Welcome to Launch Pro
Buying a practice or starting a business from scratch can be one of the most exhilarating chapters in your life. Congratulations on entering this chapter. Watch our intro video. Together, let’s set you up for success.
Meet Karen Harmsen, ProVision Business Coach
Business Plan to Reality
Set up the foundations and the right advice along your journey.
Mark Corduff, ProVision Business Services Manager
Ensure your business is set up for success.
The way you structure your business will have lasting impacts on taxation and future growth strategies.
“It is critical you understand the key differences between a sole trader, company, partnership and trust so you can decide which structure is right for your business.
Along with ProVision, if you have not already done so, partnering with a great accountant, solicitor and financial advisor will ensure your business is set up for success.”
1. Organise your business structure and support.
Decide on your company structure
One of the key decisions you will make when starting a business is its structure. Your choice of structure will depend on the size and type of business and how you want to run it. Each structure may have an impact on key areas such as tax you are liable to pay, asset protection and costs to set up.
Secure an Accountant
A trustworthy accountant will be the financial backbone of your business and assist you not only with keeping the books up to date but assisting you with making the right financial decisions for your practice.
Secure a Solicitor
A qualified solicitor can provide you with the expert knowledge of commercial law so you can avoid any issues when starting your business or making changes to your business in the future.
Secure a Financial Advisor
A financial advisor can help you set financial plans and frameworks to assist you in achieving your financial goals both personally and within your business. Think of them as your financial personal trainer.
Download tips on establishing your structure
2. Set up Your Financial Foundations.
ProVision have partnered with Optometry Finance Australia, who provide commercial finance solutions that can be tailored to your business needs.
With specialised experience in the Optometry industry, Optometry Finance Australia will seek to understand your own financial needs and situation to create the optimal solution.
Optometry finance Australia also has access to, and are accredited with over 40 national lenders including ANZ-Esanda, Bankwest, CBA, Citibank, GE Capital, ING, Liberty, Macquarie, NAB, Pepper, Suncorp and Westpac, covering over 1,400 different finance products.
3. Get Legally Set Up for Business.
Ensuring you have completed the important legal items relevant to your business before you jump into your new practice can feel overwhelming. We have created a checklist with contact details for the key activities for you to action so you can begin practicing legally.
From establishing and registering your company, to setting up your ABN and GST all the way to ensuring you have your various insurances organised prior to seeing your first patient, work through the checklist in the action steps – this will provide you piece of mind that you have minimised your exposure to risk.
Action steps.
Hint: It will be important to store or save all usernames, passwords, numbers and correspondence in a central location that you can access with ease in the future.
Get legally set up for business document
Location, Location, Location
Be seen by your local community as a committed partner in holistic patient care.
Mark Corduff, ProVision Business Services Manager
ProVision expert leasing advice.
Your lease will likely be your largest ongoing business expense aside from the cost of your employees.
“ProVision can provide you with expert leasing advice and guidance regarding a new lease, lease renewals, leasing issues and market analysis. This support is provided for members on an ongoing basis.”
Mark Corduff, ProVision Business Services Manager
What kind of tenancy can you afford?
Completing your cashflow and profit and loss template in the next module will be a critical foundation for establishing what type of tenancy you can afford and where this should be located.
Considerations such as shopping centre vs strip shopping, accessibility for your patients, surrounding competition, your target demographic overlaid with the demographics of the area, and an idea of the costs involved to set up in the type of space you are looking at are all extremely important considerations.
Commercial leases can be confusing
Commercial leases can be confusing at the best of times, so it is important to ensure you have the right assistance.
ProVision, your accountant and solicitor can all help you ensure you make an informed decision prior to signing a lease.
Being competitive in today’s market
Striving to deliver the ultimate customer experience at all levels begins with your practice presentation. A basic fitout is no longer sufficient. Patients and customers are looking to be WOW’d with their shopping experience, no matter if they are high end, mainstream or the budget conscious.
Changes and additions to your practice can enhance a variety of aspects, from better exposure and enhanced customer experiences to increasing staff efficiency and enjoyment in the workplace. All of these ultimately lead to higher traffic and sales growth.
