The Commitment Most Practices Haven’t Made Yet

Most practices believe growth depends on the next tool, technology, or marketing strategy.

But as I’ve been preparing a talk for the upcoming Outliers meeting in Palm Springs, I’ve been thinking about a different question:

What actually causes a practice to gain momentum?

Not a short-term bump in procedures.
Real, sustained momentum.

Outliers is one of the few meetings in ophthalmology that explores that question directly. While most conferences focus almost entirely on clinical science or the latest technology, Outliers takes a broader view: the three forces that determine the long-term success of a practice: technology, patient experience, and financial performance.

Think of it as a three-legged stool. Remove any one of those legs and the whole structure becomes unstable.

In most practices, one of those legs is quietly weaker than the others.

As I worked on the presentation, one idea kept resurfacing:

Nothing really changes until someone commits.

It’s the same question we’ll be exploring together at Outliers next week.

Not patient commitment to surgery.
Practice commitment to the experience.

The Reality

Many practices today are investing heavily in growth.

New diagnostic and surgical technology.

Marketing platforms.
Phone training.
Reputation management.
AI tools.

All of these tools can be valuable. Yet many practices still feel like growth is harder than it should be.

Every ophthalmologist knows the physiological blind spot—the small area of vision we simply can’t see. Our brains fill in the gap so effectively that we rarely notice it.

Practices have blind spots too. From inside the practice, everything can feel normal. From the patient’s perspective, the gaps are much easier to see.  These blind spots can show up as…

Marketing brings patients in… but conversion varies.

Clinical outcomes are excellent… but patients still price shop.

The team works hard… but the experience depends on who answers the phone, greets the patient, or explains the next step.

None of this happens because people don’t care.

It happens because the experience hasn’t yet been designed as a system.

The Shift

Practices that begin to gain real momentum make a different kind of commitment.

They commit to treating patient experience not as a personality trait or a marketing tactic—but as an operational system.

When the entire team aligns around the experience they want patients to have, something interesting happens.

Marketing converts more consistently.
Phone conversations build trust.
Technology feels integrated rather than confusing.

And over time, the practice develops something powerful: momentum.

Momentum compounds. It turns satisfied patients into advocates, referrals into growth, and teams into cultures that continuously improve.

The practices that sustain that kind of momentum usually have one thing in common: they’ve created a simple structure that helps the entire team see and discuss the patient experience the same way.

If you want to learn more, a PX FitCheck is a good place to start.

Learn more at pxmovement.com