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It's office autopsy time! Kiera shares the story of a practice that recently discovered $2.5 million going unnoticed. She talks about the doctors and their (very) busy schedules, the need for an additional hygienist, and what the cold, hard numbers told this practice about next steps. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:01) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera. And today I am excited. I was just in a practice and we were going through a lot of really fun things. And whenever I come from an office, I get so excited to come back and chat with our podcast family of things that you and your practice should and could be doing. I was told when I was in this office, this is the Dental A Team magic where we physically fly to your practice. We work with your teams. We work with you as a doctor. We uncover hidden pieces that maybe you didn't even know to bring to a call. I think it's so magical to be able to do this for practices. And so today is a little office autopsy of finding $2.5 million left behind on the table in ways that you would never expect. Sound interesting? Well, I hope you're ready because I wanna take you through and uncover hidden little cashflow pits that you might not even be looking at. So number one, we decided to go through... because this doctor is so busy. So many of you tell me I'm so busy, Kiera, my schedule is jam-packed, and I say congratulations, but what is the cost of that? So for example, if you have your hygiene department, you should be looking at your active patient base. So an active patient base for a general dentist should be 1,500 patients as an active patient for one doctor. High end, like where you can kind of get by is 1,900, but beyond that, that's very high. And we're talking 12 months and 18 months. So take a look at both of those numbers. and just look to see where are you at. So this practice, they have about 4,500 active patients with two full-time doctors. They're at capacity. So what's happening is we have options. We can add more hygiene, but then that's going to have our doctor to hygiene, AKA our exams at the wrong amount. What's happening is they're dropping periopatients because they don't have space for their... Regular prophy patients, then they're diagnosing SRPs, but they have nowhere to put them for six months. They're pushing new patients out for four to five months. So we did a little bit of fun math and we didn't even, this is just gonna be some hypotheticals, but I think for you just to hear like, what are some of the things that actually can hurt your practice and how much are you leaving on the table when we do things like this? So for this practice, when we went through and we looked at it, we thought, all right, let's take an average prophy and whatever it is for you. Maybe it's 150 up to 200 for an average prophy. We're talking prophy, x-rays, cleanings, or just even prophy and an exam. How much is that for you and your practice? Now, look to see how many active patients you have. If we've got 4,500, well guess what? You get a double that because those patients are coming in two times a year. So have fun with those numbers. We divide that by 12. We look at how many patients we're seeing per day. Now that doesn't necessarily mean how many you are, but that's how many you're going to need to see. Then we look to see how much hygiene we have right now today to see, we actually have enough hygiene spaces for it? But let's not forget that we also have to add new patients because in addition to our active base, we are constantly adding more patients. Yes, we are losing some patients, but my hope is that you at least are adding more than we're losing. So we've got to look at those two together and see how much time we actually have in a week, in a month that we need to be seeing patients. This is gonna then show you your gap. So for this practice, they had over 200 appointments that they were short every single month. That's at a minimum. So clearly they're ready to bring on another hygienist. This was great numbers to see, do I bring on a hygienist? Do I not bring on a hygienist? But the problem is they're already at five hygienists with two doctors. You can start to do the math. So it's like, well, great. Well, we're not diagnosing perio either. So options are we could bring on a sixth hygienist and that hygienist would just do SRP. That doesn't mean just that person, but we'd have eight hours of SRP in a given day. spread across all the hygienists. That means we don't increase our exam numbers, but we do increase our number of perio. We do increase our number of hygiene spots. That's going to help in some instances. But even if we fix that problem, remember we still have all these patients that we're not seeing. So this practice right now, they told me, hey, Kiera, we're pushing our patients out about eight months is where we've got to put them. We can't see them on the six month mark. We've got to push them to the eight month. So I did the math and I was like, okay, average pro fee is going to be about $150 per patient. but you gotta take all those patients that would be seen in one month and we times that by 150. Now, I understand this is very loose math, but it gives a good idea because think about it, those patients, if we saw them every six months, that's money from insurance and also from seeing them on a regular schedule, plus not just that, but patient care. We see them on the six month interval, but these ones we're not seeing every six months, we're seeing them every eight months. So that means there's two months that we're missing out on opportunities to see them. So when we did the math, it averaged out to about $450,000 with this patient base annually, just of miss hygiene. And that was only on one month. If you want to do it on two months, which is realistically what it would be, that's almost a million dollars worth of revenue, just in hygiene miss opportunity. That's fascinating to me. This is why I think a consultant is so powerful because we come in and we do crazy numbers like this and we look at your numbers and we look at where you're at. And it really gives you the confidence to know, can I bring on an associate? Can I bring on more hygiene? I feel like this, what does the number and the data suggest? So just looking at that, I was like, a simple fix is bring a hygienist in, let's have our perio go up. And then also we need to bring a doctor in for whether it's full time or not. So we ran scenarios of if we brought a doctor in, if we added more hygiene, if we had our doctors do this, what do we need to do? How do we keep our doctor to hygiene ratio running all these scenarios to then say, my gosh, this really would help our practice out. And when I think about this and I think about practices for us, are you looking at numbers and metrics like this? Are you calculating the cost of missed appointments or not scheduling our hygiene patients back? Not to mention that we're certainly not doing 30 % of our patient base as perio. What these hygienists are doing is they're seeing that they need perio, but they don't have space to put them. So they don't want to have the conversation. This is no knock to a hygiene team. Several hygienists do it because I'm going to tell you, you've got this awful disease. but then I'm not actually going to be able to get you in for X number of days, weeks, months. That feels really, really, really hard to try and convince a patient of this. So what do we do? We clean it out and we say, you know what, we're just gonna get it next time. But next time then fumbles and then we gotta have these conversations. Then we don't wanna have these conversations. We're constantly looking at like, we're just punting the ball down the line. So what do we need to do on this? What are the scenarios in this option? How much money is being left behind, but also how much patient? And this is great. Other options that we considered are, we cut insurances? Because, hey, if we've got this many patients, what if we cut out our lowest producing insurance that pays us? And the doctor said, no, my mission and vision for this practice is that we care for the average patient, that we are here to take care of them and support them. And that's what this doctor wants to do. So it's like, great. They have an incredible building. They've got more space to build out. Fantastic. Let's bring in the other doctors. Let's bring in more hygiene. Let's serve these patients because instantly if we brought on one or two more hygienists, Guess what? We could backfill very quickly with all those patients. Plus we need to hold space for new patients and perio that would be ideal based on the number of perio. So then you look at your patient base, you figure out 30 % of that. That's going to tell you how much SRP spaces you need to hold every single month in the practice. Don't forget, once you have SRP, you also need to have perio maintenance is in there. So this you can see is like this amazing web of data, of knowledge, of fun. to figure out how much is your practice actually leaving on the table unintentionally. And when I looked at that, the doctor, he was like, well, Kiera, number one, you're always worth your weight in gold. You come in and you find little things. You guys, that is one small change that's worth 450 to $900,000 just in the amount of pro fees. That's nothing else, nothing. Like that's all we did. And to be able to uncover little opportunities like this and so, for you to look at your practice, this is why I wanted to give you this scenario of this practice. There were several others that we looked at that we found that we were able to just quickly identify. But I think so often people are looking for big moves. They're looking for these all on X cases. They're looking for what could I do here? How could I do this? What could we change this for? And what I wanna highlight to you is I promise you there are little gold nuggets in your practice of true solid gold that's serving patients at a higher level. or you have to do nothing else in this practice. And all you need to do is just shift one or two things and instantly your practice is going to grow 10, 20, 30, 40, 50%. Small little tweaks and changes, small little gaps, small little pieces. So it's let's look to see our hygiene patients coming in on time, like on the six month interval. Do we have the correct active patient base for the number of doctors that we have? Do we have enough hygiene to doctor ratio? What's our perio percentage? How many perio maintenance are we doing? Are we solid on those pieces with our patient base? And then if we are on those, let's look at our x-rays. Are we doing our FMXs and our comp exams on regular frequencies? Are we doing perio, excuse me, are we doing fluoride therapy on all of our patients if you believe in that? These little tiny opportunities just in hygiene I've highlighted for you, not to mention all the other spaces that we could go after, but just hygiene alone. Are we collecting before patients walk out the door? Are we using our block schedules and getting enough block time in our schedules for our new patients, for our perio? Do we have those blocked in there? Because if we don't, guess what? Like I don't even do the math for you on how much SRP patients are, but you wanna tack that on with the number of patients that we're missing out on. That's for sure a $1.2 million mistake with no extra effort. So I just want you today, it's a quick fast episode. It's a down and dirty of one, I think this is a huge. A-ha of what a consultant can do for your practice. Number two, I think it's a quick a-ha for you to look at your practice and say, hey, during my CEO time, let me go walk through my practice and let me see these little gaps and cashflow gaps in my practice and let's see how we can close those up. And number three, I really hope you realize so many people think they need to expand, go get another practice, all these different things to grow their business. And I will tell you that 99, maybe I'll say 90 % of the time, we can find growth, we can find opportunities. right underneath your roof with no extra effort, no extra energy, just to do a small change. Perfect block scheduling. Usually can add $1 million plus to a practice if we do it correctly. No extra hours, no extra time, no extra team members, just being more strategic with it. Increasing your case acceptance, small little change, small little tweak, way more revenue to your practice. So my question to you is, what's it worth? What's your hour, two hours, three hours of admin time worth to you if it could show that you could create this? What's it worth not to call a consultant to just come check your practice and see what are maybe the hidden gaps? You guys, this practice is doing amazing. Their overhead's great, their team's great, all of that. You would think on paper that this person doesn't need a consultant. They're not stressed, they're not cashflow poor, they're none of those things. What they are is they are looking for the hidden opportunities that a consultant who's been in practices hundreds of times can come and find for them. They're looking for, what am I not thinking about that you're gonna think about? I want you to come in and find that. And I love it. I feel like I get to go in as a sleuth. I'm not looking for systems or operations. This practice, like I said, on paper, this practice looks like they would never need to call a consultant. But what I want to highlight for you is we found in a less than day and a half, over a million, and I just told you one part of this story, over a million dollars worth of opportunity for this practice. Would that be worth your time? Something to consider. Something to think about. And I hope today you take this and you don't just think about it, but you go do action because I promise you there is just this same, if not bigger cashflow leak in your practice or hit an opportunity that you're not thinking about that would radically change your practice, your patients, your team, your life. So go find it. And if you don't know how to do it, reach out, or if you're like, Hey, I'd love you just to come see like come sleuth. Let's do this together. Reach out. Hello@TheDentalATeam.com your practice, your team, your life is worth it. and you deserve all the happiness in the world. And I'm happy that you chose to listen today. I'm happy to hear you hung out. And if you thought this was a fascinating podcast, share it with a friend because I think all of us could think a little bit differently, find these little opportunities. Again, no extra diagnosis, no extra work, just changing it up a little bit, doing things a little differently and their practice is going to exponentially grow. Yes, they need to bring a doctor. Yes, they need to find a hygienist. Yes, they're strategic, but we talked about all the different scenarios, ran all the different numbers and hey, here's all the options. Now pick which one you want to do. There's so many ways to do it, but look at the awesome opportunities that they could do. And I hope that you do the same. And as always, thanks for listening. I'll catch you next time on the Dental A Team Podcast.