An investment into your fitout is an investment into the profit, asset value and future success of your practice.
How long will my fitout take?
It is vital to understand all relevant project elements and timeframes and be prepared to make allowances prior to any works commencing to get the best result from such a major investment into your business.
Understand project timeframes - article
View fitout gallery
Create a wow experience
Creating a ‘wow’ experience in your practice to make you stand out from the crowd and impress your patient base is important and there are a number of things to consider before committing to your lease such as:
- Your budget
- The fit-out requirements mandatory under your lease and understanding the true cost
- Planning for the future – establish how many consultation rooms will you require
- Equipment such as security, practice management system, eftpos/ Hi Caps, laptops, product scanner etc
Money Matters
We’ll help you set up a 12-month cash flow forecast or 12-month profit and loss forecast.
Important differences in financial documents
Keeping track of the financial activities within a business is something every successful business owner must do. While you may have accountants or bookkeepers who take care of this, you still need to know how to read and understand various types of financial statements regarding your business.
Two of the most reviewed financial documents are cash flow statements and profit and loss statements. At first glance, these documents appear to be similar, but they have several important differences.
Cash is king. Having cash is a key requirement for businesses to stay solvent.
What is a Cash Flow Statement?
The Cash Flow Statement portrays how you spend your cash. It is often used in tandem with the Profit and Loss statement.
The statement is important because it informs you, the business owner of the business cash position. For a business to be successful, it must always have sufficient cash to pay expenses, bank loans, pay taxes, wages and to purchase new assets.
A cash flow statement is used to show business owners all their financial activities. You will able to see the payments you receive as well as expenses to determine where your money is going. You will also be able to determine approximately how much cash your business needs on a day-to-day basis and for future planning. This is also where cash flow statements differ from profit and loss statements.
What is a Profit and Loss Statement?
The purpose of profit and loss statement is to show business owners what their overall profits are over a specific period. A profit and loss statement shows you what your sources of income are versus your expenses. The main difference between a profit and loss statement and a cash flow statement is that your profit and loss statement does not show every detail of your financial activities.
For example, profit and loss statements do not show things such as loan payments, credit card payments and owner’s drawings. While you consider these items to be expenses, they are not considered expenses for accounting purposes. Therefore, they are not recorded as such on the profit and loss statement, but they are recorded on the cash flow statement.
“Failing to plan is planning to fail”
There is a lot of truth to the idiom, “failing to plan is planning to fail.” Forecasting or predicting what is going to happen with your cash is essential for any business, ensuring you have enough cash to continue operating and growing. Forecasting cash flow helps remove the element of chance or surprise – think of it as an early warning system. Accurate forecasting, is a vital part of any business and will enable you to make informed strategic decisions whilst managing your cash.
It was evident through the recent pandemic, many businesses, not just optometry, did not have sufficient cash reserves or a strong cash flow to maintain business activities. Having cash is a key requirement for a business to stay solvent. There is an old saying is business “Cash is King”. Even more relevant today!
Action steps.
Log into ProLearn
Access your practice budget template
If you would like help in setting up a 12-month cash flow forecast or 12-month profit and loss forecast, or a more detailed review, please contact your Business Coach who will arrange a time convenient to meet and discuss your requirements.
Karen Harmsen, ProVision Business Coach
Dream teams are created through a meticulous focus on hiring the right people, providing a clear and juicy vision that evokes the teams commitment and sense of purpose and through building a culture that empowers, sustains and supports your team to be their best. Underpinning the success in all the above is a leader who wants to lead, who coaches and mentors his/her team with enthusiasm and is willing to have any of the uncomfortable conversations in order to thrive.
1. Hire people who share your values and love to sell
Successful businesses have learned to look beyond skills to whether prospective employees mesh with their company culture from the start.
Around 80% of your income will come from retail sales so, when recruiting, spend less time focusing on the technical skills of the candidate (because those skills can be learned) and be methodical about exploring if this person shares your intrinsic values and if they love to sell.
RecruitPro
2. Tell them what to expect
People need to understand what is expected of them to deliver the best result. Your aim is to create a team that understands what is expected of them and can work autonomously to deliver on those expectations without the need for supervision. Failing to assign clear responsibilities and standards of performance can cause confusion or misunderstanding, leaving employees unable to perform their role even if they are motivated and capable of doing so.
