need to change? Okay. That's how you create a very simple but effective system for how to manage your caseload. All right. Now, a couple of. Things that I want to address because some of you might be listening to this. As I mentioned at the start of today's episode. You might be thinking to yourself, Theresa, I have a caseload of a hundred. 

How is this going to work for me? Well, it might not work for you. And you might want to ask yourself, is this. A good use of my time. Is this something that would work for me only? You can answer that right. And what I tell my coaching clients. One of the things that we talk about in sessions is when we're trying a new strategy or a new system, Recognize that there will be an increased demand on your time and energy upfront. Right. 

Especially when we're talking about systems, it's going to cost you a bit more time and energy at the beginning. In your [00:20:00] creation of the system, but once you start using it, you save so much time on the backend that the, the ROI, in terms of the investment of your time. Pays dividends. Right? It's it's worth it. 

So you need to really ask yourself how long do I think this would take me and how helpful would this be? If you're someone who really does get bogged down with. You know those questions like, oh shoot. When is their meeting again? Or when is that report due? Or what's the what's mom and dad's name? I have to send an email or who am I reaching out to again? 

Which teacher is this? And then you're scrolling through email or digging through files, trying to find the answer. Then I would strongly suggest you try this system. Truly. It doesn't take all that long to create. It'll only take as long as you let it. And another thing that you can keep in mind is you don't have to try [00:21:00] this. For your entire caseload, right? 

Especially if you are someone who has a very high caseload, try it for 10 of the clients on your caseload and see how it works rather than investing the time and energy and putting all of that information in for. The, uh, for the entire, like 80 or a hundred kids that might be on your caseload, start with a few and go from there. And then if it's working well, you can always go back and apply it to the remainder of your caseload. 

And then once you get this system created, It's all it's created. And so for the kids that you see for longer periods of time, their information is in there. It's not going anywhere. And then as you get new kids on your caseload, Then you're going to add them, but you don't have to recreate the wheel. 

You've already done it. Okay. All right. And I also said, I wanted to point out some of the benefits of a system like this. I, [00:22:00] again, I've talked about this indirectly, but I want to just sort of highlight some of these key benefits in case you're still a little on the fence about this, and you're trying to decide. If a system like this would be a good trial for you would be a good thing for you to try. Number one, the cognitive load. Of when is that? 

What is that? Where is that? And then trying to go find that information. Might seem trivial when it's happening, like once here and there, but when that happens often enough for enough kids on your caseload. That adds up. And so by creating a system like this, you never have to ask yourself, where is that information? 

Where do I have to go to find it? Because you've already found it. You've already put that information in there.

Another benefit of this system for you [00:23:00] would be then knowing exactly where to go and exactly what information to find. 

It also reminds you about what is important. Right because let's face it. Many of us are overwhelmed with high case loads, lots of things going on, and we might want to collaborate with related professionals. But our ability to do that is limited in terms of our time and our energy and our, capacity to reach out to those people and initiate those conversations. 

If that information is already documented in this system, it's one, two. Three less steps that you have to take in order to reach out and collaborate. So it's reminding you about what's important. Who's important. Who are the people to collaborate with? And you have that information right there in front of you. 

So you're more likely to initiate those steps and, [00:24:00] and, and then begin that collaboration. And last but not least another benefit of a system like this. Is that you can see everything you need all at once in one place. So it's all right there. You don't have to think about it or wonder or search, right. 

Everything is there for you. So there's less. There's less decision fatigue. There's less overthinking. There's less all of it. It's all right there for you in one central location. So if this has not sold you on trying out this system, I don't know what will, if, if this is something that sounds like it would be useful for you. Then I want to invite you to take the next step, the simplest next step with this system. And identify what for you? 

Will that be, is that simply sitting down and doing [00:25:00] pausing this episode and doing your brain dump right now? Is that scheduling a time on your calendar for you to do the brain dump? Is that you recording a voice memo right now and starting a brain dump? Is that you going on teachers pay teachers and finding some sort of system that's already in existence. And using that, right. 

You get to decide what your next step will be, but I encourage you to take that next step, identify what it is stated out loud so that you know exactly what you're going to be doing. And then keep it as simple as possible. The simpler it is, the more likely you are to follow through. All right. That is it for today's episode? 

Hope this was helpful. Feel free to pop into the SLP support group. Because we've got lots of fun stuff going on in the group. And I also mentioned we've got Thursdays lunch and learn. It is just a few days away at the [00:26:00] time that this episode is going to air. So make sure you register. If you're listening to this episode, live, make sure you sign up for the free lunch and learn. 

There's going to be so much information in there. That's going to be really, really helpful for you. I cannot wait to share it. I can't wait to hear about how the system is working. So let me know your thoughts. Good luck. And I will see all next week.