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Tiff and Britt give tangible tips for creating a wealth plan of action. They cover everything from knowing what your ideal work-life balance is, when you hope to retire, the right systems you can create now to set you on your path, and a ton more. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Join Dental A-Team Consulting Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:01.504) Hello, Dental A Team listeners and welcome back. I am here again with Miss Britt. Brilliant Brain Britt is what I've dubbed her today on some awesome business tips and insider tips, things that we've learned along the way, things that Britt has actually gone to school for. So welcome to that. Thank you, Britt. Britt (00:19.787) Real life is cool, Cliff. Real life is cool, too. The Dental A Team (00:25.935) Fair, fair. But I do love picking your brain for it on these pieces because little do many people know you do have a degree in healthcare management. I think it's really, really freaking cool. And not just any degree, like you have, you know, your master's degree in this and it's really freaking cool you guys because It means not only do we have, you know, the knowledge that we've all picked up along the way and we've taken courses and CE and all these things and learned and learned how to use freaking Excel and things like that. But Britt also has that side of it that I get to pick her brain on things that just really, really helps you guys learn how to manage your business. So we all do have the real life training, but Britt, I think it's really cool when we get to utilize your degree and you get to utilize it in our company, I think. I assume you do, but it's really cool when you get to do this stuff. So thank you for being here with me today, Britt, letting me pick that beautiful brain of yours. And just for always being here for us, you are an amazing human being and anything that I need, you're like, yep, we'll figure it out. So thank you for recording with me. How are you doing today, Britt? Britt (01:15.638) Mm-hmm. Britt (01:34.127) I'm doing well, thanks Tiff. These are fun combos because one, like we both have years of experience in dental and so, and worked with a lot of clients. So it's fun just to kind of talk about ideas and cool things we've seen and what we've learned along the way. The Dental A Team (01:49.156) Yeah, I agree. I agree. And today is one of my favorite conversations. I love nothing more than to help a doctor and a business owner of any caliber and degree learn how to make their business work for them and then not spending so much time working for their business. Like you guys became business owners, you became practice owners so that you can have your own business, you could make your own hours and you get into it and you're like, gosh dang it. Brit, this sucks, I'm working all the time. And it's like, yeah, you will do that for a little while for businesses and it'll come back around every now and again as well. But really looking at how we can plan and project for the future so that you can make that switch at some point and it flips to where the business really is creating the lifestyle of your dreams. And that's something that we work really hard at. I know we work with mostly entrepreneurs, which means. We work with visionaries, we work with the people who have the big dreams, and then we get to help implementers, office managers typically, right? And doctors learn how to be an implementer from a visionary, but we get to work on the implementation side of really finding the strategies and keying in on the pieces that are going to help us get to that big vision that you want, doctors. So we have other podcasts, a ton of podcasts that'll talk about how we've helped other doctors do those things. I want you to listen to those. I want you to never feel like you're alone. We are here for you today. I'm actually really excited about this one today strategic wealth management and really planning for that in the future. And Brett, this is going to be a lot of conversation from you. So I hope you're ready. I hope you've got all your words ready to be used today. I know I use a lot of words in a day and I feel like I never run out, but you might run out. I don't know. But I hope you're ready for this because this one is this one. I'm letting you take over quite a bit here on the strategic planning because I think you do above and beyond look further than a lot of people even look, and look further than maybe some of our listeners are even thinking about. A lot of our doctors are younger, you know, they're 50 and under, and these generations right here, and these two, know, generations, the 30 to 50 generations, we're not always thinking of our retirement. I don't know what happened to us, but we kind of forgot that piece was going to come one day. The Dental A Team (04:08.186) for a lot of us. So really looking and making sure that we're considering those pieces and you do that well. You go retirement, I think you go retirement first, like what's our retirement plan and then five to 10 years. so, Britt, take us through some of the pieces that you work with clients on and you've worked with, you know, clients even before you were with the Dental A Team. I'm really making sure that we're looking at our wealth management from a long-term and a short-term. How do you help people prep for that? What's the first space you look for? Britt (04:38.719) Yeah, this is always fun and that's why I love lately I've been on some of our free assessment calls right even with clients coming in to say like all right where are we at you know how can we help you and this is always an important thing that I want to know is right how long do they see themselves owning a business or doing dentistry both really because it just helps us to figure out We talked about this already even with KPIs. I'm like, what's the future? And then I work my way back. So I'm like, all right, what's the long