Clarity from the beginning
The clarity you can create for your team comes primarily from:
- Their position descriptions
- The policies you have in place (refer to keeping it legal and consistent section below)
- The values you create that guide all team members behaviours
- Regular communication
Action Steps
View master task list
3. Be the culture you want to create
Create a deliberate culture
“Small businesses that focus on building a deliberate and visible culture at the outset of their businesses not only create a business that attracts and retains the best people but also achieves measurable increases in profitability, team engagement and productivity.”
An organisation’s culture is its self-sustaining patterns of behaving, feeling, thinking and believing.
Unlike a company’s vision, mission and strategy, culture is pervasive and invisible, working silently in the background to direct how people throughout the organisation think, make decisions and actually behave.
Culture self- learning document
4. Share your ‘why’
Share your vision and inspire the team to embrace a purpose for being at work every day. We want to follow those who have a vision we believe in. If your vision does not give you goose bumps, then it’s not the right vision.
5. Agree on the core values you will all share
In bringing the culture to life in your business an essential piece of the process is defining your business and brand values. Clearly defined values are the pillars that form the rules of the game your team will play and create direction on the journey of achieving your vision.
There is no better way to get buy in from your team than to ask them what is important to them. Within the context of your clearly articulated vision and dream for your business, ask your team to help you finetune what values are important to them as a team to support the achievement of the goal.
After arriving at agreed values, the team needs to further articulate the behaviours they will demonstrate in order to live that value
6. Ensure quality communication
A person's success in life can usually be measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have. Tim Ferris
It can become very difficult in amongst the overwhelming number of tasks you need to perform as a business owner, to find the time for quality conversations to actively share information and to mentor and grow the confidence, and potential of your people. That is why it is essential to quarantine the time necessary to have these quality conversations.
The 4 essential communication forums to instil in your culture are:
An organisation’s culture is its self-sustaining patterns of behaving, feeling, thinking and believing.
- Coffee Catch Ups- Weekly or Monthly
- Performance Management Discussions- Monthly or Quarterly
- Team Meetings – Weekly or Monthly (Depending on the size of your team and the desired length of the meeting
- Team Engagement Surveys – 6 monthly – Elicit feedback from your team about how they believe you are tracking
When leaders are asked, “what is your biggest challenge at work?” Communication is usually at the top of the list. The key to effective communication is to create shared understanding. Shared understanding is critical because it is the foundation for all future action.
Unlike a company’s vision, mission and strategy, culture is pervasive and invisible, working silently in the background to direct how people throughout the organization think, make decisions and actually behave.
Create an environment where people can say what they mean, and mean what they say, and you’ll go a long way to improving the quality of communication. -Alain Hunkins
Action steps
Plan into your diary for the following 12-month period:
Review the below links to assist you to structure great meetings and quality conversations:
The coffee catchup
Link to editable leadership quick meeting planner
The team meeting format
A coaching approach
Format to difficult conversations
Recommended reading
7. Make them feel safe
The whole is greater than the sum of its parts - Aristotle
There was a study conducted at Google some years ago named “Project Aristotle” (a tribute to Aristotle’s quote “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts”). The study was designed to answer the question, “what creates a highly effective team?”
Interestingly, and maybe this will be intuitively obvious to you as you read this, the study found that the number one factor that creates exceptional teamwork is psychological safety.
The freedom to contribute and be your authentic self, without the fear of judgement is a powerful tool to enhancing team cohesiveness and performance
8. Give them feedback
Accelerate performance through regular, positive feedback and appreciation. People want to believe what they do matters and that they make a difference and when they make a difference, they want it to be noticed and celebrated. The undisputed gurus of team engagement, Adrian Gostick & Chester Elton share:
Recognition is the ultimate accelerator of performance once you already have good leadership principles of goal setting, communication, trust and cccountability in place.
Action steps
View Chester Elton’s video
Audio book
“Business owners who are too busy to connect with, listen to and develop their people will never realise the culture or business success they envision.”
