The Staffing Problem Isn’t Really a Staffing Problem
Let’s be honest.
Every pharmacy owner has imagined it at least once.
An employee who:
- never calls out sick
- never forgets a task
- never needs retraining
- never creates drama
- never says, “I didn’t know I was supposed to do that”
And if you’re coming off a particularly fun staffing week, you may have imagined it several times.
Now before anyone emails me, no, I’m not suggesting we replace our pharmacy teams with robots.
Not even close.
But after spending an entire weekend at our AI Workshop with pharmacy owners from around the country, one thing became incredibly clear: the owners getting the biggest results from AI aren’t using it to replace people.
They’re using it to eliminate repetitive work that they and their team do.
When Owners Tell Me They’re Struggling With Staffing?
What they’re often describing isn’t actually a lack of people.
It’s a lack of capacity. They don’t have time to do all the things on their never-ending to-do list.
Because when we look closely, many teams spend huge portions of their day doing things that don’t require clinical judgment.
Things like:
- drafting emails
- creating SOPs
- documenting workflows
- answering repetitive questions
- making routine outbound calls
- writing social media posts
- creating patient education materials
Important work? Absolutely.
But not necessarily pharmacist work. And often not even technician work.
That’s where AI starts becoming interesting.
Now, before we dive into the idea of an AI employee, check out this other blog about 5 ways you can use AI in your pharmacy. It’ll help give you some context for what we’re talking about below!
What We Mean By “AI Employee”
One of the biggest mindset shifts from our AI Workshop was this: stop thinking about AI as software.
Start thinking about it as an employee.
Not a replacement employee (your patients still want a human to connect with and/or complain to).
But a support employee AKA a digital team member.
Because once owners make that shift, they stop asking: “What can ChatGPT/Claude/Gemini do?”
And start asking: “What tasks am I constantly doing that someone else could handle?”
That’s a much better question.
My First AI Employee Doesn’t Have a Name
Yet (lthough based on some of the names I heard at the workshop, I may need to reconsider that lol).
But seriously, one of the first AI employees many pharmacies create ends up becoming a marketing assistant.
Because marketing is one of those things owners know they should be doing.
Yet somehow it always gets pushed behind:
- prior authorizations
- staffing issues
- wholesaler problems
- PBM frustrations
- and whatever fresh chaos showed up today
Sound familiar?
AI can help draft:
- newsletters
- patient education
- social media content
- provider outreach
- blog articles
Not perfectly. But quickly and without a ton of dead “research time”.
Marketing becomes a hell of a lot easier when you stop staring at a blank screen.
The SOP Employee
This one surprised a lot of owners.
Most pharmacies have workflows. Few pharmacies have documented workflows.
There’s a difference.
Ask five team members how something gets done and sometimes you’ll get six answers.
And that’s another place where AI can step in. AI is incredibly good at helping owners document processes. You can literally walk through a task, explain it conversationally, and have AI help organize it into a usable SOP.
That means:
- easier onboarding
- easier delegation
- easier consistency
And fewer situations where critical knowledge lives entirely inside Karen’s head (no offense to Karen).
But if Karen takes a vacation, the pharmacy should still function.
The Voice AI Employee
This is where things start getting really interesting.
Because phones are still one of the biggest workflow killers inside many pharmacies.
Not because patients are bad. Not because calls aren’t important.
But because every phone call interrupts something else.
Voice AI is now capable of handling many routine communication tasks such as:
- medication synchronization outreach
- appointment reminders
- patient follow-up calls
- refill reminders
- basic communication workflows
And it’s getting better incredibly fast.
The goal isn’t replacing human interaction. The goal is allowing your humans to spend more time doing work that actually requires humans.
That’s a very different conversation.
The Real Competitive Advantage
Here’s what I think many owners are missing.
The biggest advantage isn’t the technology.
It’s the time.
Let’s say AI saves you:
- 30 minutes per day
- 60 minutes per day
- maybe even several hours per week
What happens over a year?
Suddenly you’re:
- following up with providers more consistently
- communicating with patients more frequently
- building better systems
- improving marketing
- creating stronger operations
The gap compounds. You have more time to do more things, sleep better, be a better owner, and actually grow your pharmacy.
That’s what people are underestimating.
Where To Start
Don’t try to implement ten things. Don’t try to automate your entire pharmacy by next Tuesday.
Start small.
Ask yourself: “What is one repetitive task I hate doing?”
Start there.
Maybe it’s:
- marketing
- documentation
- training
- communication
- workflow creation
Pick one.
Build one AI employee. Then build another. And another.
That’s how the pharmacies getting the best results are doing it.
One Last Thought
The pharmacies that benefit most from AI won’t necessarily be the most technical.
They’ll be the most practical, who are willing to ask: “What can I stop doing manually?”
Because the future of pharmacy isn’t humans versus AI.
It’s humans working alongside AI.
And if the workshop taught me anything, it’s that those pharmacies are already pulling ahead.
The question is whether you’ll join them.
If you want help integrating AI into your pharmacy? That’s exactly why we created the Unlimited Membership inside Pharmacy Badass University.
You get unlimited coaching, done-for-you marketing, custom AI projects, direct support for your team, KPI tracking, accountability, and the systems needed to turn good ideas into real growth. If you’re ready to stop trying to figure everything out on your own and start building a more profitable, efficient pharmacy, the Unlimited Membership may be exactly what you’re looking for.