Full show notes at the publisherKiera compares the stages of a business to the stages of the human life cycle, from the infancy of a startup, to the chaos of money flow without systems, to the growing profitability of early adulthood, and so on. The goal is, of course, to reach maturity, where the business can run on its own, there's work-life balance, money flow, and more. Kiera gives listeners the common factors for each "age group," and what needs to be done for practices to reach their prime. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and I hope you are having an amazing day. I hope it's an epic day. I hope you're loving your life. I hope you're having just so much fun. ⁓ I love dentistry. I love podcasting. I love connecting with so many of you. I just met people this week that are Dental A Team fanatics and it's always fun. And it's funny on calls when I get to chat with you in real life, people are like, Kiera, you sound just like you do on the podcast. And I'm like, that's great because guess what? It is me. So I am so excited to podcast with you guys today. Welcome. If you're new to Dental A Team podcast. Hello, I'm Kiera Dent. Dent really is my last name. And it's because I love all things dental. ⁓ I love my husband, even though he's not a dentist. ⁓ I love, I just love life. I love helping people. We had a, in our consulting, we have what we call our doctor mastermind. It's a doctor only mastermind and it's on ⁓ Tuesday, the first Tuesday of the month. And we call it Think Tank Tuesday for our doctor mastermind. We had all of our doctors there this week and we had several doctors come. It was just a really, really fun time. And as I was sitting there, I tell everybody that this think tank is supposed to feel like you're sitting in my living room, hanging out with me. We're all just here having like a good time. I love to see there's one doctor pushing her daughter on a swing. There was another doctor making dinner. There's another doctor sitting at the office, another doctor driving home. It truly is a like, let your hair down, come be, let's come hang out, let's all be together, let's all work together. Cause honestly, dentistry can be super hard and challenging. And ⁓ as I walked away from that, we were talking about the life cycle of a business and people were just talking about where they were and here's where I am and how do I get to the next phase of my business? What are some easy moves? And it was crazy because it's actually not that hard to move from one part of the business to the next part. ⁓ A lot of times it's just having somebody pointed out to you. ⁓ giving you the confidence that you can do that. ⁓ And then having a group of people around you that are just like you. And as I walked out of that meeting and that just fun hangout time, there's always Kiera's after party, which is not recorded. It is Kiera unfiltered. I just thought, I'm so blessed to get to know these human beings, these people that we get to work alongside with, that we get to collaborate with. I get to see them go through all the phases of business from where they were to where they are. working with us, get to see their production increase, I get to see their ROI ⁓ tenfold, I get to see how happy they are in life, I get to see when they were once stressed to where now they're exuberant and happy and fulfilled and that is why Dental A Team exists. That is why the podcast exists is because I want all of you to feel like you have ⁓ someone in your corner, someone who is rooting for you, someone who has answers where you feel like there are none, someone who sees the path more clearly than you can. someone who's created a community of like-minded doctors that are either where you are or have been where you are and can help you get to the next step. We have doctors who mentor each other. have ⁓ masterminds in person. have where we come to your practice. So if you're listening to this podcast and you're feeling like, gosh, I just don't even know what to do. The answer is there's actually always the what's next to do. There's always somebody who can help you. It's just you having the courage to book the call to ⁓ invest in your practice in yourself and decide that you're worth having the life and the practice that you know, you're capable of having. And so if that resonates with you, reach out, come join our doctor mastermind, come meet us in person, come hang out with me in real life. I would love to have you be a part of it. ⁓ my mission truly is to change people's lives. and that's luckily I get this amazing platform of dentistry. So, reach out, Hello@TheDentalATeam.com because honestly, I believe that it is so fun and so powerful. ⁓ to go from that. And so I teased out a little bit of a life cycle of a business. This came from Tony Robbins. I really love Tony. I love a lot of things that he teaches and ⁓ there's a lot of wisdom. so just to kind of to take this on for the podcast today, I feel like, hey, we talked about this in our Dr. Mastermind, but I think it'd be very beneficial for all of you to hear. And this is my adaptation of it to take it to dental offices and kind of then giving you some of the things that I see in a practice so you can kind of understand. But basically we have kind of like think about the life cycle of human beings. It's where we start out as infancy. We're born into this world and then we're infants and then we're toddlers. And then we go into this like middle life, like middle school. And then we go into high school and then we go into young adults. So college or young adult. Then we go into maturity or our prime of our life. Then we go into this kind of midlife evaluation. That's right before we retire. Then we go into aging. Then we go into institutionalization and then we go to death. So we think about how people go around and it's interesting because there could be say a 25 year old, 30 year old, 40 year old who actually could be on the aging path even though their age is not where you would think that they would be. And so the idea of this is to kind of look to see based on like a life cycle of us where your business is and what maybe is like the pain point. So when we look at a business and we look at like children, so an infant, They're screaming, right? They're screaming all the time. Yes, they're alive. Yes, they're there, but they're screaming and they're hungry and they don't know how to make money and they always have all these problems and it just feels like it's problem after problem after problem. That's like when you first start a business and it is chaos and it is exuberant and it is blissful and it is terrifying. Like Tiff and I were actually joking about it when we were on our doctor mastermind and we were talking about how like Dental A Team when it was in its infancy stage. I literally was paying Tiffanie via Venmo. I did not have any payroll set up. I don't know why Tiff stayed with me. So Spiffy Tiffy shout out to her today. ⁓ But I really truly was such a naive business owner. I did not have protocols. I did not have a lawyer. I didn't have HR. I just said, I want to be here in this world and put something together, but no processes, no systems. It was screaming mayhem all the time. And then you go from that infancy stage to toddler, right? Toddlers, they can sleep through the night. They're more independent. They can reason on certain things, but they're not this middle schooler, right? ⁓ And so when we look at that toddler that like they're going to elementary school, they're kind of in that middle stage. This is now where a business has elevated. It's not like paying people via Venmo, ⁓ but you still don't have the cash flow to be able to hire great people. It's still this like very new. You probably have one or two people. Practices that are in this realm are more the the startup phase. So startup is like your very infancy, whether you're buying it or if it's a scratch start or you already have it. But it's kind of that screaming and then you move into toddler where like we can afford like one or two people on our team. but maybe we're moonlighting at another practice. cash flow is not consistent. ⁓ Systems and processes are not in place. And it's really just in this like delicate, but more stable, like we're like, okay, we're not we're not gonna go broke. We know we can kind of handle, but at the same time, cashflow is not there. Then you move into middle school and you think about a middle schooler. This is where like we're starting to hit production. We can kind of have a few team members in there. We kind of maybe have a little bit of money, but not quite. ⁓ And we're starting to get a little more established, but we're like very gangly. We're very awkward. ⁓ We're doing the dentistry, but we're still, we're still not quite making it. And so from there, when we move from there, You didn't go into a teenager and you think about a teenager, they think they know what they're doing. They've got the keys to the car. And this is where you've got money, but you're blowing through it because you have no systems, no processes. Like you are mayhem. Like you're making the money, but you're not keeping the money. And you're running on all four cylinders. But it's just chaos. It's wild. There's a frenzy. There's an excitement. And I think when Dental A Team was in that phase, We had a little bit of money and so we were hiring people, but we didn't have quite enough money so we're not hiring experts quite yet. And you can just feel there's like this teenage energy and ⁓ then you move into like young adult and young adults were like perfect. The company is making money. We're able to hire more experienced people. So like we can bring on an office manager. We can bring on a better hygienist. We can have more things in place. And then we go into this like maturity and maturity and prime are where we're. Profitable, we've got the production, we've got the systems in place. have a leadership team that's running the practice. It's not all dependent upon the dentist or one or two people. We've got the systems in place, we've got the profit in place, we've got the production in place. And a lot of times that happens when people are in this maturity or this prime, they're hanging out right there. What they often do is this is when they wanna buy another practice. Sometimes they even wanna buy a practice when they're in toddler, teenager, or like that college mid-year. But they're really just... this is when they do it. And what happens is when you buy a practice or you expand your practice or you any of the phases, then you actually like usually kick yourself down and you go back to either toddler or maybe middle schooler or high schooler and your business like re re fumbles. There was a practice that I was working with and they're like, Kiera, we have this great opportunity. I worked with them for a year and we got everything set. The doctor was like, I'm tired of having to run it all. So they were like kind of in that probably more at that mid year, they were probably college age. So the practice was great. They were profitable, but the doctor was still doing everything. And the doctor was just like, I don't want to do this anymore. I need you to train my team. I need you to train all the people so that way I can just come be a dentist and truly own my business, which kicks you into that maturity and prime. So we worked together. We were able to train the team. We were able to train the doctor. We did leadership training. We trained the whole team. We put systems into place that they didn't realize. And the doctor like literally we got them into prime like It was incredible. It took us about a year to get them there. And they're like, Kiera, it's great. Cause I was thinking like, we're wrapped up. put a bow on this. I'm super excited for you guys. And the doctor was like, Kiera, guess what? There's this awesome opportunity for another practice. Do you think we should buy it? And I tell you, when people get into this like prime, like they're in it, they've, they've, they reached the mountain. They're like, we should buy another practice. And I was like, well, so here's the deal. your kids have gone off to college. That's where your practice is right now. Like you're sitting here, you're very happy, you're very comfortable. Life is very easy for you. And buying another practice is going to be literally bringing on a screaming brand new, like brand brand new infant baby. Do you want to do that? And the doctor was like, that's a good point. ⁓ Let me think about that. And they're like, here, the deal is just too good of a deal. And honestly, if I was in their shoes, I would have done the same thing. The practice was truly a, you should take it and do it. And then what happened, we flew all the way back down into toddler. Like we didn't go quite back to infancy, but oh my gosh, like the practices started screaming and both practices started struggling. And all these little pieces came up because we went from having this mature, we're in prime, our life is really easy to bringing on this screaming baby. And all of a sudden everything started jostling, the leadership team got jostly. We were bringing in different partners and lo and behold, two, three years later, we finally now gotten the practices. they're right around teenager, maybe young adult for both locations and guess what they want to do? You guess it, they want to buy another practice. And this tends to be the cycle of dentistry. ⁓ Or what actually can happen is we go from prime and then we actually can go into midlife evaluation. And what happens here is when doctors are considering like, do I want to sell? Do I want to keep sitting in the chair? Maybe we're ⁓ not, not purposely, but maybe we are not diagnosing as much as we used to. Maybe we don't want to go to the CEs. Maybe we don't want to do all these other pieces. And you start to get into this midlife. And if you're not careful and you don't get the CE or get a younger associate or whatever it is to kick you back over or bring in different team members, you can actually then fall into aging and become this aging practice that ⁓ if you're not careful, will actually die off. ⁓ And that's what we call sleeping practices. New grads love to buy aging practices, but then what can also happen is your team members might also be at a different space on the life cycle than you are. So sometimes when you inherit this sleeping practice as a new owner, well, you might. inherit a team that also is maybe a little bit sleepy too where they're like I'm on my way to retirement, I don't want to be putting in all this new technology, I don't want to do all this software, I don't want to do all these changes or that team might be like sweet and they got kicked back just like someone in their 50s can be like you know I'm gonna go run a marathon and they kick them back into that maturity, that prime or they're in their 60s or they're 65 like my mom she went back to college, my mom was on her path to aging and she went back to college later…
Full show notes at the publisherTiff and Trish discuss the often ignored practice transition — are you looking ahead for your practice? Ten years out? Thirty years? The two consultants discuss what to keep in line now so that any changes on the horizon are received with minimal panic and damage. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:01) Hello Dental A Team listeners. We are here today with some really, really just fantastic information. We're rounding out the year, if you can believe that. It's almost 2026, so whatever year you're listening to this in, hopefully it's also still super relevant, but we are heading into 2026 here soon. And we thought that it would be really fun to just wrap the year with a couple of different practice strategy kind of. don't know, just like how to progress where you're at, from where you're at to where you wanna go. Strategy podcast. So I'm just super excited. I have one of my favorite human beings in the world here with me today. I have Ms. Trish Ackerman. She is a prized possession on the Dental A Team team here. She is a traveling dental consultant with our team, which means that she does virtual consulting. So we do. coaching calls, video calls, we team training calls, all those pieces, you guys know that, but she also travels to practices and sees different practices in person, kind of helping them strategize and train the team and get things working again, kind of oiling that machine. And something I like to say is, I always tell my practices, Trish, and I think you probably feel the same way, I always tell my practices that we have the most incredible practices that join the Dental A Team. We really attract the most incredible people, but more than anything, I always know that I'm coming into a practice that's running really well. And my job is to find the areas where they just kind of feel a little bit stuck. Maybe something's a little bit inefficient. Maybe there's just something that's like, gosh, if we tweak this a centimeter to the left or a millimeter to the right, kind of I think of like implants, like, you know, you gotta just get them just right. And if we can make that little tweak ⁓ with them in office and find those areas, then their lives become. less stressful. like to remove the stress. So I always tell practices, gosh, like I just don't get invited to practices that aren't doing well. I'm always, I'm always just so shocked at how well practices are doing. And Trish, I know you've consulted for a while. You've been here with our team for a little while, but you have just so much, there's like a wealth of knowledge behind you and all of the aspects of everything that you've done. And I'm so excited for you to be on this team. I know your practices are thriving because you're here. We are thriving because you're here and we're all better people because of it. So Trish, thank you so much for being here today. I'm excited to pick your brain on these practice strategies. How are you? Your hair, we already talked about your hair is stellar. I had a weird hair dream. So hair is on the mind. It's like, it's a thing today. So welcome with your beautiful glasses and your beautiful hair. And it's 8 a.m. in the morning. What were we thinking? But this is a great way to start our day. Trish, how are you today? DAT Trish Ackerman (02:44) I'm doing great. Thanks, Tim. I always like doing this with you. The Dental A Team (02:47) Okay, thank you. Thank you. That makes it much easier ⁓ when I schedule it that you enjoy doing it. So thank you. I appreciate that. ⁓ I do enjoy life with you. You shed a lot of perspective for me. So thank you. ⁓ Yeah, definitely team listeners. I had this, okay, start over. Marketing, our marketing department, they help us come up with a lot of topics. And then the consulting team, we kind of look at them more like, hey, is this relevant? Is this something that DAT Trish Ackerman (02:55) Welcome. Thank you. The Dental A Team (03:17) we're seeing pop up in our worlds of consulting with our clients and our listeners is this something that's going to be super beneficial. And this topic came up and I was like, gosh, actually, it's kind of super cool to end the year with this because now we get to look into what next year is going to be. And this could be a lot of strategy that helps build, I think, Trish long term visions. It might not be something that someone's thinking about today. Just like I know we have. you