Link to recognition plan
9. Manage their performance
Performance Management mentoring and training programs need to be built into your Dream Team Creation plan from the beginning.
The term performance management gets a bad rap traditionally because managers with poor performance management skills have used the annual sit down to beat people up about things that have or have not done, sometime in the past 12 months.
Effective performance management is a daily or weekly occurrence where feedback and support are provided to the employee to help them grow and deliver the best results, they possible can. The sit-down formal meeting which I recommend monthly or quarterly then becomes an opportunity to thank the employee for their efforts, join in the celebration of their success and to set new and challenging goals for the next period.
It is your business. You get the set the tone so make the Performance Review meetings one your employees look forward to.
Link to performance management - *In construction
“When asking the question what about your business most frequently keeps you awake at night, the most common reply from small business owners is -my team” Karen Harmsen - Provision Business Coach QLD.
10. Embrace or replace
Are you a reluctant leader? Does the idea of leading, inspiring and performance managing your team send chills down your spine? Would you prefer to spend the day in your consulting room with patients and just let the team be? If you answer yes to all or any of the above, then you have taken the first step to providing better leadership. “Hello, my name is Karen and I am a reluctant leader.”
Your team needs a leader. Your businesses success or failure is in the hands of your team so you have two choices; you can take some time to focus on developing great leadership skills with the help and support of your Business Coach and other trusted Mentors, OR you can also consider hiring a Practice Manager who is highly skilled in leadership .Whatever you choose, do not leave the role of leader in your business unfilled.
Recommended reading
Your Irresistable Offer
Your opening frame package.
When launching a practice one area that is consistently a challenge to any new business owner is what to offer their patients by way of product.
Meet Tony Jones, ProVision CEO and acting Merchandise Manager
Define your range position
Clarify your ‘Why Choose Us’ before thinking about what you want to stock in your practice
When thinking about who you are and what you want your business to look like. It is important first to clarify your ‘Why Choose Us’ before thinking about what you want to stock in your practice as this will help clarify what kind of product to stock.
There should be a vision for your business when you presented your business plan to your bank. A Business Coach can help guide you on how your ‘Why Choose Us’ will influence your opening package.
Are you clinically focused? Do you want a simple brand offering that meets the patients’ needs or are you looking to offer a fashion forward/ boutique range that is unique in your market?
Who is your target market?
Refer to your original business plan
Does your business plan match the local patient demographics? There is no use offering high end fashion brands if your prospective patient does not have the money to spend on high end frames?
You can reference your local census information available online from your council (by seat and adjacent suburbs) is worth analysing as it will provide a snapshot of the people who live in your area. The demographic, the gender split, average salary, homeowners, kids etc.
Link to Census example
Research your market
When working through these online references have a look at the most recent census and the one prior as analysing these will help identify any trends or changes to the demographic and area you want to service, e.g. have early retiree numbers grown over the years? Is there a growth in young families?
Budget
How much money do you have to spend?
When you created your business plan for the bank & having completed the Cash Flow exercise in the above section, you will have calculated a budget for purchasing new product.
This budget can also be referred to as Open to Buy (OTB)
What is your Budget or OTB?
Refer to your original business plan & forecast
View our inventory management brochure
Visual Merchandising
How many frame units do you need to fill your shelves or front faces?
You want to protect your capital. How can you fill your practice with the product required while conserving your cash:
Your merchandise display is sacred and should be viewed as ‘Display Stock’ that should rarely if ever be out of stock.
You should have only one extra unit in under stock (the stock that is off the floor rather than on display).
View our inventory management handbook
Supplier partners: Consignment or negotiated terms?
How do you want to purchase your opening package?
If you are setting up from scratch, have little data to work from and are testing your market perhaps consignment is an option for all or a portion of your stock orders. Consignment preserves capital for other projects and helps stock your practice with a range of brands and price points.
Be mindful of the exit strategy for everything you purchase. As you learn more about what your patient wants, needs and what they are willing to spend. You will want to adjust the brands you stock and the styling to suit the customer demand.
If you have budgeted for a full buy, terms can be negotiated between 3-6months. Before you open the doors and are generating revenue you might want to consider a longer window to pay your account.
