The Waiting Room

The Affordable Care Act could be the greatest thing that ever happened to your business.

Why? Because it will motivate you to grow revenue and profits in a way you have never been motivated before.  You can use it as a catalyst to put yourself into action and make your business stronger than ever before.

The smartest business people are starting to realize that the Affordable Care Act looks very likely to be fully implemented over the next few years.  They also realize that they had better get control of their businesses, their top lines, their bottom lines, and their product.  The time is now to begin figuring out a way to generate the revenue and profits needed to pay whatever expenses or penalties occur when the employer mandate begins in January, 2014.

Let’s say you are a business owner with 50 or more employees that does not offer health insurance. You are not feeling too good.  Maybe you are checking your own insurance to see if it covers psychotherapy.  Your counterparts felt the same way in 1965 when Medicare started, or 1937 when Social Security started, or more recently on the eve  of FMLA, COBRA, and let’s not forget ERISA.   You may feel that clearly new expenses are coming your way, and there is a good chance that the world is going end and you will go out of business because of it.

But after you calm down, you realize that the world will not end and you will keep going .

Or maybe you are watching the presidential race unfold like you watched the Supreme Court deliberations about the Affordable Care Act.  You are hoping circumstances beyond your control will eliminate the employer mandate.  The strategy that the Supreme Court was going to rule in your favor didn’t work out. The next hope is that Mitt Romney will get elected and invalidate the mandate as he says he will.  But, face it, you are not really sure how or if he would do that since he has not offered any specifics.

The best businesses are not just watching, they are taking action to build revenue and profits. They realize those profits  may be required to pay for new expenses that are imposed by the health care law.  Many employers are vague about the fact that they may face either increased health insurance costs or Affordable Care Act penalties.   The thinking goes that it may be less expensive to just pay the penalties than to offer insurance. But penalties are not tax deductible, so they may be working with the wrong numbers.

When employers take energy out of their fear and anger about the Affordable Care Act and focus on making more money, they are truly responding to the potential burdens of the legislation.  In fact, the best scenario that can come out of the Affordable Care Act, other than it realizing its controversial and disputed promise, is that it’s going to force a lot of business owners to figure out how to make their companies stronger, more successful, reach more customers, bring in more revenue, and make more profits.

You have 15 months.  When do you start?

“I’ll just wait,” you say to yourself.   “I’ll see what happens with the presidential election.”  But, let’s say you do wait, and the election goes your way and the law never comes into effect.  Are you willing to skip an opportunity to make your company stronger, more successful, reach more customers, and bring in more revenue and profits because the pressure is off?   Do you, your employees and customers have too much already?

photo credit: kenteegardin via photopin cc