know, lot of new graduates who listen and, a lot of doctors who've been in practice for 20, 30 years, or even three years, five years, wherever they're at on their journey, I feel like this is information that we like to shed light on for all of our practices. That's like, always be prepared. Just like, I don't feel like, I don't feel like we buy houses. We don't have a home and not know the value always. Like we're always making sure we know the value. We're making sure we know, you know, our prices right. our interest rates are the best that we can get. Do we need to refinance? We're always looking at those aspects, but I think that we forget to duplicate that and look at it in our business as well and make sure that we always know the health of our business. And Trish, when we're building out goals, I know you and I both do this. We like to look as far ahead as we can, like 10 years ahead to say, what could that look like? And when do you want to retire? Right, when do you think that you want to repair? How long do you want to work? And even if that's 30 years down the road, making sure that at any point we could be ready for that. And so today is really talking about practice transition strategies, what that might look like. And Trish, I want to know from your perspective, you've done quite a few practice transitions, I would imagine, in the history of dentistry that you've got behind you there. What are some of the... What are some common to start, like let's start just broad. What are common practice transitions that you have seen that you've worked through? Like what does that even mean when a doctor says I want to transition or we say transition in there to understand that? What does it mean to transition? What have you seen? DAT Trish Ackerman (05:24) What I've seen is doctors that have been with the practice for many, many years, they built their legacy and they are ready to pass the baton to a new dentist. And it's a big decision. And sometimes they're sometimes they have sellers remorse because then they realize that, shoot, maybe I wasn't quite ready. But I have, I have seen it where, I mean, most of the time the sellers are very ready and, the new buyers coming in are very ready. So you know, it's a transition. We make sure that the doctor, both doctors are aligned, the seller and the buyer, and that it's a good fit for both. The Dental A Team (06:03) Yeah, I love that. love that. So transition could mean a sell and a buy, right? A transition is a change, right? Transition is we're making a change. We're looking different in the future than we do today. And I agree, I think a couple of pieces that on both sides are super important, I think is that alignment word that you used, right? And making sure that we know where we want to go. I think a seller needs to know where they want to go. Why do they want this practice? the or why do they want to sell this practice and the buyer needs to know why do I want this practice and being in alignment with that is absolutely key. Now, when we're prepping for selling ⁓ and transitioning, we'll call it transitioning, what are some of the things that you have advised or you've worked on yourself while helping practices to sell? How do you prepare for selling? Like what do you need to make sure is in place if they're not? We'll take it two ways. Maybe someone's not selling today. They're like, well, one day I might sell. And then maybe someone's like, gosh, I need to sell. want to sell. I'm ready to get out. So what would you advise someone who says maybe one day I might want to sell? How do they keep their business prepared for that? DAT Trish Ackerman (07:16) Well, that's always the best way, like start a plan. There are times when it's like an emergency and need to sell, when they have the, when they've got the time to plan, you really want to ensure like the, like you were talking about, tip that the selling of the house, you don't sell your house if the flooring is just a hot mess or if, or if the roof is caving in, you get those things fixed first. And in a dental practice, you really need to protect the patient base because the new buyer or even somebody transitioning in to purchases, what does the patient base look like? And if we're adding a partner, do we have a patient base for them? If we don't, this is the time that we, the doctors need to be hyper-focused on growing that patient base. That also requires like, what does the accounts receivable look like? What is the collection ratio? Is this practice producing but not collecting? And though you do like kind of a full analysis on the top. five KPIs typically, and then ensure that they are in really good condition. You want your practice to look appealing and you want your practice to be healthy. And when you're selling anything or transitioning in, the patient base is always number one. So if you have the syndrome where the front door is open, but the back door is open as well, we need the time to strategize to get that back door closed to ensure that when we go to sell this new buyer, The Dental A Team (08:35) Yeah DAT Trish Ackerman (08:43) or new partner knows that there's a solid patient base in place. And then again, the counts receivable, that's another really big one. That's got to be cleaned up pretty well. Again, to look appealing and to be worth something. The Dental A Team (08:55) Yeah, I love that. I am in transition. Like we're looking at purchasing a home and we have a home that we're either going to rent or we're going to sell. And what you're making me think of now is that our realtor, I love her dearly. She is one of my best friends in life. And she is like, cool, we can totally do this, but she needs some really nice pendant lights. Like Tiff, got to open that. She's like, I know you've got some storage closet somewhere that's got a ton of, you know, a ton of decor, like she's like, you gotta spruce this place up. Like, yeah, she got brushing up, this is perfect. And I was like, ⁓ wow, yeah, you're right. And as I'm looking at Zillow and looking at all of these homes, I'm like, ooh, I love those pen and lights and ooh, I love that has black trim. And I'm like, my gosh, actually it's those pieces ⁓ that just sparkle that make you want that thing. If you want to get a good price, if you want something great for your patients, you want a great person to purchase your practice and you want a great person to carry on the legacy of what you have built and a great person to take care of the patient base that you have worked so hard to get, I think you have to make it attractive and appealing. And I think you're absolutely spot on. The patient base is huge. A doctor buying a practice, a DSO purchasing a practice, like anybody purchasing his practice. purchasing a practice wants to see that it is valuable. And the value is in the people, right? The patients and the dollars. And I think what you said is exactly true. The flip side of a patient base, you can have all the patients in the world and you can have that back door closed, but if you're not collecting the money, that back door is open. The money's just going out the door with the patients instead of staying in the practice. That's also an issue as well. So you've got to, you've got to hang those pendant lights and get those systems in place and really, really evaluate if you were, if you remove yourself emotionally from the practice that you've built and you look at it objectively, would this be appealing to you? If you looked at your home on Zillow, you took pictures and you scrolled through those pictures and you looked at your home, would you be attracted to purchase that home? If you weren't emotionally tied to the place. So. DAT Trish Ackerman (11:15) Yeah. The Dental A Team (11:15) I love that. DAT Trish Ackerman (11:16) And piggybacking on that, when you're buying a home, you're buying a practice, what's your profit look like? I mean, if you're buying something that isn't going to have any value because there's a lot of debt tied to this or like a home, if you're going to purchase a home, but you're paying too much for it because it's really only worth, mean, those are also the things that the buyer has to look at. Is this practice, is it like heavy, heavy overhead? And if so, The Dental A Team (11:19) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. DAT Trish Ackerman (11:43) that needs to be trimmed down along with ensuring that the patient base is strong. If you're gonna sell something, it needs to be profitable to the buyer. The Dental A Team (11:52) Absolutely, absolutely. I think that's spot on because you're gonna look at a home and you're gonna say, okay, well, this is the dollar amount that they have it listed for based on these photos or based on what I see in person. This is what I'm gonna have to put into it to make it what I want it to be. So I'm gonna take that into consideration. So if you've got a house priced at 525 and I know it's gonna take 60, $70,000 to... make it valuable to me, make it the home that I want. Now my brain is saying, this worth 600,000? Because that's what I'm actually putting into it. And then my offer to you is gonna take into consideration the upgrades that I feel I need in that home in order to compensate for the price that you've listed it for. Yeah, I love that. when you're talking strategies for, we always, think, let me start over. DAT Trish Ackerman (12:35) Absolutely. The Dental A Team (12:44) Prepping for selling, I said this in both versions, right? Because I want a doctor to purchase a practice and think that way, right? I want you to think if I were to sell this down the road. Like how can I invest, reinvest back into this practice to make it the best that it possibly can be? I want this practice for a long time, but we're not gonna be here forever, right? We're not, we may be in our home forever, but the likelihood of that in this day and age in 2025 is unrealistic. We're not gonna, we're likely not going to serve the term of our loan agreement in our home. Like we're going to move on, we're gonna find something new and the same is true for your business. So making sure, we don't know. We don't know when that's going to happen. We might say, want to practice for 30 years. Great. But if you wait for 25 years to get ready to sell, you're going to be in an emergent sell situation. So day one today, making sure that you think like a seller doesn't mean that you're selling your practice. It doesn't mean that you're not there for your team. It doesn't mean that we're not here for the culture and that we're not here for the growth and the patience. It means we're preparing for everything. That will set you up for success because you're constantly thinking about the value and about the r…
Full show notes at the publisherDr. Pia Lieb returns for a second part on the podcast. In this episode, she talks about being obsessed with your craft, and why that extra 10% for patients will take you miles. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:10) I love that you, ⁓ I think this is probably what's made you really great. I don't know. I've heard a lot about you. But I think what you do is you make sure that the patients are obsessed with the results and not that Dr. Pia is obsessed. Like you're obsessed with the craftsmanship of what you've done. You're really talented at that. But like hearing that you let people walk out and go try these on and what is it going to be like before you do it? That to me says that you are so obsessed about the outcome and the result for the patient. And then your job is to make sure you have the most excellent craftsmanship, the best product, the best techniques, the best method to get them the outcome they want. And I think hearing that, I'm just so proud of you. And I'm so grateful to hear that there are clinicians in our industry that are obsessed about that rather than the reverse. Because I think some people are obsessed about maybe the dollar, maybe about doing these types of cases, but they're not the best at it, or this is what I think that they should look like. You really want to make sure that that patient is like a walking raving fan of you before you even do the work on them. And that I think is very special about you. Dr Pia (01:17) Thanks, but you know, I like to say that, you know, like, the thing that people don't understand is I'm technically the Hermes of dentistry because I, it takes a long time to make a Birkin, right? It's all made by hand. So are the veneers, hence why it's so hard to get one. But look, I Kiera Dent (01:39) Mm-hmm. Dr Pia (01:42) 22 years old and it still looks brand new because it's the quality of the craftsmanship you know and I tell all my patients you should get anywhere between 20 and 25 years out of the mirror okay this whole nonsense of five years and ten years that's because they want to redo the case and for you to pay them again if you're doing good quality work the only reason they should be replaced is because you have recession due to old age Kiera Dent (01:55) Wow. Mm-hmm. Wow. And you don't have any issues with these super, super thin ones popping off. Dr Pia (02:17) No, because okay, let me let me explain to you. Let me explain to you physics. Okay. Okay, do you know why they pop off? Kiera Dent (02:19) Let's talk about this. I'm so, cause a lot of people haven't popped off and it's so scary. So I'm like, let's talk about this. You know, this is why I'm asking you. Cause I don't like, feel my guess is that they were not bonded on correctly. And that's my guess. Okay. I'm ready. Dr Pia (02:28) Okay. No, it's, two things. There's two things. That's one, but that's the second one. Right. But let me explain to you. Do you remember when you were in high school and we went to, ⁓ Kiera Dent (02:37) Okay. Dr Pia (02:43) ⁓ chemistry and we had the microscope with the two glass slabs and we were looking for amoebas and all that stuff. Okay, remember how we were all a painting that you know what and we all tried to pry those two glass slabs apart and it never worked? Well that's the same principle with veneers. The thinner they are the stronger they are. Kiera Dent (02:51) Yep. Yeah Fascinating. Dr Pia (03:06) Okay and I'll tell you why because teeth you know because you're in the business so teeth we all have ligaments right the teeth are hard it's a hard structure the bone is a hard structure so we have the dental ligaments right they're horizontal they're transversal so those are like the shock absorbers that hold the tooth inside the bone socket. Now Kiera Dent (03:12) Mm-hmm. Right. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Dr Pia (03:30) when you're speaking and when you're eating those teeth move microns not visible to the eye but your teeth have mobility just like trees have mobility in the wind right we don't see the trees move unless it's a hundred mile an hour winds but if you have a five mile an hour wind you don't see that tree moving right but it does move Kiera Dent (03:44) Mm-hmm. Right. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Dr Pia (03:56) So when you're doing these 3D print and you're filing like the turkey teeth where you have the little pegs left and the ratio of tooth to porcelain is 50-50 or you're having 60-40 or 70-30 that 3D printed porcelain does not flex. Kiera Dent (04:05) Yep. Makes sense. Mm-hmm. Dr Pia (04:23) but your tooth does. So that's the number one issue why they pop off. The thicker they are, the easier they'll pop off. And the number two reason is the dentist has no idea about occlusion. Because if you have a premature contact or you have lateral excursions or a protrusive, you're going to pop those off like there's no tomorrow. Kiera Dent (04:23) True. Interesting. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yes. Totally. Yeah. Dr Pia (04:51) So these are the basic principles. If you don't know occlusion, you shouldn't be doing dentistry. I'm talking about GPs or it's the holy grail of this profession. Occlusion, occlusion, occlusion. Kiera Dent (05:03) And I will tell you as a patient who has the most obnoxious bite, ⁓ there are dentists who do no occlusion and there are dentists who don't because my bite you adjust one teeny tiny little micron and the whole bite gets thrown off and they're like, no care, it should be fine. And I'm like, I can always tell if you're just doing blue paper and you're having me bite chew all around, I know you don't understand occlusion because I'm like, you're never going to get it. I'm going to be, you're dancing all the way around. Like from the patient who has sat there, four hours upon hours and had to find other dentists because the dentist who thought they could do it truly can't do it. And this isn't me being a jerk. This is me being the patient who has to suffer through a dentist who doesn't understand occlusion. Like what you just said as a patient, ⁓ and like there's some, know, you can have it like completely off and like, yeah, it feels great. And then you have patients like myself that teeny, teeny, teeny tiny. I can feel it. You can't even find it. And I'm like, no, it's off. My bite is not, my teeth are not coming together. Dr Pia (05:59) You always know, the patient always knows. They're always right. Kiera Dent (06:02) always. And please don't have me laying back. Please don't have me lay back. Let me sit up. Let me lay back. Let me tell you on both of them, because it's always different. And they're like, no, it's good. And I'm like, it's not. You're not sitting in my mouth. Dr Pia (06:09) Yeah! Because you most probably have long centric, right? So you have one occlusion when your head is back and you have a different occlusion when your head is forward. Now, if that's the case, you need to check both. Kiera Dent (06:18) Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Correct. Thank you. Preach, please, for the patients like myself. These are the pieces. And I don't disagree because when I have seen dentists and they're not checking that and the patients are constantly popping off, I'm like, just maybe check to see how those teeth are hitting in all directions because they will pop. Dr Pia (06:43) ⁓ but let me interrupt you for one thing. The other thing that's an issue, okay, if they do it and you're anesthetized, you're not going to get a good read. You always have to call the patient back the next day and check the occlusion again in all the positions when they're not anesthetized because I will guarantee you on my career that it will be off. Kiera Dent (06:53) ⁓ no, never. Yep. Yep. Always. And they're like, no, you can bite when you're numb. And I'm like, I don't even know how I'm biting. I have no clue. I know I'm biting differently. Preach. These are the things and the conversations that I've said. And having somebody like yourself who's so good at this. I mean, you guys, has a referral-based practice. Like people are flying in to see her. I can see why, because how you speak about this is so different. And I think today, one, I hope people are inspired of things to do, things to not do. different ways to do this. I also love the risk that you took. I love the growth. I love the determination of self of I will be the best. You have the passion. You've got the grit. You've got the tenacity. I have doctors who are great surgeons that are truly incredible at this. I've got doctors that are amazing at occlusion. I've got doctors that are amazing at fillings. There's a doctor and one of his patients said like, have the smoothest fillings in all the land. And he's like, that's really weird. I had him fix a filling that chipped. And I'm not going to lie, he has the smoothest fillings in all the land. Like I've never felt a feeling as smooth as this man did for me. Dr Pia (08:12) That's because he polished it afterwards. 