Building a Core Range – Good, Better & Best
In line with census information you have collated, it is key to build a range with a set of price points that work across different segments of your patient demographic.
A clear price strategy will also help a team member know where to guide a patient when working together:
You should have an example of the 3 different price points of ‘Good, Better & Best’ in line with the practice display needs and the current stock on hand (SOH):
Inventory Management Handbook
Welcome to ProSupply
Our exclusive online portal that puts over 20,000 more frame styles at your team’s fingertips!
Our merchandise manager works closely with our preferred suppliers to offer you the most competitive and cost-effective wholesale price always flexing to meet any market opportunity.
With the continued trend towards online shopping, the ProSupply portal is the perfect in-store selling tool to give your team the ability to show your patient every style and colorway our preferred suppliers carry.
Visit ProSupply
ProSupply ‘How To’ Videos
ProSupply how-to videos
Supply & Fit: Replenishment Strategy & Ordering Process
View our video
Our exclusive replenishment program gives you the capacity to order both lens and frame online without ever having to impact your stock holdings and allowing you to keep your best sellers on the shelf.
By reducing the cost of freight and creating smaller more frequent ordering habits, Supply & Fit improves your cash flow.
By streamlining the delivery process, it also minimises the time your team spends processing orders allowing them more time to spend with each patient.
Without the need to hold as many frames in practice Supply & Fit further frees up cashflow allowing you the opportunity to respond more nimbly to fashion trends & technological innovations in frames.
View ProSupply case study
Visit Supply and Fit within ProSupply
360 Degrees of Communication
The development of strategic communication and marketing is essential if businesses are to survive, let alone prosper.
Marketing can be one of the areas that practitioners can find challenging to navigate. The ProVision team of highly skilled marketers and graphic designers collectively assist you to deliver a strategic and integrated marketing communications program to grow your brand and business.
Creating the right brand image
The right brand image sends a clear message about the unique nature of your practice and it’s products, services and experience.
What’s the first impression you want to create for prospective patient?
Brand image benefits can be:
Your practice brand image
Your practice brand image reflects the feelings your patients have or will have about the overall experience the business offers as well as its individual products, communications and digital platforms such as your website and social channels.
Your practice brand image summarises what your practice stands for as well as how it is known in the marketplace. It creates a specific impression in the minds of your patients.
Your brand name provides the overall banner for operations and is the cornerstone of your practice relationship with its patients. It is also the first step towards your brand personality. Brand names can reveal what a practice does, contain recognisable words that convey what a practice does, capture the essence of the practice or represent something unique, different and memorable.
You can check for similar trademarks you may wish to use currently in use in Australia and also internationally via IP Australia.
Check for same or similar trade marks in classes relevant to optometry.
Class 44 (optometry services), Class 9 (optometry products including frames, lenses, contact lenses)
Search trade marks
Another element of your brand is your domain name which forms part of the URL for your website. Perform a Google search using your desired names to see if there are other businesses of the same name in Australia or your state/territory. Search to see if your desired domain name is in use below.
Domain name search
Graphic Design
Our experienced and talented designers can develop a suite of personalised marketing materials including logo design, stationery, flyers, practice brochures, gift vouchers, invitations, banners and advertisements. We can develop your practice signage as well.
Your logo – a powerful element of your brand
Your brand logo is the symbol used to identify your brand. It is designed to be compatible with your brand’s name and it contributes an additional aspect to a brand’s image. A strong name featuring a well-designed logo helps brand recognition within your consumer base. A well-designed logo also reduces the search time consumers spend when they look for specific product names identified by effective logos.
Quality logos require careful thought, planning, and the expertise of designers who understand the principles behind creating or changing one into a version that will be effective.
Quality logos and brand names should pass the four tests:
Creating quality logos can be challenging. Logos that pass the test of time are even more difficult.
Because logos are a reflection of a brand, a cheap, poorly designed logo might suggest an inferior brand to consumers.