term? Where are we wanting to go? If it's like, I know I've got at least 15 years of me. Great. Awesome. Like that at least gives us a starting point of where we think we're going and how long we need this business to be producing or the value we need from it for how long you're going to be retired. And so that's where I start is thinking, okay. So for those of you out there that don't know right now, number one action item, it doesn't have to be exact, right? You don't have to do it, but like, what would you love to be your age of retirement to where at least you're not sitting in the chair anymore doing dentistry? That's an important number. One, for you to know, and two, get a good financial advisor, because they need to know that number, because then you're going to work with them to figure out what lifestyle do you want? How long do we think you're going to, you know? The Dental A Team (05:35.121) Thank The Dental A Team (05:51.538) Thank Britt (05:57.333) live on this great earth and live an awesome life and how much money is that gonna take? So we know, all right, what value do we need in investments, in an account, within your practice, because that's an asset for you as well. How much wealth do we need to build for you to be ready to retire by that point in time? And so, yes, even if we, whether a client says it or not, I'm always thinking about what's that ultimate point? What's the end point we're working towards and how are we gonna get there? Or at least I wanna get you in a position to where The Dental A Team (05:59.314) Thank Britt (06:27.317) you have the choice to do that, right? You don't have to, but I never want a client to get to the end to where they're like either physically can't do it or something else and they're not set up to be able to live a great life and enjoy it for the rest of their days. So always thinking that big and then thinking about like, all right, and kind of, there any milestones? Some doctors know right away, hey, I want to work down my clinical days and we'll spend more time with family. The Dental A Team (06:29.009) Yeah. The Dental A Team (06:51.955) you Britt (06:52.423) Awesome. Let's figure that out. Some are like, no, I want to work and do you know, be in the chair. That's the part I love for as long as I can. Fantastic. That just kind of helps us to see what are the pieces we have. I love it. I think Kira was saying the other day. life is ultimately just like a series of algebra equations, right? Like everything you look at, it's like, all right, I've got A and C, what B do I need to get to C type of a thing, right? So that's kind of how I look at this is, all right, where do we ultimately need to go? What do we need this asset, this practice to become to do its part in that grand scheme of things? So knowing that first, and then with the practice, it's like, all right, great. The Dental A Team (07:12.253) Yeah. The Dental A Team (07:19.111) Yeah. Britt (07:35.687) Either, what do we need to build in value of building this up to where what's our EBITDA? What could I sell it for? Not saying you're going to sell it, but I always want it to be worth as much as possible. And also like what do need to be making from that practice? Some people they need the full salary of doing the clinical and you know making a lot out of that practice for a certain amount of time and then even just knowing of like all right once I've done that for 10 years I don't have to I can but I don't have to I could always bring in an associate and make X amount off of you know profit from the practice You know based on kind of what we estimate there will be so that's kind of how I work it We've got to know the end The Dental A Team (07:46.034) Agree. Britt (08:15.769) goal, financial advisors, know dentist advisors are one of our favorites, but working with someone to help you see theoretically when you would retire, what amount do need by then, what current assets do you have, and then we help you on the practice part. What do we need that practice to be or what do we need your income to be from that practice to get you where you need to go. So there's my like long-winded explanation tip. The Dental A Team (08:30.451) The Dental A Team (08:38.781) Yeah. It was long way to do it short. You accomplished both. You accomplished both. So I agree with the retirement piece and I think I always look like five to 10 years, right? But you're right. That retirement piece is so important. I have had doctors that have come in maybe later in their career with Dental A Team and they're like, gosh, Dental A Team, I'm ready for you and guess what? I'm tired. And it's like, okay, well, where are we? So now we're like trying to pick up steam towards the end of their career when they didn't see that coming. Or they had an injury or I had a doctor this year that had some really big health scares this year and he wasn't ready. He's like, I know that he's not ready to retire and he wasn't ready to start thinking about it, but he had to. He was forced into that space and that's so much harder and so much scarier than it needs to be. if we just plan and project a little bit further. So it opened me up too. It opened my eyes up like, gosh dang it, we've got to be on this no matter what. Always be prepared to sell whether you think you're going to sell or not. Always have a business that's sellable and always have a plan for that retirement piece. I think on our side, the Dental A Team comes in for both. We come in for that strategy. We're like, gosh, what do we need that to look like? Where do we want to go? How are we going to get there? How can we? build this out together? And then how do we get everything systematized to where it needs to be? Get your money coming in. So our side is like, how do we get the money? How do we get the profit? How do get you to be more profitable? How do we get EBITDA up? How do we do these pieces strategically to ensure that you're prepped and ready to go? And then on the financial advisor standpoint, they're