99% don't polish them. You know, I had a colleague, checked, he did a, we put a crown in and I'm like, Joe, can we polish it? He goes, no, you're good to go. I'm like, no, I'm not. He's like, but I polished it. I'm like, okay, there is a porcelain polishing kit that you've got to go red, blue, white. Kiera Dent (08:18) I was shocked. Hahaha Dr Pia (08:40) and the white has to be on low rpms and you have to make sure that it's shiny and polished and he's like i don't have the patience for that go do it yourself in the office and i did Kiera Dent (08:52) But I think like that even I feel like dentistry you It to me what I'm hearing is a lot of dentists. It sounds like go 90 % of the way But it's like that extra 10 % is what really in my opinion makes a lot of difference for patients It's doing the polishing. It's doing the small finesse like you you're working in such a small space anyway Why not make it absolutely perfect and dr. P? think you really inspired me to even look at myself in my life of where's that extra 10 % that I could really just make a dazzle Where could I really make it shine? It's not, it doesn't take a lot of time, but it does take intentionality. So as we wrap today, this has been such a fascinating podcast and I've absolutely loved it. And I just appreciate your time. I want you to wrap with, you can do do's, don'ts or a mix of the in between. What should people who are doing cosmetic dentistry from your perspective as truly one of the most expert people I've ever met do in cosmetic dentistry or don't or you're welcome to do a mixture as just a quick wrap rattle of things that you've seen in your career. Dr Pia (09:48) Before we do that, want to talk to you, I think that we should do this again because I want to talk to you about DSOs and private practice. Kiera Dent (09:56) Mm, yeah. That is very fascinating. This is heavy on my mind of all different topics currently in the landscape, which I don't disagree with you. Dr Pia (10:08) Yeah, that's things are things are changing and not for the better. Kiera Dent (10:12) They are. Yeah, absolutely. That will be it. Dr Pia (10:17) Because I'm a dinosaur now. I mean, there's very few of us that do handmade work anymore. So getting back to your question. Look, I Kiera Dent (10:22) I don't disagree. Dr Pia (10:30) cosmetic dentistry you have to be very very very passionate about it and and the key is to leave your ego at the door and try to be the best version of yourself and that means take every course if you're a young dentist or still in dental school take every course that you can take you know look on Instagram and find the people that do the handmade work like myself and you know there's a handful of that do it and ceramist as well and find the good beautiful work and reach out to everyone like you know everybody can reach out to me you know and ask me like hi how do I do this or how you know how should I go about doing that the thing is you have to be passionate if you're do and what I've told every student of mine in 18 years you're not doing this for the money the money will come you have to do this because you love doing it Kiera Dent (11:31) I don't disagree. think, on that note, Dr. Pia, what is the best way for people to follow you? Because I love that you said this and I tell people all the time, the world has shifted. We are in 2025. I'm going to choose a plastic surgeon, a cosmetic dentist, a surgeon based on their Instagram. I'm gonna go look at their photos. I'm gonna go look at their work. We don't live in a world where we are isolated just to our own state anymore. Like people fly across the country to go get the best work done. So. Dr Pia (11:56) yeah, mean Instagram, I get internationals from Instagram. I've gotten Kazakhstan, I've gotten the UK, I've gotten the French, I've gotten so many and they're all Instagram. And I'm like, okay. I'm just Dr. P, I spelled out the D-O-C-T-O-R. P-I-A, my first name. Kiera Dent (12:06) How cool is that? So what is your Instagram handle? So people can follow and kind of see what you do. Dr. Pia, and I think if you want to see someone, I know you said you're a dinosaur in this, but as we've been chatting, I'm like, this is the doctor that I would fly across the country to go to. This is the one that I would go see. She knows what she's talking about. She's got the finesse, she's got the passion. She's willing to do one veneer. She's the person I'm going to trust to do work on my mouth. And it's how does she get seen? How does she get known? How does she do this? Guys, these are the legends. These are the people. These are people that have just like done what you're wanting to do. Follow her and also, I don't know if you have heard at the beginning of the podcast, it sounds like Dr. Pia, you're passionate about helping any person who this is their dream become the best in the industry. And that to me is why she... Dr Pia (12:51) for sure. For sure. Just DM me if you have any questions. That's the whole like Instagram is the new portal of learning. Kiera Dent (13:01) Mm-hmm. Dr Pia (13:04) Just ask questions. mean, it's none of us were born knowing how to do veneers. We all had to learn it at some point. And as long as your ego is at the door and you're willing to learn and be the best version of yourself, then you're great. You're great. But if you think you know it all, I'm still learning. And I've been doing this for decades. I'm still learning. I want to be up to date and things are changing. Materials are changing. There's so many things. Kiera Dent (13:13) Right. Dr Pia (13:34) Styles are changing. Thank God the Hollywood smile is dying. Finally. This took about 16 years, but thank God it's dying now. It's going back to natural Kiera Dent (13:34) Yeah. No. Right. which Dr. Pia, people didn't get to hear this. I heard this pre-show. You came on, we were just chatting and you said, I love my career. I love what I do. And to hear that you've been doing it this long and can still say that you love that. That's what my hope and wishes for so many d…
Full show notes at the publisherKiera is joined by renowned cosmetic dentist Dr. Pia Lieb to talk about Dr. Lieb's journey in her field, as well as her insights into what the rich and famous ask for (and pay for) when it comes to their teeth. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera. And today I am so excited. I have an incredible doctor on our podcast. Dr. Pia is coming to from New York, Manhattan. And this woman is incredible. She has been able to build and sustain a high-end cosmetic practice. She's figured out how to be, you guys are gonna love this, a referral only destination for patients seeking discretion, innovation, and ultra-personalized care. This woman has been named the Michelangelo of dentistry and I am so excited to welcome her on the podcast. Welcome Dr. Pia, how are you today? Dr Pia (00:32) Thanks for having me, Kiera. Kiera Dent (00:34) Of course. Well, I have been so excited about this podcast. I don't often get to bring clinical guests onto the podcast. And so to just kind of hear of how you do your cosmetic dentistry, how did you become this practice of being so sought after? ⁓ How did you become the Michelangelo of dentistry? So kind of just walk the listeners through how did Dr. Pia go from where she was to where she is today? Kind of just give us a background on, on who you are and what your story has been. Dr Pia (01:04) Well, I'm gonna start with, it all started in dental school. There was a lecturer by the name of Dr. Gallup Evans who has passed away since. And he was giving a PG, which is obviously post-doctoral course on cosmetic dentistry. And his reputation was he was the one who did. the supermodel Polina Povaskova's veneers back in the early 90s. And I went up to him after the lecture and I basically said, I'm a sponge, teach me, tell me what to do so I can do the same thing that you're doing. I've completely fell in love and cut out a class to go to that course. And after the course, he turned around to me and said, well, sweetheart. You're either born with it or you're not. So I went home and I cried for five days. and he completely tore me to shreds and that really got me upset and ⁓ I was a great student. was the youngest in NYU as a student. I graduated high school at 16. I was the nerd, right? And basically what I did is I was asked to start teaching after residency and that was my... Kiera Dent (02:03) Absolutely. Dr Pia (02:26) way to make sure that I would never allow anyone to speak to a student like that. And my whole point was, I want to empower the dental students. I don't want anyone to feel the way I did by this particular person. And basically I had nowhere to start. So I started taking all of these courses, these PG program courses, and I met up. Kiera Dent (02:37) Mm-hmm. Dr Pia (02:53) When I was actually in dental school, I went and I met the holy grail ceramist who invented veneers in America. And I went up to him and I said the same thing, I'm a sponge, please teach me. And he was like, great. Okay. You have a car. And I'm like, yes, I do. He goes, all right, come to the lab every Friday after school and every Saturday, let me teach you how to prep and how to do veneers. And this man who also passed away has taught me everything. Kiera Dent (03:12) I'm Dr Pia (03:23) that I know because the doctors were not doing it and there was only two guys in New York that were doing veneers in the 80s and in the 90s and those were older men in their 40s and they were not going to take a young 20 year old female and teach her what to do because they were you know insecure that we were going to take over the business from them. So that's how it all started. And obviously, I taught for 18 years and I did do that what I set my mind to do. I wanted to give every one of my students the best experience that they can have with dentistry and with cosmetic dentistry. And we're still friends after all these years. So I must have done something right, that they still love me to invite me for dinners into their houses. Kiera Dent (04:10) Thank ⁓ I think that you're speaking to my own heart. mean, having that love being in the dental colleges, of to give back, like that's the whole reason Dental A Team exists was because of those students that you just fall in love with. And kudos to you because I got really lucky and I worked at Midwestern University's Dental College in Arizona. And I have been told that the culture there and the experience there is not like most dental schools. It was a very empowering, very enriching. There was no smashing of models. There was no... ⁓ destroying people's dreams, but I know that that's not everywhere. so kudos to you for ⁓ making a stance and also not giving up on your dream. And I think something I took from that is how often are we maybe told something that's not true and we believe it. We take that on as an identity and yes, crying for five days. I don't blame you, I would have done the same thing, but ⁓ it is. Dr Pia (05:03) No, it's demoralizing, you know, like it's just here you are, you're this young bright-eyed and bushy-tailed eager beaver who wants to be the best at her profession and then you get some 50 year old man telling you, ⁓ honey, you can't do this, you gotta be born with it. I'm like, really? Kiera Dent (05:20) Hmm. Maybe I am born with it and have you seen it. ⁓ Dr Pia (05:25) And you know what I was and that's that's the thing and it's just but it's the way he said it but we'll get back to karma because 18 years go by and he was lecturing again and karma if it's a small I don't want to say the b word on a podcast but Kiera Dent (05:42) Mmm. Hahaha Dr Pia (05:51) it is. So he's got the lecture, same thing, same before and afters. And this time I'm wearing a white lab coat and scrubs underneath and I had you know, and at this point, I was clinical assistant professor and there were like 350 doctors in the audience. And he's like, Does anyone have anything to say? And I'm at the back wall, I wasn't sitting down, I was standing up and I raised my hand and I was like, He goes, and he goes, I know that name. You're in press and you're my competition. And he was like, and you know, what is it that I said? said, you know what? Thanks to you, I am who I am today. I want to say thank you. If you didn't say this to me and make me go home and cry for five days, I wouldn't have. done everything humanly possible to be your competition and here I am I didn't know if he was gonna slap me or kick me out or just whatever it was but it was not what I and he said you know come on down and just tell us more about it he goes you've got so much pressure all over the place and it was funny because at that point Kiera Dent (06:52) Ha! Dr Pia (07:08) That was like maybe 10 months after I did 10 episodes on TLC of 10 years younger. And I was all over the place. Like everybody knew me from TV and from press and ⁓ the New York Times wrote that I'm the Michelangelo in Smile Boutique. And it just got to that point. I got the recognition that I worked so hard for. he was like, all right, give me a hug. I was like, thank God. to get a slap. But I was ready to get like thrown out or to. So that's kind of what I wanted to do is I just want to empower every single person out there. And you have to understand, when I went to school, we there were no women, it was 97 % men, we had Kiera Dent (07:43) You Dr Pia (08:02) maybe seven girls in the graduating class. I mean, not that we had a lot. We have much smaller classes back then and we were 97, but seven out of 97 is a low percentage. Kiera Dent (08:14) That is, yeah. Wow, that's such a fun, ⁓ I think kudos to you. And one of my favorite lines through life has been, life is not happening to us, it's happening for us. And I'm sure in that moment, you felt like life was happening to you. Like, who is this jerk? And they destroyed my dreams. And yet, ⁓ again, not to say that that's ever the right route to go. But I just want to highlight and compliment of you took something that people could have said would be sour grapes and you actually turned it into beautiful wine. and you turned it into something beautiful and it was fuel to your fire to make you into this incredible woman that the world needed. And so I'm very curious, how did you then go from, okay, here we are, how'd you become this renowned cosmetic dentist, getting on TLC, getting all the press, like what was kind of the way to get into that? Because I'm sure there's a lot of dentists who want to live your dream. How did you do it? Dr Pia (09:04) I think the way in was truly like in 1998 or 99, I don't remember what year it was, but it was the first gen art fashion show for Fashion Week in New York where they took up and coming young designers and they had a private fashion show with about 10 of small up and coming, which we don't have anymore. mean, New York Fashion Week is no longer what used to be. But I go there and I had a patient from Belgium who had a really good friend who was an up and coming crazy French designer and he was showing the runway and I just basically went with her and I remember that we were after the fashion show there was a VIP with champagne and we got these wristbands and so forth and my my patient was, you know, late 30s, single and ready to mingle. And there was this really cute male model that did the runway for ⁓ another designer that wasn't as big. And she was like, my God, he's so cute. And here I was, I had no makeup on, right? Kiera Dent (10:07) Yeah. Dr Pia (10:23) this long Margiela dress and I have like Doc Marten boots, my hair up in a ponytail, just like mascara and red lips on. And I went up to this guy and I said, hi, I'm Dr. Pia. You know, my friend Jacqueline wants to meet you. And he had this woman who was next to him and she was like, you gotta talk to me. I'm his booker. I didn't know what a booker was. So I'm like, what's a booker? I thought it was like the, you know, betting on horses, know, like booking, you know, that's what I thought. Kiera Dent (10:47) Yeah. Yeah. Dr Pia (10:53) And basically, ⁓ I was like, No, no, no, I'm just, you know, we're going behind if you guys want to come and join us at the after party behind and he was like, great, she goes, No, no, no, we can't go anywhere. You got to go through me. And I'm like, Okay, I said, Look, I'm a cosmetic dentist. And back then we had cards, right? So I was like, Here's my card. She goes, I want one, too. And I and Yeah, that was it. had some drinks afterwards. And she was like, Yeah, I want to come in as a patient. I have to come in first before he comes in. Because he said he needed his teeth done. I was like, okay, so the next morning, I'm like, live it at like nine o'clock. I call Wilhelmina who was like back then the number one modeling agency for men. And I call and I'm like, Can I speak to Jennifer and Kiera Dent (11:32) Yeah. Dr Pia (11:47) She picks up the phone. I'm like, hi, it's dr. P again. I'm like, I just want to make it really clear I'm married. I do not I am NOT picking up on on your male model It was my friend who was interested just making putting it out there and being totally transparent. So she's like fine I Want an appointment so I booked her and the moment that I booked her She introduced me to the modeling industry. So then I started getting all the models Kiera Dent (11:57) Mm-hmm. Dr Pia (12:13) the supermodels, I got everybody in and I think that's how it all started with the press and everything because they've seen my work with the modeling industry and that's how kind of it all started and the thing with me it's always been privacy it's I've never named names I will never name names because it's like plastic surgery if you're going to go in and get a facelift do want it to be plastered all over the press I don't think so so it's the same thing with veneers I mean I do very natural handmade porcelain and the whole secret that I think to my success is I've never gone into that chicklity white Hollywood smile the toilet bowl teeth or the turkey teeth as now they all go to Turkey to have them done well I've never done that so for me I've always followed what I believe in and did the best that I can and I think that that is as long as you love what you do Kiera Dent (12:55) Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Yeah. Dr Pia (13:12) and try to be the best that you can be. think the universe, no matter what God you believe in, you know, I think the universe gives it back to you. Kiera Dent (13:23) I think, well, and also what I heard from that is kudos to you for just going and meeting people and for being out there. Like, I don't think people realize the power of connections, the power of human interaction, the power of who you know. I think we're in such a society where it's all online and we just think, which you can still connect online, but like, don't be afraid to say hi to people. Don't be afraid to introduce yourselves and... Like I said at the beginning, Dr. Pia, it's very rare that I bring on clinical guests to the podcast. So I'm curious, you work on supermodels, you work on really incredible people. I have a doctor, which we will not name names either, who works on movie stars in LA. so I have a couple of questions and if you don't want to answer by all, you probably do. We will chat post show and see, exactly off call. ⁓ But. Dr Pia (14:07) I probably know him. If it's it, we'll do it all off, off. Kiera Dent (14:15) I'm curious, Dr. Pia, just for listeners to know, what is like, I'm gonna ask a few questions and like I said, privacy and respect are my number one. So if there's something that you're like, I'm not gonna answer by all means, audience just know Dr. Pia is so kind to come onto the podcast for us and I did not prep her because I never know what I'm gonna ask. It's just a genuine curious host over here wanting to know, what are the average cases like dollar wise, our low end to our high end of cases that you're doing? I just want people to know, because I think people do not believe that this is real life dentistry and it can be. Dr Pia (14:51) You're talking about veneers or you're talking about all the procedures. Veneers. Veneers are from three to 45, 100 or two. It depends. mean, if someone is a massive grinder and I've got issues with them. Kiera Dent (14:54) I would say let's do veneers and then let's do other procedures. Dr Pia (15:12) having, you know, doing the grinding at night, felspathic, I'm a little bit weary of doing that and I'll do the 3D printed. ⁓ As much as I'm not the greatest fan of doing that, I would rather keep them in a night guard and let them have the beautiful teeth. But it basically is... ⁓ Kiera Dent (15:19) Totally. Mm-hmm. Dr Pia (15:35) You know, for the handmade porcelain, I mean, there are some people out there that are charging over five. And I think that's just a little bit exaggerated because I know how much it costs me to make. think, you know, 4500 is a fair price. You don't have to go above five. I think that's just the ingredient. Kiera Dent (15:42) Totally. Sure. Mm-hmm. Which I appreciate that you say that, especially with the press and with the people that you worked on. You have an opportunity to charge more, but you're also being ethical and fa…