Learn about rebranding
Request a call from the Local Area Marketing Team
Your website should be the engine room for conversions
Your website is the hub of your digital world and perhaps the most important element in your whole digital strategy. It is digital real estate to which all of your other online activity will direct your patients. Most digital marketing techniques drive traffic to your website. But traffic by itself isn’t worth that much if it isn’t converted, it is only valuable when converted and that’s what your website should be, the engine room for conversions.
Designing for digital is designing for action. This includes both actions the user will take and actions your website will offer in response to the user input.
When we ask our preferred website developers who design independent practice-specific platforms what is their first question to the practice owner they say:
‘What is your call to action?‘ They say this because this is what they will design your platform to achieve.
EyeCarePro & ProVision Partnership
Established and solely devoted to the eye care industry since 2005, EyeCarePro (ECP) are a group of 80+ internationally based staff of experienced Web Designers, SEO strategists and Marketing experts, set to bring the future of eye care marketing to your practice.
With nearly 1,800 clients and counting, ECP are constantly evolving to meet the needs of practices. ECP can customise their package to fit the needs of every kind of practice, from single optometrist community practices to multi-location urban powerhouses.
Their comprehensive digital marketing services include:
- Beautiful, professionally designed mobile-first websites with all Australian based content written for you.
- Personalised local SEO and Google My Business Management.
- Monthly meetings with a dedicated and experienced local ProVision Digital Marketing Specialist.
- Access to industry leading Google Search Advertising management, to help you get the best bang for your paid advertising buck.
- Campaigns that directly feed into Facebook and your website
Learn More
Utilise the My Health 1st patient booking portal
Reduce call load on your front desk and automate more administrative tasks so your team can focus on your patients and the success of your practice.
My Health 1st Resources
Get started with My Health 1st
Once you become a registered practice with My Health 1st you can embed the booking link into your website and we will embed it into your ProVision practice page to ensure you are attracting and securing more bookings. Notify the marketing team once you have become a My Health 1st listed practice.
The importance of brand awareness in your local area
ProVision and Direct Mail & Marketing have combined their knowledge and understanding of the challenges facing your optometry practice and the importance of brand awareness within your local area. ProMarket enables you to market your brand and logo more effectively, across a number of promotional mediums in an on-demand, online environment.
You have the facility to incorporate your specific logo and branding across all of the ProVision marketing material, display, promotional posters and essential printed products for your business. This includes personalised recall letters & postcards, email templates, SMS, campaign materials, banners, brochures, vouchers, birthday cards, invitations, sale banners and supplier promotions.
Visit our New Year Campaign resource hub
Login to ProMarket
Engage with GPs in your local area
- Within ProMarket you can create a branded GP referral letter and upload your target list of GPs – the letters will be printed on premium stock and mailed to your practice.
- You can order our campaign posters and hand them out to GP practices and other community groups.
- You can create branded referral pads and provide to all medical practitioners in your area to acquire new patient referrals.
We as optometrists don’t traditionally market as well as we could because we don’t realise the value in triggering the emotional points, which is important in building any relationship - Susan Ang
Increase GP referral - by Susan Ang
Go to GP engagement framework
Our national marketing campaigns
We create 3 national retail campaigns to amplify your reputation for clinical excellence.
All campaigns feature the tagline See Better. See Us. All campaigns use a fresh creative approach to cut through the industry clutter and establish a level of consistency in consumer messaging over time. Each campaign is supported with direct marketing materials through ProMarket as well as media and digital advertising resources, social media content and public relations tools.
The ProVision retail campaigns embrace a modern marketing direction designed to amplify your reputation for best in class eyecare and position you as a thought leader in your local community. Our campaigns are designed to promote a more comprehensive eye health and vision consultation, providing a pivotal proof point to differentiate you from your competitors.
Engage current and new consumers using our targeted marketing campaigns that showcase your expertise and reinforce your individual brand in a competitive communication environment. With an extensive suite of materials on offer that extend across print and digital for each campaign, you are well supported to implement a successful marketing campaign - Shannon Browning
Your Launch Campaign
Whether you are starting a practice from scratch or taking over a practice that has an established data base and goodwill in the community, taking the time to develop a carefully considered Launch Campaign is essential.
