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Cherry picking is wrong - I just have to say this....

Posted: Oct 07, 2014

Cherry picking is wrong no matter how you look at it. That being said, I believe very strongly that being paid by productivity fosters that very thing! People who are desparate to make a living sometimes resort to doing things that they would not normally do. Add to that the fact that apparently some MTSOs PUNISH employees who do not meet minimum productivity requirements!! When did we start treating medical transcription like factory work???!!! I FIRMLY THINK THAT WE NEED TO BE PAID BY THE HOUR, AND A LIVING WAGE!!!!!! Sure, you DO have people who do manage (somehow) to make a living being paid by productivity, but they are FEW and FAR between! They are the EXCEPTION to the rule!!! I worked as an in-house medical transcriptionist at a hospital for 20 years getting paid by the hour. I quit that job because we lost a huge chunk of our work load when radiology went to speech wreck. I also had always had a dream of working from home and (foolishly) did not think I would have problems making ends meet (I know, I know.....naive me!). And, I wanted to keep doing transcription instead of other jobs around the hospital (none of which I was qualified to do would have paid as well). I am not saying that cherry picking does not go on with employees paid hourly (I'm sure it does), but I think it is FAR less likely to happen. I know my little rant is not going to change things, but just had to get that off my chest. If only we could get the ones in power to make the decisions to see this!

Cherry picking - anon

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I have encountered cherry picking since 1987 when I initially started in a medical transcription department in our teaching hospital. It did not seem to matter to the brass if they did or not. The other MTs would not stand with me about this nor anyone else. Nothing was ever done either.

Then I get to these nationals and know that cherry picking happens in them as well. I always get the crap work and when I do get good work it has to be because another MT is not working that day or is sick or something.

I could really write a book on cherry picking and how many got higher raises because of their cheating.

Worked in my last in a building job and a nurse who was doing this kind of work when our company was failing and going out of business decides she is going to go back into any chart and put her name as the one who transcribed it thus making a lot more money than we did and duplicating that very dictation.

She claimed to be a Christian, yet this is how she did, cheated her co-workers. Honestly, I have not had good work experiences at all and most of them concerning the lack of cracking down on cherry picking.

Wow! How did we get so sidetracked? - NM

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.........

We all meandered around - to cherry picking

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eventually

Cherry picking... WWJD? - HannahRu

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I never realized that during the course of my work day when I assigned myself all those easy dictators, that I had sold my soul to the devil. :)

Seriously, everyone cherry picks, so don't be so self-righteous. How many times have you gotten a really crappy dictator and you decide it's break time. Send it back to the pool, kill some time until your sure the next poor sap got it, and then log back in? That my fellow sinners is cherry picking. You may not have assigned yourself the peach, but you spat back the pit.

As far as good Christians versus bad Christians, let he/she without sin cast the first stone...

Original poster here againâ�¦ - … I, for one,…

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â�¦ do NOT cherry pick, and I doubt very seriously if I'm the only one who does not. I do not say this with a haughty spirit because, as I said before, I know I am in no way perfect. And as I said in my original post, I can totally understand how tempting it is to do it when you're livelihood depends on losing a certain amount. I have just learned that the way I feel when I feel like I've done something wrong is not worth it.

Correction to above post - Original poster

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Should read when your livelihood depends on PRODUCING a certain amount, NOT losing.

You're my hero. - HannahRu

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Come on, be honest, at least with yourself.

picking cherries - newgie

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Or maybe the person was ready for a break anyway, and it can be beneficial to have a break and come back to the job more fresh, if it is still there.

As someone mentioned, though, I wonder more about team leaders.

Okay, I'm being cynical, maybe my coworker really does - HannahRu

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need a break 45 minutes after logging in.

Of course the team leaders are cherry picking. They can rationalize it all day long - they can't meet minimum because they're too busy with clerical stuff, phone calls, emails, etc. But then they have a pretty good argument for being paid HOURLY instead of by production, dontcha think?

When you really think about it, whose to blame for cherry picking anyway? Is it the team leads who are paid on production even though the very nature of their job prevents them from producing? Is it the MTs who are stuck transcribing the slop at the bottom of the barrel because all the clear, easy to understand dictators are sent to India or wherever? OR Is the MTSOs who have basically feed off our desperation and turn us all into liars and cheaters to so we can earn a decent wage?

You know the old saying, "The devil made me do it..." Guess whose the devil?

team leads - newgie

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Team leaders seem to be able to manipulate work flow (cherry pick) with no oversight.

team leads taking the good notes - Henry

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Absolutely. Why do you think just as you are signing off a nice juicy 15-minute report by a great doctor, it vanishes? It has been snatched up by the team lead and either typed by her or redirected to a favorite MT.

breaking too soon/team leads - newgie

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Btw, I do think you are cynical regarding break after 45 minutes. All kinds of reasons. Who knows?

I think team leaders need management. It's a bad situation.

And there you go, the self-justified culprit, so that's - how they live with themselves

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//

Hilarious (the part about.... - Starzzz

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spitting back the pit. My stomach hurts from laughing so hard!) On a serious note, as far as a remedy goes, the physicians can easily be weighted. This way, difficult dictators yield more lines for the transcriptionist. I love getting some of the crappy stuff when it's weighted at 200. If the actually line count is 100, I get credit for 200. And let's be honest, once you transcribe a half a dozen reports by the same provider, a seasoned transcriptionist can usually get up to speed on any dialect.

Forced to cherry pick - Sylvia

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Then you have M*Modal's "First Time Right" policy, counting the number of blanks we do, and after 10% blanks for one day, the rest of the week you get paid 30% less per minute. Why would anyone use blanks, with a system like that? Solution? (1) guess; or (2) log off and wait. Forced cherry picking.

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x ...

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