going to look at what does it take to live your current lifestyle? Is that current lifestyle what you're going to want to sustain forever? The Dental A Team (10:28.948) based on the rates of inflation, what will this look like year over year over year for how long, like Britt said, do we think you're going to, you know, what's your life expectancy, your projection, they're gonna go, they're gonna go as long as they think that they can for you. And then it tells us how much do we need to be pushing into your retirement all the time to get there. So the financial advisor helps with the logistics, they have these really cool, freaking systems behind the scenes that they just. plug a couple numbers into and it tells this projection and I'm like, are you freaking kidding me? That is so beautiful. But that it helps us on our side to be able to pair those pieces together and say, okay, I had a doctor this year that he's like, Tiff, like, I'm getting tired and I need to speed this up. And I was like, well, get your financial advisor on the phone. Like, let's figure this out. And he's got to pump $12,000 a month into his retirement. Britt (11:20.791) Mm-hmm. The Dental A Team (11:20.801) That's into his retirement in order to be ready for the projection he just gave his FA, his financial advisor. That's a huge chunk. Like that's a drastic change from what we were doing before. I think we doubled it. He was at like six or eight thousand, depending on what the month looked like. We doubled that. So having those projections early on, that's the strategic wealth management, right? Like wealth management is current. Like what do want your life to look like now? And what do want your life to look like for the rest of your life? Wealth management is let us help you bring the money in. Let us help you get the money, get profitable or be profitable where you're at, whether you use it only to or not. Like get profitable within your business and then manage where that's going thereafter. Investments and CDs or IRAs or whatever it is that you've got your retirement, your 401k is like. Britt (12:02.059) Mm-hmm. The Dental A Team (12:14.763) What do you have going on on the other side that's generating income off of that income so that you can keep up with the inflation? You can keep up with all of the pieces that you want your life to look like and combining those, I think is the superhuman power. And with the right systems in place, the right training, the right people behind the scenes, a lot of practices are experiencing turnover, right? The last, I'd say five years, we've seen more turnover than we ever had before. People are like, I'm in dentistry for 17 years or I've been at this practice for 22 years. Like we don't see that anymore. But with those systems in place, that doesn't have to affect the profitability. And I think before we were seeing that that was affecting the profitability because we were losing people. and we were so dependent on the people and their knowledge, it was negatively impacting your strategic wealth management. Like it was negatively impacting the projection for your retirement. And one thing that we've learned in the dental field in general is to not be people dependent. So we're taking those systems and those pieces and able to duplicate them, teaching you guys…
Full show notes at the publisherKiera points listeners to where opportunity for hidden savings or additional value could be lurking in your profit and loss statements. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Join Dental A-Team Consulting Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:00.942) Hello, Dental A Team listeners, this is Kiera. And today I just want to have a really fun podcast with you. I want to talk about some possible ways of hidden value, how to trim some fat in the practice. think these are just some fun things that I don't think we often think about that really can actually add pennies, dollars, Benjamins, thousands into your pocket with minimal effort. As always, thanks for being a part of our Dental A Team podcast family. I adore you. I appreciate you. If I was with you right now, I'd be telling you, you're doing way better than you think you are. And my mission is to positively impact the world in the greatest way possible. Life is my passion. Dentistry is my platform. And I am here to infuse you with positivity of tactical tips of sharing how you can be living your best life. Life, the life you were destined and meant to live and doing it through dentistry because I'm obsessed with helping you guys give back to people, share with people and become who you were ultimately meant to be. With that, you're loving this podcast, Go leave us the review, share this with someone because for me to get this into the hands of every single person, every single dentist in this world, I need your help to do it. So please truly go share, share this with someone. And today let's start talking about ways that we can trim the fat, find the hidden value of just little things that we might not be thinking about. My husband does this. He is the guru in our family of looking at our expenses and figuring out what things are we not doing. of just little tiny things of hidden fees. So you can do this in your personal life and your professional life. And something my husband and I were talking about is we don't have this on a set cadence, right? And so how can we set this on a set cadence? So if you're using a software, our company uses ClickUp. I would not recommend it for most practices. I usually recommend Asana or Trello or Basecamp. Asana is my go-to. Monday.com is another great one. Those are all really good ones, but put this as a reoccurring task. So every year we actually look at these things. And then I do set as a reoccurring task. every single quarter. My bookkeepers know, so email your CPAs today. Hello, CPAs. Super excited to talk to you. I need you to send me a detailed P &L at the end of every single quarter. I set up myself reminders in