10 Suggestions For All MTSO's: - see message

To all MTSO's:

1. Show us the money. You make tons of it. We know it. You know it. Try paying us more of it, and cheating us out of less of it.

2. Simplify your transcription platforms. Every time you "improve" them, for some STRANGE reason, it gets harder and harder to do a day's work on them. Some software salesman has sure taken advantage of whoever in your company buys transcription software. Please. Develop some sales resistance.

3. Let MTs working on a primary account STAY on that account, whydontcha? Once they pick up speed, knowledge of the specialty(ies), and a little "institutional memory" for that facility, you give it to someone else, and start that MT out on something totally foreign to them. I'm not saying we should have no variety, but I AM saying, once we've got good speed and knowledge of a certain account, it's counterproductive to all concerned to keep bouncing us around.

4. Incentives. "Essay Contests?" C'mon - get real. That's bull, and you know it. Production contests where all you get is the CHANCE to have your name pulled out of a hat for a prize? Pul-EEEZE. We're not that dumb. Give us real, monetary rewards for those times when we give up our weekends to help you with your backlog.

5. Flexibility. You *claim* to have "flexible" schedules in your ads. Then you try to lock us (IC's included) into rigid schedules, penalizing or locking out MTs who must sometimes deviate. We may be just keyboard-pounders to you, but we ARE humans, after all. We get sick sometimes. Or hurt. Or have dentist appointments. Work around it. That's what your production coordinators get the big bucks for, so how 'bout they EARN it for once? Your rigid-as-a-schoolmarm schedules were bad enough when we were in-house. At home, when work dribbles in at 3 jobs an hour, and on what you're paying, it's ridiculous.

6. Go back to paying OVERTIME. Nuff said on that subject.

7. Pay your QA's better, and TRAIN them better. Most of them are illiterate, and they're confusing and/or pissing off your MTs to the point of quitting.

8. Learn more about what we actually DO when we work for you. Most of you don't have a clue what medical transcription is - all you know is pie charts and profits. Broaden your education. Try transcribing one of your accounts for a day. You might actually come to respect what we do.

9. Un-learn the outdated, 1950's "punitive" management style. People DON'T work harder, faster or smarter to avoid punishment. Punishment only breeds resentment and passive aggression in the workplace. We'll work harder for respect and an actual living wage, than we will from fear. Quit dinging us all the time for what we do wrong, and start rewarding us for when we've put out the extra effort you keep begging for.

10. Re-consider your belief that offshoring is good. Yeah, you're making a tidy profit right now, but sooner or later, it's going to come back to bite you big-time. Another added benefit of becoming a 100% American company again? Maybe after you die, you won't go to hell. Because the way things are now in medical transcription, I'd bet dollars to doughnuts that's straight where you're going someday.