Full show notes at the publisherTrish shares with Tiff and listeners her experience with a practice that started with a whole lot of uncertainty under a new doctor, and the steps undertaken that lead to a thriving workplace within a year. Specifically, she touches on how trust, flexibility, and numbers each played a role in this success story. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:01) Hello Dental A Team listeners. I am so excited to be here today. We are, I have Trish here with me. So we are here just hanging out today and we, I'm so excited actually that we did this at 8 a.m. It's way more fun. At first I was like, ⁓ that is early to be ready. But then, know, we're like, spray our hair's great. Our makeup is fresh. Like it's actually super fun. So thank you for spending your morning with me Trish. How are you today? We are hot to try. DAT Trish Ackerman (00:27) Thank you. We are hot to trot. The Dental A Team (00:31) Trish, I got to love on you already twice, so go listen to the buyers and the sellers version of practice ownership, you guys, because you'll get to hear how amazing Trish is. But I want to pull a random on you, Trish. And I have not asked in a while, and I think that the Dental A Team listeners in the world out there needs to hear, how are the piggies? And yes, I said pigs, like oink oink, how are the piggies? DAT Trish Ackerman (00:56) The piggies are great. So I do have two pigs and ⁓ they are very well known with my friends and my colleagues. I have, it's Miss Daisy and Joey and that is spelled J-O-Y-E. And well, they're doing great. However, winter's here is coming. It's winter in Arizona. we think they don't like the cold. They don't like the cold at all. So we have been having some loud piggies that like to come indoors and they do. So we have in and out pigs to go in and out with dogs. The Dental A Team (01:07) course. Yeah. Ugh. Yeah. DAT Trish Ackerman (01:26) We have a total podcast just about that. anybody's thinking about getting a pig, please call me first. The Dental A Team (01:30) Yeah, yeah, and that's true. I, Trish, I think actually, like, save the pigs. I think that's a really good point because I and we can, you can take any theory and apply it to anything, right? Anything, everything looks great. ⁓ And when you're in it, you realize maybe I didn't do enough research, right? So this sounds like a great idea, but maybe I didn't do enough research. And I've known people, aside from you who have had pigs as pets. And I know one family that just thrived loved their pig and ⁓ they live a long time. You guys, there's a lot to know about pigs. are incredibly smart. ⁓ but I do believe they're very smart to the point of like stubbornness, right? But there's like so much to learn and Trish, something that everyone should know is a passion of yours is these, the pig projects. Right? And that stems from that right there, in my opinion, of people not understanding what they're getting into. When I was young, I wanted nothing more than a little pig. I wanted a little piggy. Right? And so many people in the early 2000s, in the 90s, they got a little piggy. And what happens to a little piggy, Trish? This little cute little oinker does what? DAT Trish Ackerman (02:49) it gets real big real quick and then it roots everything and people are not prepared very and loud we prepare yes life's not The Dental A Team (02:50) They're so big! They're so big, they're so destructive. loud. My mom was like, you're not getting a pig. Yeah. Thank God. So, so everyone knows Trish does, she volunteers ⁓ for, there's a whole, the whole place here, the volunteer that takes piggies and cares for them and loves them. And it's just something that she's really, really passionate about that I didn't even know existed until meeting Trish. So thank you for bringing that to my life. But I love the analogy that can be taken from that, right? Because we do that with everything. We're like, okay, that was so cute. my gosh, sparkly, do it, yes. This is an instant yes. I want it, I need it, I want a goat, right? I want a highland cow, a mini highland cow, because why? Instagram shows me pictures of them next to a fireplace. I wanna cuddle with a mini highland cow. That sounds dangerous, right? Like I also want a coyote. DAT Trish Ackerman (03:40) Yes, yes. Yeah, it's great. The Dental A Team (03:57) Like there's so many things that we want in life because they're cute and they're sparkly and they feel like they're gonna feel amazing. And then we get there and we're like, ⁓ shoot, I did not do the research. I did not realize this pig was gonna get so giant, right? So I love that. Thank you for letting me take that journey with you. And so if you do have piggy questions, Trish@TheDentalATeam.com. It's her direct line. You can make sure. DAT Trish Ackerman (04:03) ⁓ Mm-hmm. Thank you. I'm your girl. The Dental A Team (04:25) And it's going to be just fantastic. It's going to be so much fun. okay, on that note, practice owners, doctors, know, teams even, we all get into that space, right, of shiny object syndrome, or it just sounds like it's going to be amazing, or it looks so pretty. And we sometimes tend to miss some of the underlying pieces that we've got to know. And I think that's where consulting is super beneficial. for practice owners. There are so many things that you don't know until you know. And a lot of those pieces are healthy patient base, right? What is a healthy patient base? How do I keep, maintain, create a healthy patient base? What the heck is billing? How do I even do that? What is insurance? Why do they tell me what I can and cannot do? These are literally real questions that we get from doctors and, or team. Why does my team hate me? How do I make my team like me? Well, my team likes me, but they don't respect me. Culture is massive. And all these things are things that we don't always think about when we purchase a practice and we get into this like beautiful building or the, ugly building that we're going to make beautiful or whatever it is. And just like the piggies, it was so cute and such a good idea. And then all of a sudden it's this massive. Mass, like how much do they weigh Trish? Like a full grown pig weighs what? DAT Trish Ackerman (05:56) I mean, I don't have the hogs, but Miss Daisy, I mean, she's close to 90 pounds and Joey, he's about 110 pounds and they start out little. The Dental A Team (06:01) 110. Yeah, yeah, and people think like a St. Bernard is wild. Like no, these are pigs, right? Like it was so cute. They are really cute still. I'm not saying they're not still cute. I'm just saying they come with some baggage, you guys. So when we're looking at these practices and we're helping these practice owners, these are pieces that we have to dig for. We've got to be like, hey, like that's a truffle finder. Like that pig is going to tear up your backyard. but we can safeguard it. There are things that can be put into place to make sure that your backyard is safe, right, or as safe as possible. Same thing with your practice and your consulting. And that's what we do. We are good. Trish is great at pigs. She is great at many things. Recare, reactivation, AR, billing, team, culture, leadership. I could literally list the millions of things that Trish is really, really fantastic at. And I think sometimes she's like an octopus that can just like all these arms are just going in different directions and she's just so fantastic at it. And Trish, we've talked about a specific client before and this client is just super cool, super amazing, super fun and a go-getter, like quietly a go-getter, which I love. I love that it's like a sneaky go-getter because he's so quiet. ⁓ So we talked about them before, but something I wanted to kind of highlight and focus on today during our podcast is yes, they've done these amazing things and with your leadership and your guidance, they have implemented some really incredible tools that we have talked about in the past, ⁓ you know, for handoffs and exams, mentorship, like all these pieces and it's worked wonderfully and the doctor is doing fantastic, but something I don't think we highlighted in the last podcast on this. on this topic and conversation is the work that you've done with the manager and the team and like how that has flowed and how the doctor's leadership in the last less than a year has really molded the culture in the practice that that practice has now become, it's thriving. Like it's a practice that is safeguarded. It's a practice that has the systems in place that the team is really excited to be there still. and has the like and the respect. I want to hear those tools, because those are sometimes the tools that we miss in moments of get our operations manual done and do all these checklists. And I want to hear how you helped them do that. I know he did it, they did it. And that is something that we can truthfully say. They showed up. They did the work. But what were the... They did, and how did they do that? Take me through all of those pieces. How did you help them do that? How did they do the work? How are they showing up that's different than practices we're not working with right now? DAT Trish Ackerman (09:00) This practice, it's so special to me because of the legacy behind it. just to reiterate this, we've got our current doctor in there now. It was his dad's practice and it was also his grandpa's practice. so he had something that we knew, he had something that we knew we had to preserve and grow and just blossom more than anything that practice had ever seen before. And this doctor, he's kind of like your, he's just like your perfect implementer. And I never, and that doesn't happen all the time. And it did with him. And he, this is a doctor that has a stellar OM, like a real OM. And she, they are great partners. And when we, you know, we kind of walked through all the KPIs initially, like let's look at everything. The Dental A Team (09:35) Yeah. DAT Trish Ackerman (09:55) And then we started breaking it down, like where could we improve or where could we increase things or where can we be more efficient? And we'll start with just say the patient base, because this was a bottlenecked practice, which is it's got his pros and cons for sure. I mean, it's great because you're bottlenecked. The cons are you could possibly lose a lot of patients very quickly. But what we did is we would strategize together and I would map out the steps for him in like an ABC fashion. The Dental A Team (10:06) Yeah. DAT Trish Ackerman (10:25) Here's A, go do that. Here's B, go do that and C. He would do just that with the support of the OM and team. The OM and the doctor together would roll out at team meetings and even sometimes just morning huddles like this is something we're implementing today and they would do it. And that is, you know, it's like to have, if you bring us on to help you, there has to be a trust there. I mean, we're, certainly not here to make make you do something that is not gonna work. Sometimes something doesn't work, but we pivot quickly. But for the most part, we're here to help. And this doctor walked in with nothing but trust. And I admire everybody that comes on to us, because this is a big decision to get a coach and have somebody consult for your practice. But that is really how they made these things move, They did everything, everything, and almost exactly how I would roll it out to them. The Dental A Team (11:17) Yeah. Yeah, I agree. I watched it. I watched it. I, as you were speaking, picked up that trust word as well. And I think the, the trust that he has for himself to make good decisions flows into all of the other pieces. And, and I don't mean that he knows every decision is a good decision. He trusts that no matter what the decision that he makes, he's going to pour into and it's going to work or it's not. And if it doesn't work, then he moves on to something different. He trusts that no matter what, at the end of the day, it's going to be okay. So that means that he trusts the people that he surrounds himself with. If he has chosen you, he trusts you. And I think that trust flows into, I think it makes us better consultants, right? Because we feel that trust, we know, and we're going to push you. We know the extent to which we can push you. And if that trust is not there, you're not going to get as much push. And I know there's a lot of There's a lot of times that I hear I'm not seeing movement or I need more. Well, it's both ways. We're gonna gauge it by how you're showing up. We're gonna show up too. And this is someone who shows up and that trust then, it doesn't just flow into the type of consulting that he gets. It also flows into how his team shows up. And you said that his office manager I've met, wonderful human and is just, wants the best for the why, the purpose of the practice, the why that they're there serves it. That then allows them the trust that they have in each other, in the decisions, in the practice, in their why, in their purpose flows to the team so that they can show up and say, hey, we're doing morning huddle today. It doesn't have to be this like, hey, in a couple of weeks, like we're prepping for this, hey guys, we're prepping, because now I'm coddling and the team is like, is it good? it, like why is this? Why can't we just do it, right? When it's not like a, hey, this is what we're gonna do. We're gonna try this out. It's gonna be amazing and let's do this. It's a like, ooh, like a gas and a break at the same time. It's like, ⁓ well, maybe though the team feels that. And they're like, I don't think I wanna do this then. I don't trust that you've put a lot of thought into this. I don't trust that this is a good idea. So I'm gonna rebel. And then, know, teams and practices and practice owners are like, why isn't this working? I think you nailed it there with the trust. He trusts himself, he trusts you, he trusts his team, and he trusts his spouse. The trust is ever flowing. He trusted his father to gift him, maybe not gift him, but to build this legacy practice for him to take over one day. And I think that is massive. So then that trust flows into everything that he does. And I think you get to see that. And Trish, what are your... What are some of the ways that you've seen the team really rally behind him? DAT Trish Ackerman (14:24) They, okay, behind every number is a story and watching his numbers change. The story is that the team changed with him and they are, they're very transparent with their team. They're very, they're, very direct, but in a lead, but they, they both have very strong leadership. They're a firm and principal, flexible and procedure is what I love to use. The Dental A Team (14:27) Yeah. DAT Trish Ackerman (14:50) So they would be firm in principle, like this is a new implementation that we're going to roll out today. They would be flexible in procedure with certain team members because, you know, change is always kind of wild. It can be. The flexible and procedure would be, okay, if you're not ready to implement today, let me set you up with some coaching, but immediately so that we can…