my inbox. You can set it up in your project management software, whatever it is, but have a reminder to review your P &L. And I think review your business P &L and your life P &L every quarter. And if you go through every single line item, you will find little areas, but a few things for you today of hidden costs, hidden value, things that you could be doing. Kiera Dent (02:20.834) Number one is your insurance. My husband, he's a pharmacist and we have disability insurance, we have life insurance, and there will actually come a point in time, potentially, that you actually no longer need this insurance. For dentists, I'm strongly advocating for you to always carry your disability insurance in case anything happens. I've had so many dentists actually have fluke weird things, like I had a dentist in their 30s have a stroke, I had a dentist in their 20s get cancer, I had a dentist who had tingling in their hands and they actually have something in their neck, you never know when something weird is going to happen in dentistry. Your hands are really what are going to be able to make it to where you can be successful in your career. but assessing it. I know for us with our our insurance, it's usually we do a lot of research when we buy our cars or our house or our practice or we're getting out of school, but then we never go and reassess it. And so check to make sure are we really like are we paying more than we should be? Is there a better carrier out there? Are there new people on the market that could be better for us? And just go check instead of just paying that premium every single month, go and look, can we trim the fat? And I know this sounds annoying and you're like, gosh, I don't want to do it. Delegate this to someone, have your managers look into it for you if you want to. But the point is look to make sure that we're not just passively paying our insurances, but we're actively looking to make sure, are we getting the best rates? Are we getting the best fees? Could we negotiate our lease and our rent? That's another zone. all the different areas that we've negotiated, let's make sure we're looking back. And I think insurance is a really, really big one. The next one is internet. Internet goes up on us, cable, our subscriptions. Can we get those discounted? I know a lot of times with insurance, give you a promo, or excuse me, internet. They give you a promo for a while. And can you cancel it and restart it? Please do it on a weekend. We do not want it disrupting patient care. But can we cancel it and actually get reduced fees? And I know it doesn't sound that great. It's like, OK, well, maybe I could get 50 bucks. Well, 50 bucks over the course of a year is 600 bucks. And so if we look at that, I know 600, you're like, but Kiera, we're doing like 4 million. I agree with you, but $600. It's the principle of continually looking for where can we trim the fat? So we're always staying at our peak because we never know. And so we're always looking at these things, trimming little hidden costs. These things add up. So let's say we're able to save $200 on our insurance. We're able to save 50 bucks on our internet. Then the next one is credit card fees. Kiera Dent (04:44.834) I'm going to be a huge advocate for you looking at credit card fees and not just being like with the person that you started the practice with. Credit cards are notorious for tacking on these extra additional fees that you don't even know what they are to where you're paying 7 % on your credit card transactions. That's ludicrous. There's companies like Bestcard or Moolah. can definitely, we have affiliate relationships with them that we can connect you with and you can get the best prices and promos with them. You get terminals for free. You should be paying... two to three percent max on your credit card transactions. And so when you look at that, paying an additional four percent on credit card transaction fees, that is so much. So let's say you're a four million dollar practice. OK, let's say that you let's actually I'll just do two million. OK, let's come down a little bit. So a two million dollar practice, you transact all of that and we're paying an extra four percent. That's an additional eighty thousand dollars just because we weren't wise stewards over and like looking to trim the fat. looking at these items. This is where we look at it. Every single month my credit card company sends it to me. You can send it to your manager. Do the quick math. How much was it? How much of that percentage did they take out? Because it doesn't seem like a lot. But what is the true percentage? For me, I try to average 2.7 to 2.9 because we don't take actual cards. You guys actually do a lot of actual cards in the practice. I know you have a lot of cards on file. What can we do to get that reduced down? And there's also companies like Dental Merchant Advocate that can actually go through your credit card statement, see how they can save. They do a 50-50 split so they take 50 % of the savings and you get 50 % of the savings So it's a great company They can reduce it for you But also go and look at these other companies and see could you also reduce your own fees for you? So look at that look to see look at the credit card fees. What are you being charged for me? I also have a bunch of credit cards that charge me annual fees Could we be getting the same points or better points from other credit cards? Of course talk to your financial advisors because I know opening and closing credits can actually hurt you and help you depending upon how you do it But are there other ones that you could be doing that would actually give you better rates, give you better return? Being just intentional with the credit cards. We put so much money on our company cards. Are we still in the best credit card for our business and for the savings that we could be getting? Or are they charging us? Again, we don't fall in love with it. Things change. So let's make sure we're always being so strong. Same