As you have worked your way through this module you will already understand some of the key elements that form the foundation for your campaign. In line with the the importance of your brand’s visual identity and how your website will be the engine room driving your bookings, a strategic, diligently prepared new practice Launch Campaign and communication plan will ensure you have all the elements in place to launch your new practice like a pro.
Keeping it consistent & legal
A successful workplace has clear and concise codes of conduct.
Being part of ProVision, provides you with automatic membership to the Australian Retail Association (ARA) and access to the ARA’s Employment Relations Management System (ERMS) called enableHR, which offers a wide variety of Human Resource services to our members.
A key part of any successful workplace is to have clear and concise codes of conduct. It provides employees with the ability to know and understand the company’s expectations and protects the business.
Clear and concise code of conduct
Now is the perfect time to update or implement policies to ensure the ever-changing needs of your business meet the diversities of your workforce and the ever-evolving legislative requirements.
Having up to date policies has many benefits in helping employers provide a roadmap for day-to-day operations ensuring compliance with laws and regulations, giving guidance for decision-making, and streamlining internal processes. They are fundamental in setting the standards of behaviour expected of employees and creating the right workplace culture for your unique business environment.
Creating a policy is one thing, however policies needed to be consistently communicated to both new and existing employees to embed them in your business and for them to be effective.
Creating Policies on the ERMS
There are already established policies on the ERMS for your business to use.
The ERMS has a range of policies from Employee Handbook all the way through Social Media and Working from Home policies.
The system allows you the ability to create a policy tailored made to your business. They can be downloaded in Word format and amended to suit the needs of the business. This step by step process shows how to establish a policy to meet your business needs.
As laws change so must policies to maintain their relevance and compliance with legislation. The ERMS houses the most up to date policies for you to adopt in your own business ensuring that your expectations are clearly defined. While not all policies listed below may be relevant to your business, it is worth investing the time to review your current policies and ensure they comply with current workplace and legislative requirements.
Advice & Support
The ARA offers ProVision Members an employment relations hotline service where Members can discuss their people management concerns with an experienced and qualified expert. Member can obtain uncapped, free of charge advice in relation the following:
- Disciplinary matters
- Managing disputes
- Ending employment
- Wage and Award rates
It’s like having your own in-house Human Resources team helping to remove the stress associated with the more challenging aspects of managing a team.
Managing Your Employee Contracts and Data
The ERMS can manage your employee data from the recruitment phase all the way through to termination, and everything in between.
The ERMS allows you to:
- Generate contracts of employment from frequently updated, pre-prepared legally compliant contract templates;
- Access current information in relation to wages and award rates;
- Manage the personal and emergency contact information for your employees;
- Record any incident and injury management details; and
- Maintain performance management records.
It’s your own personal Human Resources Information System (HRIS), without the associated costs.
Policies to Establish
- Alcohol and Other Drugs
- Business and Social Functions
- Code of Conduct
- Coronavirus and Infection Control
- Education and Business Development
- EEO Bulling and Harassment
- Employee Handbook
- Grievance
- Internet and Email
- Leave
- Motor Vehicle
- Parental Leave
- Performance Counselling and Discipline
- Privacy
- Right of Entry
- Social Media
- Travel and Health
- Travel
- Whistle-blower
- Working from Home
- Workplace Surveillance
Log in to enableHR
If you do not have your login details, please call ARA on 1300 368 041.
- Select option 1
- Quote your PV Member number and they will give new login details
- Alternatively contact Samantha McEvoy Member Recruitment Specialist on (03) 8544 3925 or email smcevoy@provision.com.au
When you have your login details, click on the link below to access the enableHR site –
Go to enablehr
ARA How To Create a Policy Document
Your Launch Checklist
Your new practice 18-week action plan
Your detailed timeline for the 18 weeks prior to your opening taking in to the account the lead time for each of those actions.
When you start a project as important as opening your new business wouldn’t it be great to understand at the outset everything that is involved?
The ProVision team of experts have created the ultimate 100 point Launch Checklist that distils a huge amount of information into one simple, actionable checklist. It takes into account the lead times for each of the actions and allows you to create a priortised action plan based on those lead times.
You wouldn’t go on a road trip without your GPS. Consider this checklist your GPS to your new practice launch journey.
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