Andy Warhol’s most famous quote is, “In the future, everyone will be famous for 15 minutes.”  I think he might think it was ironic that he is partly famous for that quote.  He would also think that our current culture is proving him to be right.

In healthcare, we deal with each patient for about 15 minutes at a time.  They may be in our office or our emergency room for longer periods of time, but in terms of human contact, 15 minutes is pretty much what they get.  So why not make that 15 minutes their 15 minutes of fame?  Treat your customers like they are famous and they will come back.

Imagine that today, George Clooney and Julia Roberts came into your office for care.  Most of us would like to think that we would treat them just the same as everyone else… but that’s not reality.  We would be sure that George didn’t have to wait long in the waiting room  We would make sure that Julia was as comfortable as possible.  We would celebrate them… because they are celebrities.

Instead of thinking that we would treat those celebrities the same as everyone else, in other words, give them “average” care… What if we decided to make our “average” the celebrity treatment?  What if we treated everyone who came in like they were George or Julia?

After all, if Andy Warhol is correct, the person you are treating today may not be famous, but they will be eventually.

Can you give everyone the celebrity treatment?