Meet Lauren Glisic

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Lauren Glisic. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Lauren, so great to have you with us today. There are so many topics we want to ask you about, but perhaps the one we can start with is burnout. How have you overcome or avoided burnout?

Until about 4 years ago, I was working in a clinic where I would see 2, sometimes 3, patients an hour. I spent every lunch break catching up on emails and sending out exercise programs to my patients. After seeing between 15-20 patients, I would then spend another 1-2 hours completing documentation in order to be paid by insurance. I didn’t feel like I even had the bandwidth to go above and beyond for my patients. I wasn’t challenging myself professionally, and I often felt like I was just doing the bare minimum to get by. I knew this wasn’t sustainable, but I also knew that every other PT clinic was operating this same way. I questioned if I had chosen the right profession and was feeling the burnout after only 6 years of practicing.
My business partner and I talked often about how we were going to do things differently one day and why our business model would be so special. The first thing we did was make a list of the things that were most important to us in our careers: Work-life balance, positive and uplifting work culture & supportive colleagues, and the autonomy to provide the highest level of care to our clients. We realized quickly that we’d have to break free from the traditional insurance model in order to achieve all of these things together. At Athletic Lab, our PTs see 25-35 patients each week. They have 60 minutes one-on-one with their patients and are able to use this time to build close connections, evaluate progress, specify exercise programming, and make a meaningful difference each and every session. We encourage our PTs to block time on their schedule to drop into group workouts, join a run club, try a new fitness studio, etc because one of our core values as a company is “Health as a lifelong commitment”. We put a big emphasis on mentorship, continuing education, and professional development in order to keep growing our clinical skills as a team and all of this is paid for by management. I know how important it is to feel valued and supported by your employer in the work environment, and this is something we try to give to all of our staff. I think if you can build a workplace that you’re genuinely excited to walk into each morning, then your clients are going to be excited to walk in there too. Those are the intangible things that set Athletic Lab apart from every other PT clinic in LA.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

At Athletic Lab Physical Therapy and Performance Training, we’re redefining what Physical Therapy looks and feels like with a holistic, movement-focussed approach to rehab. We use a 3 Step Process to get results. First, we fix the pain (This is where most PTs stop). Next, we identify and fix the root cause of the pain. Finally, we teach you how to stay pain-free and moving well for life. We help active people solve their pain problems for good, optimize their movement, and get back to doing the things they love to do.
While we work with athletes of all forms and sports, our PTs specialize in treating runners. We have a very in-depth evaluation process that helps us to identify underlying muscle weakness, joint stiffness, imbalances and asymmetries, or core instability. From there we do thorough movement analysis specific to your sport, whether it’s running, deadlifting, or swinging a tennis racket or golf club. Based on our findings, we come up with a program specific to your needs and goals. We are constantly monitoring your progress, testing and retesting strength and mobility to make sure that the exercise programming is appropriate to get you to your goals. We also do a lot of injury prevention in our athletes, helping them to stay strong and avoid injury down the road. Our ideal client is proactive about their health and fitness, prioritizes wellness, and sees physical therapy as a piece of their regular fitness and health regimen. Our goal is to seamlessly blend physical therapy with performance training to create that holistic approach to fitness that is often missing in just physical therapy or personal training alone.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

1. I certainly don’t have all or even a lot of the answers, but I know who to go to for those answers and I have a whole team who helps keep the business health in check. I think being able to delegate tasks that you know someone else can do better than you can is essential. I have a business mentorship group that meets monthly to bounce around ideas and keep us on track with our goals. I have a team managing new leads and our CRM, and another person keeps an eye on our digital marketing. One of our PTs is in charge of our social media, while the other PT puts together our newsletter to keep our community in the loop. Our client care coordinator handles most of our sales calls. One of the most important things you can have in a business is a solid team of professionals to call on.

2. I believe in what I’m “selling”. When someone commits to a plan of care with me, whether it’s a 6 week ankle stability program after a bad sprain, or a 6 month marathon training program, I am very confident that with my expertise in this area and with diligence on my clients’ end, that we’re going to accomplish their goals.

3. Being an athletic person myself, I have a lot of empathy for my clients. I know that if a Physical Therapist told me “You need to stop your exercising completely and do this clamshell exercise instead for the next 6 weeks” I would walk out the door. When I communicate with my patients ,I try to understand what their goal is first and foremost. If their goal is to run again, then their exercise program had better look a lot like running.

How would you describe your ideal client?

My ideal client is proactive about their health and fitness, prioritizes wellness, and sees physical therapy as a piece of their regular fitness and health regimen. This client trusts me as the expert, but also communicates to me when something is not working. I love collaborating with my clients to create an individualized plan that works for them. I’m not necessarily an athlete anymore, but I do love the discipline and structure that comes with being an athlete and for that reason I love treating this population. They’re always going to do the work you give them and therefore see the results.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://athleticlabpt.com
• Instagram: @athleticlabpt
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauren-glisic-bb413a237/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCE3fxkasA0BlfooKBxtOslg