Full show notes at the publisherKiera provides very specific tips for how a visionary CEO can keep their practice(s) flourishing on multiple levels without sticking their fingers in all the pies. She gets to the quick with a single question a leader should ask anytime a new task comes across their desk: Just because you can do something, does it mean you should? Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and I'm excited about today's topic and I hope you are too. Delegation, I feel like it's such a, ⁓ feels so hard. It feels like what should I do? What should I delegate? What should I not delegate? And this is for like helping you get to multi-level success. So whatever your success level is, whatever you want it to be, delegation is a huge portion of leadership. And I feel like, especially in multi-practices, if you want to get to multi-practices, that's kind how I'm going to highlight this today. You have to ⁓ really get good at delegation. It's not about doing more. It's about doing more of the right things ⁓ and doing less of everything. And so really, really, really getting into that zone of genius, helping you out with that. So I'm excited about this. ⁓ I'll kind of work it through in a couple of different parts to make this easier for you. It's helping you know, what should I delegate? What should I keep? and how to lead across all the locations with clarity. Because as you scale, a lot of people forget that they have to delegate, that they have to get different pieces. And so what happens is things just start to fall off the wagon. And that can get really, really scary. And then you're trying to like catch it all. And so many people, when they get into multi-practice ownership, they tell me like, I wish I would have just stayed at one. And I think, well, yes, there are benefits to staying at one. You had a call inside, you're so wanting to grow. It's just hard right now because we didn't set it up as successful as we could have. Now, I am not one to judge. I did the exact same thing. And so I know the the taffy pole stretch of trying to do every single piece when you're a multi-practice ownership. And so this is coming from real life tactical, curious life experience of what we see with clients to give you the tips of the trade, to give you the secrets to success and doing it here on the podcast in such an open, friendly, welcoming, no judgment zone. More to just give you a hug to tell you, hey, you're doing better than you think you are. And let's give you some tactical practical tips to help you out. So, A Team, we're obsessed with single practices, so multi-practices. We love to help owners build thriving practices at all levels. We love to work with practices anywhere from the startup zone all the way to the multi-location zone. Whether your plan is to build it into a legacy practice or to sell to a DSO or to whatever it is, there is no right answer with Dental A Team. It is your right answer. It is what is best for you, your life, your practice, and also allowing you the freedom to change that. So. working with doctors and their teams to get to that high level success. ⁓ We are ultimately here to help you have the most profitable practice, the happiest team, the thriving practice of your dreams, and to do it on the easiest way possible. So that's what we're about. This is for ⁓ true, true, helping doctors become true CEOs, not ⁓ operators of their businesses to own their businesses to act in that seat rather than being the managers that oftentimes they are. So step one, when you're moving into this multi-practice ownership, you are shifting and I want you just to know your identity is going to be stripped away. You're going to become the same thing that you feel very uncomfortable in because you've never done this, but this is what your organization needs and I think so often owners fail to rise to the need of the organization of what it needs and they like to stay where it's comfortable. And I remember as an office manager, I like when I truly stepped into the office manager role, I'm like, Well, this is weird. I don't even know what I'm supposed to do. And you've got to just settle in and you'll figure it out very quickly. so helping you just know as the owner CEO of the company, what you have to own, like your true role is to own the vision strategy and culture. These are things that do not get delegated out. They're the core of the leadership. They're you setting the example. And when I realized, like, I remember one day I Googled like, what does a CEO do? Like I truly did not know. ⁓ because I'd been a manager for most of my life. I'd been a doer most of it. I did not realize that my job was to own the vision, the strategy, and the culture. Now, not all CEOs, not owners of businesses actually enjoy the vision. You might not be a visionary and that's okay. You might just need to have somebody paired with you who's a really strong visionary. There's usually a visionary integrator according to Traction by Gina Wickman that I choose to, I subscribe to the strongest. So I'd be like a CEO and a COO. ⁓ The CEO is the visionary, the CEO always operations the day to day making the dreams happen. So it's like Walt and Roy Disney ⁓ are some good examples of that too. So when I'm looking at as a portion that you cannot delegate away, you've really got to own this vision strategy culture. That's you, you're the culture master, you're the strategy, you're the vision. So where are we headed? What does that look like? ⁓ What's our 12 month? What's our three year? What's our 10 year target? That can still be, you set the like framework, the team builds it into a full complete picture. And then what's the culture that we want replicated across all the teams. So ⁓ when we start to get that vision strategy and culture aligned and ⁓ owners don't delegate that, you then can bring in hires faster. You can have core values. You can have KPIs like, because we know it's very clear. How do we act? What are we going towards? And then what are the things that we need to measure? So this is truly something that when I realized like that was my job and it was the bigger picture piece, there's other people that do the day to day. It felt awkward. I'm not gonna lie. Like I was like, ⁓ I feel like I'm putting on a different t-shirt today. And like, I don't even feel comfortable. Like I don't look good in yellow. Well, you might not look good in it, but this is what the organization needs and nobody else is doing this besides you. So ⁓ the question is, if you're a multi-practice ownership and you're in this ownership role, question one is, have I clearly communicated our vision? It's like, if Kiera or the Dental A team were to walk into my practice today and ask any team member, would they know the vision of our company? That should be a resounding yes. And if not, you have not communicated it enough and it has not been clear enough. Does your entire company know the core values and do they live them? And does every single practice know what their targets are for that practice and the KPIs they're tracking? It's very simple way to ask yourself this. And I love to ask this and I love to come to offices. If you were to ask any member of our team member, they would be able to tell you, yes, we know exactly what our core values are. We know what the mission is of our company. We also know where we're headed. Now, I think I could be a bit more clear of where I'm headed in the three and tenure. My leadership team knows that a lot better. My core team knows where we're headed this year, what our core values are, and what the core values are of a company. We have this on a... So some of them could rattle it off, our new team members, this is part of their onboarding. So helping you really figure that out is going to be paramount because now all your practices, all the locations are operating the same way and there's strong clarity. Step two is you're going to delegate operations for leaders. So this is kind of like the CEO versus the COO. So like realistically owners of like CEOs of DSOs and multi-practice ownership, you don't have to be a DSO for this. It can be multi, it can be private still. I have a lot of private practices that are three, five, 10 locations. That's totally fine. You can do that, but you can't scale if you're still solving the supply issues and front desk drama and putting them. So you have to have a regional manager and a lead at each location. That's paramount. You need to have it. They need to have their KPIs and what they're tracking. They also need to know how to make decisions. Like what's the decision framework and how, what do I have decision making autonomy over at the office manager or regional monitor level versus what needs to get approval? And then also we've got to have like training, not just tasks. So that way everybody has training of what do we need to do when we have that set up consistently. So you teach your team and you have a set protocol and process of how to run huddles. Like a system to me is something that no matter who you are, where you come from, whether you've been with us for one day or 10 years, you should be able to do the same thing and get the same results. So a huddle should have a form that everybody follows. You can have it broken down for me. I even have minutes next to it. Like this part's two minutes, part's five minutes. So it's a true 15 minute huddle. for every single practice. Our one-on-ones have a set protocol of how do we do them, when are they run, and how often are they done, where are these things stored? We have a process of how we set up our rooms. We have a process of how we schedule. All these things that you start working on, and doctors who are owners and visionaries might not be good at these processes. So you need a really good regional or really good office manager or really good operations next to you to help build all these things so you do have confident leaders that are leading next to you. But this is everything that gets delegated out. And there's a doctor that I worked with who's actually really, really great at checklists and operations and building. And I said, that's fine. Rock on. You got to pick which seat you want to be in. Do want to be in the CEO visionary seat or do you to be in the operations seat? Both are fine. Both are on the table. Both are doable. And you could honestly do both super, super, super well. You just have to decide which one you want to do. And this doctor, two years later sent me a message and they said, Kiera, I'm so glad you pushed me into that because as much as I was trying to do both, wasn't excelling in either. So they moved into the CEO visionary role. They hired an amazing assistant to them. They hired an amazing regional manager and the practices are flourishing on multi-levels and they have seven locations now in their organization. But this way, there's not the bottlenecks. The CEO, the owner often creates these bottlenecks because they're not delegating those pieces. And then next up is going to be like, how do we actually systematize across the board all the locations? And... ⁓ So this is again, like we've talked about it so many times, it's KPIs, having a dashboard and a scoreboard so you know how every practice is doing, having leadership meetings with agendas and having communication that's very open amongst all practices. And then I do like a centralized training at least once a quarter, if not like once or twice a year. So that way all the teams and all the organization, I know this is a pain for people, but the more you get them all together, the more they realize that they're all on the same team, they're all there. But like, this is not you owner, you're delegating these pieces. So you're delegating the reporting and the communication. So if you look at this really, you're not delegating the culture, you're not delegating the vision, and you're not delegating ⁓ the other piece to that is like the strategy of how we're going to get there. That's your world, that's what you're supposed to be doing. And then your job is to really rise up your leaders. But you are delegating operations, you are delegating systems, you are delegating meetings. Like there's so much to your job that you've been used to doing that you're delegating. And me going from an office manager to a business owner, sometimes it's easy for me to get stuck in management because that's where I feel comfortable. That's where I feel good. ⁓ Vision and strategy, that's actually really hard to put on a scorecard and to account for my time to say like, yep, I put in 40 hours. Well, vision and strategy are not tasks. are, it's like fluffy clouds. and they take quiet, they take ⁓ out of the office, they take ⁓ white noise time is what I like to call it. And it's actually very hard. And I think sometimes this is why CEOs don't like to go into this because it feels fluffy. feels, ⁓ I don't know, like so hard to track, if you will, which it is. But at the same time, if you do that job and you do it well, everything else falls into place and then you just check in on all the other pieces. that are truly delegated. really, it feels so, sometimes I feel like it's unfair. I'm like, what? Like this is all I'm doing and this is everything else that they're doing? Tasks and vision do not get put in same buckets. They're not on a scale of equilibrium. It's not like, well, I spent three hours on vision so I should spend three hours on tasks. No, sometimes vision takes longer. Sometimes it's harder to build. Sometimes strategy's harder to build. The number of nights and times where I'm like working it through in my brain and I'm building it on paper and I'm working through like, What does the company need and what is the culture and how am I going to show up and present and like, what are the meetings I'm going to put it in place? Just because that comes natural for visionaries does not mean that it should be shortchanged for operation that's task built and task focused. But all of this is literally delegated. So all you do is you own the vision and you delegate the operations and you delegate the systemization. Now you oversee it, you are a part of it, you can help create it. So that way it's there. But this is how you have to start to operate in multi locations. A lot of times you are also over the hiring of new doctors ⁓ and then like the partnership portions within the company. If that's a piece of it, that's really what the owner CEO visionary C is responsible for. Yes, you might still do some clinical dentistry, but typically the more practices you build in, the more you're going to need to be overseeing the entire organization and doing less and less and less dentistry because it's something you can delegate out. No one else can do the vision, the strategy and the culture. They can't. everything else can be delegated. And I know this feels weird. It feels awkward. And it's not always right away, but it will start to be something you phase out and phase out and phase out. And it actually becomes really fun and it becomes hard and it's a challenge, but that's what it is. Scali…
Full show notes at the publisherOnboarding a new team member has turned into a very transactional process. In this episode, Tiff and Monica discuss how to add authenticity, connection, and engagement to the mix. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:01) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. Welcome back. I am just so happy to have all of you. know there are so many people out there that support the Dental A Team in so many amazing ways. And you guys being here downloading these podcasts and having that little, I know Apple allows the like auto download. I always love that. Cause when I'm on flights, I can just, you know, podcast. But you guys being here. pushing those through for us, being here to just support who we are, what we do is so truly incredible, whether you're a client, a future client, or someone who's just here to listen and you're like, ⁓ you know, never gonna sign up, we don't really have a preference of how you get to us. We just love that you're here. We wanna deliver all of the most amazing information that we possibly can. You might notice we share a lot of information, a lot of tips and tricks, a lot of like, I don't know, feel like, Monica, I feel like they're like. secrets, trade secrets, right? And people are like, gosh, I'll just listen to your podcast. I'm like, fantastic, do that, do that. When you're ready for someone like Monica, who I have here with us today, you guys, to be like, I'm gonna push you a little bit further. She's here, we're here, and we're ready to help you get to that next level. And as I said, you guys, this is a truly, truly exciting day for us. I have Monica back on the podcast with me today. I am so excited to have you here, Monica. I know. Monica Gomez (00:57) ⁓ yeah. The Dental A Team (01:20) Previously, I've kind of given a good spiel of who you are and how we found you. And we got to record a podcast, if you haven't listened to it yet, about this really hiring tips and strategies. But there's so much to learn about Monica, her coaching style and who she is in that episode. So if you haven't listened to it yet, go do that. And as an introduction today, Monica, welcome. I'm so excited to have you here. And I just I'm excited to pick your brain. love I love watching. I feel like I get to watch the flow of how thoughts come to you and it's just really fun and I love our time together. Thank you for blocking out your morning and being here with me this morning and Monica, how are you? How was your weekend? How's life? How's Monica? Monica Gomez (02:05) ⁓ Life is great and I'm starting off my week with podcasting with you ⁓ and this is so fun. This is my second podcast and I'm so excited to be here. Our first one was really, there was a flow to it, right? It was a ⁓ great little conversation, valuable. We dropped lots of gems, you guys, so go listen to that podcast and I'm excited to be sharing this space again with you, Tish. Thank you for having me. The Dental A Team (02:21) Yeah. Thank you, thank you. I do love this and it actually makes me think this is like a little off topic here, but just for a smidgen of time. love the podcast space with you consultant ladies ⁓ on our team because I love that this is a space where I get to, I think I get to share how much I love you guys. Like how much admiration I have, how much I look up to you guys and get to like extract so much. knowledge and input from you. And I think this is our space of like, truly having some connection time. And we have our one on ones, I mentioned that before, but those are so goal driven and work driven. It makes me think I love relationship and community. And I think that's something that humans are learning again, we're relearning that we need that. I think we lost that for a moment of time here recently and in the years and we're coming back to that. You kind of don't know what you have until you lose it sometimes and we lost that space. And I think this is our space of true community. We do have our weekly meetings, we have our one-on-ones, we have our data-driven, work-driven time together, but the podcasting space is actually really special to me because I do get to, I get to get to like, want, we get to put you guys out there and I get to just spend this time with you. And it makes me think you mentioned something on the last podcast that we had recorded together. You mentioned that intentional team time together and that like just clicked. As you're talking, like it clicked for me. This is our intentional time together and instilling that into, infusing that into the workplace. It's really special. And I want doctors and owners and leaders and anyone who's here, dental assistants, treatment coordinators, I don't care who you are. I want you to... know from the bottom of my heart, this is a really special place and you don't need to go start a podcast unless you want to. But having that intentional time, like coffee time, like go in the break room and have coffee together and talk about your weekend. Like me getting to hear about Monica's family life and Charlie, her puppy, getting to know those pieces of you personally, it changes and it shifts our dynamic. So I wanted to highlight that because as you were speaking, I was like, my gosh, this is Monica Gomez (04:44) Yeah. The Dental A Team (04:57) something we haven't had yet because this is only our second podcast together, but that I know I do have with the other consultants and it just totally clicked for me because we just, think, mentioned that in the last one. So Monica, thank you for being here. Thank you for letting me say all that and for giving me this intentional time today. Monica Gomez (05:15) Yeah, thanks, Tiff. Yeah, I think ⁓ this time together, we get to peek, a little peek behind the veil, right? And yeah, we do have a lot of connection time. It's structured time, right? But the value of unstructured time is just gold. is, ⁓ it builds trust, it builds ⁓ camaraderie, it builds affinity, it builds ⁓ an endearing, right? An endearing kind of sense of The Dental A Team (05:23) Yeah. Yeah. Monica Gomez (05:44) of viewing the other person in a different light. So yeah, I think this is a powerful, like meaningful time. I agree with you. I agree with everything that you said. This is definitely a special magical space. Yeah. The Dental A Team (05:53) Yeah. Yeah, thank you. Awesome. Well, thank you for being here. And again, if you didn't listen to the last podcast, I know this is the third or fourth time we're saying it. You should. This is kind of I think Monica actually helped me choose today's topics that she wanted to speak on. I think they actually naturally flow together. So I would maybe even listen to this one after the last one or listen to this one. And then I don't care which order you do it in, but listen to both of them is my is my point here, because today we really we're going to talk about onboarding. Monica Gomez (06:07) You The Dental A Team (06:28) And you can onboard anyone, but I think maybe when we add in onboarding the right team member, because the last podcast we recorded was really how to hire the right team member and hiring with intentionality and meaning behind it. And the onboarding, Monica, I think has to flow off of that. If we're not continuously showing up as the person we wanted to hire, like we talked about in the last one. If we show up in the interview space and we're like, this is who I want you to be, but then we're onboarding and we're like, meh, meh. We're like, this is boring person and we want somebody who's dynamic and fun and engaging and speaking to the patients, but we're like, not that person. I think it makes a huge difference. So Monica, as you've trained people, as you've onboarded, you've trained practices to do this, what are some key highlights that you like to infuse into the onboarding process? Monica Gomez (07:16) Yeah, great topic. And I agree, this one goes hand in hand with our previous podcast. know, onboarding traditionally has been very much transactional, right? Here's your cubby, here's what you do, here's where you sit, here's how you answer the phones, right? We've got to move. Well, there's a part of it that has to be transactional because you have to learn, you know, what your job is and, you know, the daily to do's. But I think if we lead with that, it's a mistake. ⁓ As I mentioned before, and we talked about how the workforce has changed, ⁓ and we're leading with connection and engagement and authenticity and all those components that make us unique, I think we, I really feel that we need to move. from a transactional place to a transformational or transcendental. ⁓ It's gotta be more about behaviors, right? And how we wrap our arms around like this new person that's joining our little family, right? How would you like to be welcomed into a team that would make you feel welcome and received with open arms and warmth? That's how we have to welcome our new people. The Dental A Team (08:19) Yeah. Monica Gomez (08:37) You know, we've invested so much time and energy in interviewing our job post, our, you know, filtering our candidates, interviewing, that whole hiring process, offer letter, the whole nine yards. And then we just throw them in, sink or swim. We've got to add, we've got to be intentional and we've got to add more value to the onboarding piece because, you know, people sometimes are left thinking like, gosh, The Dental A Team (08:55) Yeah. Monica Gomez (09:06) this is not the place that I thought it was gonna be, right? Like make it the place that you post it on your job ad, right? Like create, you get to be the creator. You're the co-creator, right? This is your platform. Like what do you wanna create for your new people, right? And I think transaction. It's always part of our industry and in the workforce, right? There is a transactional piece to working. ⁓ But again, that humanist, right? And so one great tip, I'll start with one tip and I'll turn it over to you, Tiff. ⁓ One great tip is have a welcome packet for your team, right? A t-shirt, their name tag, little, you know, if you picked up little sprinkles of who they are and what they like in the interview, like, The Dental A Team (09:53) Mm. Monica Gomez (10:04) put together a nice little welcome basket for them, a pen post-it, a nice little saying. I think that's, wow, I mean, that's super impactful on their first day, right? Like, welcome to the team and have everybody go around at Morning Huddle and just give a little shout out as, you know, The Dental A Team (10:12) Yeah. I love that. Yeah. Monica Gomez (10:31) how valuable it is to have a new team member. I think that's super simple and important. The Dental A Team (10:37) Yeah, I love that. think you hit on something really important there. It's really that feeling of being welcomed, coming into a new space is, I mean, we don't even like going to a party unless we know, a dinner party, unless we know everybody who's gonna be there, right? We're like, I only know two people. Like, is that enough? Right? I got a text from a friend the other day that was, know, or not the other day, it's been a bit, but for, you know, Halloween. And then she's like, I gotta go to this thing with my husband. And like, I don't know anybody. And I was like, okay, like this is, we're all coming into this dinner party not knowing. anybody else, even if you've done working interviews, you still don't know them. So I love that really just toning in on the personal piece and the relationship, because if you can have a relationship with them, you can, you know, build that camaraderie just from the get go. I think they actually retain information and onboard quicker as well. So I love that. Yeah. Monica Gomez (11:26) It's hard being an adult, you know? It's hard being an adult. And I think in the practice, you know, just circling back to our topic on our previous podcast, fun is really important. We forget to have fun as adults, you know? And gosh, you know, think of it like you're in the sandbox again. See through young eyes, see through young eyes. Put those lenses on and just remember what it is to just play in the sandbox. with your friends, right? And have like that pureness of intention and that pureness of heart and spirit. I think it's just easier when you can kind of connect to that space to welcome others in. And they'll say, I love that you're here. Welcome to the team. How can I make your week and your integration easier? I think that's a gem right there. That's... The Dental A Team (11:56) Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Monica Gomez (12:23) super valuable for the person receiving and also for the person that's delivering. The Dental A Team (12:28) I agree. I was thinking, as you said, you said it's hard being an adult And I thought, yeah, I remember just being like, do you want to swing? Like, there's two, like, do you want to swing with me? Like, that's, we don't do that anymore. Yeah. It was easy. Now it's like, we go to, we're in the same Pilates class 10 times and I'm still like, do I talk to you? Do I not talk to you? And it's like, goodness gracious. So yeah, like just, do you want to swing? Like just, let's just have fun with it. I love that. ⁓ Monica Gomez (12:34) Yeah. It's easier to fix ones. The Dental A Team (12:53) And so Welcome Packet is beautiful. if you guys like put it together, it could even be like ⁓ a welcome note card. Like, hey, excited to have you. Like everybody, we write thank you cards to our patients or we write condolence cards or happy birthday or happy anniversary. Like, congrats on your wedding. We write these cards and I've seen them in multiple practices. So I know a lot of people do them. You pass them around to all the team members or the happy birthday for the team members, right? Everybody writes on the card and it's like this little message. You could do it as simply as that. Like, hey, Monica's starting on Monday, guys. Like, it's Thursday. Let's wrap this up. Let's get this like welcome card together and a candy bar or a little ⁓ bouquet of flowers, like four carnations. Like, it doesn't have to be difficult. It doesn't have to be robust or like over the top. Just speak to who you are and who they are. I love that. And Monica, something you said was we were kind of prepping for this was you don't have to have it all together. And I loved that because we've saw many podcasts on Monica Gomez (13:33) Yeah. The Dental A Team (13:49) operations manual and it's fantastic. And I agree with an operations manual and practices come to us and they're like, Monica, we need an operations manual, help us build it. It's like, okay, yes. And it's super cool. Also, it's not a requirement. You can onboard, you can train, you can have them help you build the operations manual while you're training. Don't hold yourself back from onboarding someone successfully. Monica Gomez (14:01) Yeah. The Dental A Team (14:17) because you feel like things are missing and I love that you said that. Now, on that same aspect, a job description, super simple, to put together a job description of who they are, how they show up and what their targets are per position and then build off of that to say like, hey, in the first week, two weeks, 30 days and then kind of go from th…
Full show notes at the publisherKiera goes into the key pieces for a worry-free practice, including systematizing your stress points, providing boundaries around time and energy, and leading proactively. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and I hope you're having an amazing day. I hope that you are excited for today's podcast. I am, because like, why don't we create a stress-free practice? That sounds like, sign me up. Yes, please. Thank you. Happy to take you guys through that and how to create a stress-free practice, at least at a base level, at least certain tactical tips that you can put into place today to start exploring that, experiencing that. And honestly, I just love, I love the game of business. I love the art of business. I love. ⁓ I love the impact and the change we're able to make. And I truly just love human beings. I love helping people just experience their best life, whether it's my sister or my friend or my neighbor or our community or our podcast family, whomever you are, wherever you are, I'm just so grateful and honored that you're here with us today. So if you love our podcast, if it's changed your way in any way, shape or form, do me a favor today and just share it with somebody that you think this could make their day better. Whether it's today's podcast or another podcast. Go to our website, TheDentalATeam.com, click on our podcast tab, search any topic that you ever could want, make sure that you're able to access all the free resources that are available to you. And if I can help you personally or professionally in any way, you guys, truly like, I built this company to be a friend in the industry, to be somebody who has vetted all the different people out there to help you out. And it's so fun because I used to work at Midwestern University's dental college before I started consulting. And it was so fun. The other day I was on a call. and my phone, like I was on a video call and my phone lit up and I looked at it and it was literally a dental student. we're talking throwback to the past, shout out to my Midwestern family. And I was like, oh my gosh, I've not seen that name on my phone and we're talking eight plus years. And so as soon as they finished the call, I called them back and I was like, dude, it's been so long, how are you? And it just like, my cheeks hurt from smiling so much right now. It made me so happy to be able to have been in the industry long enough to have worked with so many different clients and have so many different resources that no matter what has been thrown my way with different clients, this student that I haven't talked to in eight years who's at a pretty awesome crossroad of their practice and their life and what they're doing, to be able to truly give them ⁓ advice, to give them resources, to help them out. And I realized once again, that that is why this company exists. It is to truly be that friend in the industry. And he's like, Kiera, like, your time is valuable. And I was like, are you kidding? Like, this is what my time has meant for my time is meant to help and to serve and to be that resource and advocate. Whether you work with us as an active client or whether you're an massive advocate of the podcast, ⁓ or if we're just someone who have we met in passing, just know that you have somebody out there who is truly committed to making you the most successful, the happiest. all the best resources I can possibly bring to you. That's what this podcast is about. So share this with somebody who needs this. Make sure that you get this into the hands of all these dentists that need the help, that need the resources, because this is a free resource. There's no strings attached other than just asking you to truly give back to those around you, in your community, in your study clubs. Make sure everybody is a raving fan listening to the podcast, because my job is to help you become the best that you can possibly be. So with that today, like I said, I teased it out a little bit. We're gonna help you figure out how to create this, you know, stress-free practice. And it's honestly going to be through nothing sexy, nothing hard. I hate hard things. I like it to be easy. One of our core values is ease. So everything I bring to the podcast, everything we do in consulting should make your life easier and not harder. like honestly, stress-free practices come from systems and leadership. That's the bottom line. It's systems and leadership all day long. And it's the discipline to follow through on both of those. That's what it is. So this is something where it's like, we're going to reduce the chaos. We're going to protect your energy and help you truly feel so much better in the practice because this is what we're about. Like this is how we're able to get you guys there. And so the systems and the leadership done with consistency will help you have stress-free practices. Now, a lot of times it's, know what you should do, but you don't do it or you don't consistently do it. It's like parents, it's like, I know I shouldn't give my kid candy, but I do it because they're screaming and I just want the screaming to stop. Well, is that a temporary fix or is it a long-term solution? And so for this, making sure that we're systematizing. Now systems for point number one are going to be exhaustive. You will never be fully systematized. You will never be fully done and perfect in all the pieces. There will always be an evolution. And I just want to like get rid of the hope and the wish that, my gosh, like maybe I could do this or maybe it would change or I will one day reach this mountain. You won't. So when I work with offices, like how do you get them systematized? How do you do it? What's your magic diet pill? And I'm like, Well, I systematize the stress points. I systematize what's causing the most pain that's going to give me the most gain. And I do that immediately because then the screaming stops, but it stops forever. Did you hear the difference? The screaming stops, but it stops forever rather than just feeding my baby candy. So they stop screaming temporarily. Well, then they're going to start screaming because they get a tummy ache and then they're going to throw up on me. And then that's a whole nonsense rather than just giving them the food that they actually need and want and doing that consistently to help my baby out. So for your practices, we're gonna systematize those stress points. So what happens from this is, I usually when I go into a practice or our consultants go into your office or we're working with you virtually, we're going to look for the top three pain points that you tell us are the pain points. Then we're gonna use the data to actually tell us additional pain points. And then we're gonna look at those two things combined and we're gonna pick out the top three things that are going to move the practice forward. Like literally this is what we do. So sometimes it's a scheduling and efficiency. It's a communication like that happens all the time. It's a billing, it's a profitability, it's a lack of production. It's a, don't know what my next step is. It's whatever your pain point is, like, my gosh, like I was talking to an office the other day and like, I'm so sick of the like time off requests and people calling out sick coming to me as a doctor. And I said, that's funny. Who's your office manager? Like what's your office manager doing? Because that should never be coming to the doctor. Should definitely be going to the office manager. That right there. is a simple, easy fix. We put up a system, we put up a process, we just tell the team, here's the new organization chart, here's who goes to who, boom, pain point gone and resolved as long as you stick with it. So what we wanna do is we wanna look at what our top three recurring pain points are. Again, we talk to the team and then we look at your data. What do your numbers tell us are truly the issues that you're having? And then what we do is we create systems, SOPs or protocols, and then we have accountability with it. So like when I go into a team and, there's an issue of our scheduling. Well, great, let's put a scheduling template in. Let's roll it out to the entire team. Let's let everybody know what the rules of the game are. That way everybody can play the game. And then we put it into place for six weeks and we reassess and we refine and we change it up as need be. And when you start to do this and you start to systematize, and for me, I don't like systems that you have to remember. I like systems to just be in place. So a scheduling template just goes in place and everybody can follow it. We tell them the rules of the game, but it's very easy. Like don't make it where it's like, This green block is for just treatment, big treatment. Well, what the heck is big treatment? Let's do this green block is for a $2,000 and you can have X, Y, or Z that can go in there. Fantastic. Well, now I know when I'm looking for green blocks, any person who's a crown or quads of fills or endo or implant, like anything 2000 or above can go here and I can stick it in. Now, now that's easy. I know it's $2,000 instead of big production. That's so much easier. Then what happens if I can't fill that? Well, great, 24 or 48 hours, whatever we decide as a team that feels good to us, we hold that block for that long and then we can go and change it. Now what happens is somebody is like, but Mrs. Jones just wanted to go in that spot. I know I'm not supposed to. What happens then? Well, great, the person who's scheduled gets to call Mrs. Jones and move her. We don't play the game. We don't get to do this. Like unless it's 24 or 48 hours, that block is held for that exact procedure. And I checked to see whose name did it and they get to call that patient with me. awkwardly sitting there with them, supporting them, so we don't do this again. I want to make it so uncomfortable that you would rather follow the blocks rather than have to deal with the consequence. But it's fine, you know the rules of the game before we start the game. So that way no frustration occurs because expectations have been laid out. Fantastic, we follow the blocks. People are like, Kiera, we're hitting higher production. We're getting out on time. We're getting our lunches. Patients are happier. Isn't that funny? That was something that was such a big pain point for you. And with simple little steps that we put into place that all of us like agreed to follow, the whole team's on board, we all know that. We instantly fix the problem. This is what I'm talking about, systematizing your stress points and making it to where everybody can follow it. We hold it accountable. But like once you put it in there, now there's really not a lot of like remembering what we have to do, because it's all in there spelled out. Like NDT or handoffs, if you're struggling to get your case acceptance up, put that in place. phenomenal, it's on every single route slip, it's in every single note template, then all you really have to remember is to fill in the boxes. And we have a tee up to where the team members prompt the doctor if the doctor forgot to say it. That's great. And now you're like, Kiera, you just added $25,000 to my practice. You're welcome because you did the work. You followed the system. You systematized the pain point and we looked at the numbers to tell us based on what you're telling us, based on what the numbers are telling us, let's put this into play. So if we can solve three of those issues for you, That would be amazing. So looking at your practice, look to see what those pain points are and commit to systematizing those, those hot points, those stress points that are going to move the needle forward the quickest for you. Then the next piece to make the stress fee is you've got to make sure that there are boundaries around time and energy. So with offices, a lot of times like burnout doesn't come from working. Burnout comes from having poor boundaries and overworking and committing to everything to where you feel like you can never catch up. So what this is is like, I love to build with doctors your ideal week. And we're going to, guys have heard me talk about this constantly. I cluster likes with likes. So we have our admin time. We have our doctor time. We have like when I'm building out a block schedule, we have it to where you want your crowns and we have what you have at the end of the day and right before lunch. So that way we can actually batch all of this along. You can get a lot more done when it's batched and it's clustered and it's connected. And then we protect that. Like doctors, I tell them, like, here, I can never get out of here on time. And I'm like, great. So here's the deal. You get out by like, what's reasonable. Let's say you end patients at five, you're out the door by 530. For every day you're not out at 530, I'm gonna let you out of a four day work week, if you have three days, you gotta get out one day, that way you don't have to be perfect. Three days you gotta be out by 530, and if you're not out by 530, you owe me a thousand bucks at the end of that week. my goodness, guess what? They instantly get out at 530, how? Because we made it a priority, we had a strong boundary on it, and we said this is what we're doing, and there was something on the other side of it. Or it can be like, okay, you follow this for the next two weeks and you get to have a pedicure or a massage or whatever you want to do. We attach something fun to it. But what's wild is just changing how we're working. It's changing how we're setting this up, but we're making it a, like it's a, it's a no go zone. We don't go past this and we say no to what doesn't align in those blocks. So for me, I know I've got podcasting days. Tiffanie was like, Kiera, can you wait? And I said, no, Tiff, I've got podcasting. Like I gotta get there. And she's like, that's okay. I can take care of it in another time. Or I could have been like, absolutely, Tiff, no worry. Like I'll push the podcast. Like not a big deal. Well, when I do that, yeah, then I'm to be working on podcasts later. Everything goes down. Nothing works well because I didn't set boundaries around my time. And I didn't make a commitment that I was worth it because saying yes to something is saying no to something else. And I say yes to Kiera because I know at the end of the day, my greatest asset in life is my body. It's my time. Like that's my greatest assets. And so I've got to be so, so, so strict on it. Everybody will try to take it. It's my responsibility to be consistent with that. So we protect that. We say no. And what's wild is when doctors will do this and they set up their ideal weeks, when they set up their admin time or their CEO time, their deep work time, and they actually commit to it and they stick with it, they literally start to grow the practice exponentially. They start to feel so much happier. They start to get out on time. They start to have more time with their families. I had one doctor and she was just burnt to a crisp. H…
Full show notes at the publisherHappy Thanksgiving! Kiera gives ideas of service opportunities, from a personal to a practice-wide scale. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and happy, happy Thanksgiving. I am so honored to share today with you. You guys, I love Thanksgiving. It used to not be one of my favorite holidays, but gosh, you know, the secret to living is giving and to have a day dedicated to gratitude, a day dedicated to love, a day dedicated to families and friends and to just come together and to remember how good our lives truly are. I think is beyond special. And I just want to say, for me, it would feel crazy for me not to jump on here and to say thank you to all of you. You guys are my favorite humans. You're the people that I love, that I get to talk to so many times a week, that I get to hang out with, that I get to see your stories, that I get to know personally and professionally, that I get to see your wins. I get to see you tag us on social media. I get to see the emails that come in. I get to see your reviews that you leave. I get to see you positively impacting the world of dentistry. And just to truly know, that you guys are doing so good out there. And I just want to say thank you. Thank you for being here. You guys, this podcast was a hope, a wish, a dream when I was hiking up, I'm not joking, Half Dome in Yosemite. And I thought there is nothing out there that's serving dentists and teens. And it's a niche and it's a space. And I'm going to come in and I'm going to positively impact. And I'm going to get both sides of the coin to come together to really, truly influence and impact dentistry in the greatest way possible. And that is such a huge testament to all of you for being here. for being a part of the Dental A Team family. So I just wanna say thank you for being here. And to this, I just wanna say like, if you've been an OG, thank you for being here from the beginning. And if you're a newbie, welcome. I hope that you feel loved. I hope you feel appreciated. I hope you just feel great. And I hope you remember how amazing life truly is. So I want you guys to just know that watching this podcast evolve, to seeing millions of downloads, to seeing us in so many countries, my like... It's mind boggling to me. It's crazy because when I built this, didn't know how many people would listen and to see the fans, to see the love, to see the raving fans, to see the clients come through, to laugh with you, to celebrate with you, to cry with you. I just want to say like, gosh, like this is a journey. It's a joy and it's an honor and it's a privilege because I know your time is your greatest asset. And so I just want to say thank you. And today with it being Thanksgiving, you know, I really just want you to know that I believe that the secret to living is giving. And we have a portion of our company called Live To Give. And I've talked about it on a few other podcasts. I've talked about how like, you know, it was back in 2019, I went to a Tony Robbins event. And a lot of you know how much I love Tony Robbins. That was because I caught one of my lightning moments in life where I was in a space so focused on myself and it was random because I was building a company called Live To Give. and that was where we were non-believable and we were like getting donations to help these nuns who didn't even have a house. Like it was crazy and we raised so much money so quickly and I've done it a few other times. Like another one idea was the Vibe prison ventures where inmates were actually like I went I actually went to the prison and it was crazy and I was scared out of my mind ⁓ but I saw these inmates take their skills that got them into prison which were not the best. and turn them into good and they pitched us their business ideas and to be able to sit there with them. That was another business that I got that was part of the Live To Give to be a part of that and to give back. And I found that so many of the times in my life that are my happiest moments are those where we like went above and beyond. And a few years ago, I talked about like probably my favorite Live To Give moment that we've ever had was when we were able to, one of my friends in Arizona, her son was struggling with stomach cancer and I really wanted to do a make a wish and make a wish is like really, really hard to get in touch with. And I had committed that year. I was going to do a make a wish. I didn't know what it was going to look like. I didn't know how we were going to do it. I told my team, this is what we wanted to do. And we found this boy and his goal, his dream was to go to Italy. And I was like, this is it. Like guys, this is it. We have a team member who's a stomach cancer ⁓ survivor as well. And I was like, this is it. This is our live to give. And our whole team was able to participate in it. We're able to give this, this child who's 12 years old, him and his family, a complete all expense paid trip to Italy when he got done with cancer and to give him the hope and the wish. And you guys like that moment in my life, I think about the ones that really impact us the most, the ones that changes, the ones that are like those lightning bolt moments. And I, the bulk of them are ones that we've been able to give to serve, to love. ⁓ We were able to last year as a team go and like help so many kids at the children's hospital. our team has done angel tree where we go and like shop for these families. And Shelbi and I, I remember we went shopping for a family of nine and that was the exact of my family. I think back to when I was at, ⁓ United Way and I was able to bring holiday magic to hundreds of families from the donations of others. And I remember there was a time where I just was feeling grumpy about life. I realized like, I haven't checked my, giving like vitals. in me in a while. I think about businesses and I think about all of you and we are constantly looking at our KPIs of our business. We're looking at the KPIs that drive us to success, but I'm like, what are the KPIs of our life that drive us to success? And maybe those are some of the pieces that are there. And I've just realized that giving and serving and loving should be an area that maybe we want to check those vitals, especially today. of where is my giving my love, my service, KPI? Is it high? Is it low? Is it on track? Is it off track? And I will say that if it's off track, today's a great day to get it on track. And maybe a couple of ways for us to give back is just to love a little bit more, to text someone today that you might love. A few years ago, my brother-in-law and I have a kind of a unique relationship. When I met... He was a business owner and I always thought he was so grumpy. I didn't really like him that much. was like, Jason, your brother is so just rude. I did not care for him. And as I become a business owner further into my career, I understand this brother-in-law so much. And he's kind of like, I don't know, I would say like a little crusty on the edges. He's not soft, I'll put it that way. And I was actually really, really scared to text him. But just cared about him so much and I appreciated so much of what he's done and he's been a mentor to me. And I just said, take a risk, a gamble. I remember I was sitting on the beach in Maui and I texted him and I just said, hey, I just want you to know how much I appreciate you. I value you. And how much of a mentor you've been to me and you've given me hope when I didn't know that there was hope. And I'm just so grateful for you. And he wrote back, he's like, Kiera, I don't usually cry. And that text meant so much to me. And I just think that's our giving. KPI. So what little love bombs could you send out? What service could you and your team do together? Our team, every year in December, we do a Live to Give. Could you guys adopt that in your company and together collectively as a podcast family? Think of all the lives that we could give back to. I think about my husband was talking about another brother that he has and this brother literally is in such a hard place in his life right now and does not have a lot of money, has a lot of family dynamics, I won't get into it. And when I say like, pretty much homeless, that's literally what's going on with him. And I only highlight that because his situation is so hard. we were, Jason was talking about struggling with something and he was like, ⁓ I could help you with that. And Jason and I talked about it and we thought about who are the people that give to those that are struggling? A of times it's those that are like, not hardly better off than they are. And I think like, Could today or this next month, could we maybe boost that live to give side of us where we look for people in need, we look for opportunities that can be in our patient base, that can be in our team base, it can be in our community, it can be in our families. Can I give out little love bombs? It might be cold in your area. A few years ago, we did a coat drive and this came from one of my friends in Utah who... would ask all his friends to donate coats that they're no longer wearing and would drive around and hand out coats to people on the side of the road that could really use it. I'm not here to say you've got to go do that, but I just think like, what a blessing to those people. What a space for us to be able to share and to love and to give back. Like you guys, are so insanely blessed. I promise every single person listening to this podcast today, we all collectively could say that we have been unruly blessed. in our lives. And so where is that? Could I text a team member and tell them like, Hey, you're doing such a great job. I'm not joking. I have a little list over here to write thank you cards to my team members sporadically and unexpectedly for great things that they do. Could I text my spouse if it's been a while and tell them how much I love them? Could I maybe call my parents? I think about like, if you have your parents alive right now, I hope that you just love them. I hope that you call them, I hope that you tell them, I hope you forgive them. Even offering forgiveness to somebody that maybe doesn't deserve it, it's not a gift to them, it's a gift to you. ⁓ Patching up and cleaning up when it maybe doesn't seem like it's necessary. ⁓ All these are little gifts of gratitude, of giving, of serving, of loving people. And what's crazy is the more you give that, the more you feel alive, the more your bucket's filled like, Every year we go and do something and I leave those events just on like cloud nine. We have a team member who last year she was so inspired by it. She like found a girl in Africa and basically like adopted her and has been like helping her get through college and like she sends her letters and her dad did it and they were just so inspired that they've like changed these lives of people. And like, but that team member changed as well. And so I just think today, Let's look at our KPI of our giving metric and how can we add maybe a little bit more service and give back? Because I promise you guys, the secret to living is giving. That's why I have Dental A Team's Live to Give. And if you know somebody that could benefit from Dental A Teams Live to Give, it's completely like on us. It's not even that I might make it the 1031 or excuse me, our nonprofit in the future. Like that just is a great idea on the podcast that came to me. because I want to build a nonprofit. But if you know a family that's deserving, you know of somebody that could have a make a wish experience, you know someone in your community, I would love to partner up with you. I'd love to help make magic happen. I'd love to use the podcast. I'd love to connect with a lot of you. But like, there are so many people, including ourselves, including our team, that a little more love, a little more kindness, a little more gratitude could go a long ways. And I just want to encourage you today as you're in this space for you to think of how can you do just a little bit more? How can you make a little bit more impact and change in people's lives? How can you just truly like not be as lonely as an owner and to give heartfelt thanks and gratitude to any person around you. And I was like, team members to your doctors, to your owners, it is lonely at the top. It is hard. And to give a genuine heartfelt thank you of gratitude, could truly go so far. And so I think just go out of your way, text your team members, tell them how much you love them, tell them how much you appreciate them, how much you value them. Team members, tell your doctor, tell your family. Like these things don't have to be monetary. It's us just loving of being kind and to give. to just give back a little bit more. And then I'd also encourage you to also give a little gratitude to yourself for the things that you've overcome, for the things that you've been able to do, for the challenges, for the person you've been able to become. Think back to who you were when you started your business, to who you are today and give grace and gratitude. Because the reality is like, I think about this, like if you were... to look back and to be able to talk to your younger self, what would you say to that person? You'd probably be like so freaking proud of that person. Like you're gonna do it. I'm so proud of you and I'm so grateful for you. And then I think like, let's go even further. What if you only had one week left to live? What would you be doing right now with your life? I promise you, you'd be living on your highest cloud nine. You'd be telling everybody thank you. You'd be telling everybody you love them. You'd be giving hugs. ⁓ one of my friends from high school just posted recently that his mom passed away unexpectedly. And he wrote, he said, hug your parents, hug your family, tell them that you love them, love your cousins, love your aunts, all of your uncles, like tidy up because your life can change so quickly. And what I hope for all of you is that your life does not change so quickly, but it does change so quickly, not in a negative way of losing somebody and wishing we could love on them more. but that your life could change so quickly that you start to live your day every single day of having gratitude and love and telling your family and calling them and sharing with your team and not holding back. It's like, I'm hoping that you just feel this like confetti explosion of love being able to be finally released and unshackled from you to give it to yourself, to give it to your team, to give it to your family, to give it to those around you. I hope you know that I love you. and that I care about you. And I think that you're doing way better than you ever imagined you could be. That I'm so proud that you're living the dreams that you once thought were impossible and you made them into the possible. That you push yourself, that you evolve, that you want to be this good human, that you're positively impacting your community and your team. You're doing so much good. And I just hope that you feel the love. I hope that you feel strengthened and I hope that you just know that I adore you. And with that, I would also be completely ridiculous because I cannot let today pass without doing one of my favorite traditions. And t…
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