thing with your labs. Are there better labs out there? Are there better supplies out there that we could go and work with? I know that there's some great companies like Ordo, O-R-D-O. Kiera Dent (07:09.114) They can actually get you reductions on your supplies. I know you love your suppliers and I'm not here to say not to, but there are better ways to do it you can actually save a lot of money. There's buying groups. If you want some help, email me Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. You can literally work with your same exact suppliers, but you can save exponent. Like we're talking thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars. To me, these are the simple things that put money in your pocket. And like we said, $200 on our insurance, 50 bucks here, 80,000 with our credit card fees. with our supplies, a lot of offices are saving hundreds of thousands. Like I am telling you in the hundred thousand right there, we're up to 180,000. If we could save a hundred thousand on our supplies labs, getting a reduction without losing it. You could bring in a 3d printer and not have to pay for those night guards or orthotrains. Now, of course, make sure that you are trained and you're not hurting patients to try and cut costs, but there's a lot of things we can order. A lot of things. I have offices that order things on Amazon or different suppliers, but check to make sure that the fees haven't gone up. because they do everything goes up and let's make sure that we're actually paying the best fees. And are there other people coming to the game that could be possibly just as good if not better. So looking for that. Other things, cell phones. I know this sounds silly. I've been with Verizon. my gosh. For like 20 years. I kid you not. And there's another cell phone company called Visible that's new to the market and they're $25 a month for unlimited data. I sound like I'm on a Visible commercial. $25 a month. unlimited data, unlimited call, text, everything. And I watched for a while to see, they actually really good? My family has been on them $25 a month for a cell phone. And yet most of us are probably paying like 70, $80 a month for our cell phones. That's a simple switch. It runs off the Verizon towers. The only con is if you go out of the country, you do need to have a SIM card there. That's the only con they don't have international currently. I guarantee you they'll get there. But $25 just for cell phones. That's like, right there, let's just do another 50 bucks for us. So we've got 200 for our insurance, 50 for our internet, 50 for our phones. That's $300 right there. That's 3,600 bucks that you like just in those simple savings, not to mention the 80,000 on credit card fees and the 100,000 on supplies. But this is where we trim the fat. This is where we're able to find little simple things. This is where we're good stewards. we can pay. I think it's always funny. I don't think about like gauze. If gauze is the exact same, but I could pay Kiera Dent (09:35.962) $200 for gauze or I could pay 20 bucks for gauze. It's exact same, same packaging, same gauze, everything. It's not like the string gauze. Don't worry. I know that there are some better products out there that we pay for. But why on earth would I be paying 10 times the amount just because I wasn't willing to go and do some research? Now doctors, your time is very valuable. So I'm not going to say that these are necessary things for you to go do, but for your office managers, have them go look into this, have them do the research for this, but be intentional. I mean, you're spending money. Why don't we make sure we're spending it? in the most effective way possible and keeping the most amount of money in your book and your in your pocket. This is how we keep profitability. This is how you're able to afford consultants. This is how you're able to afford coaches is how you're able to afford CBCT. This is how you're able to afford the CE and why not be smart with our finances. And I want to tell you, I believe that the best doctors that are good owners are the ones who fall in love with their numbers, who have the discipline of looking annually, quarterly. They do a full financial review, a whole assessment. Take a look at these items. Look to see the hidden. We look at them like, we just don't feel like we have enough money. Well, I know $3,600 doesn't feel like a lot, but guess what? Every single month, that was $300. What if we could put those $300 to a team member and be able to hire somebody who has higher value? We maybe can't afford that hygienist because they want $47 and we're only paying 45. Well, that $2 per hour might just got made up for because we just cut down our internet bill by just making one phone call. These little areas are where you become incredible practices. And so I just want to give you some ideas to get your brain stirring. If you have some good ideas of where you've trimmed the fat or some great resources or some great suppliers or some great dental pieces that you've been able to find, let me know, email me Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. I think it's always so fun to share with you the best ideas. That's why I love the podcast. That's why I love to consult because I love to Share. love to bring our doctors together. I love our community that shares the best resources, how to get things cheaper, how to save money, looking for different ways to do it. Because if we can be better, we can hire better people. We can hire more team members and have them work in great places. We can grow your practice exponentially because we trimmed the fat in the areas that really it didn't make a difference. Our internet is same internet. We're just paying cheaper. Kiera Dent (11:53.282) Our cell phone could potentially be better or worse. If you hate visible, I'm really sorry, but take a look at it. Like that's saving. You could put your whole family on it. Think of now, instead of just you, you've got four or five, six people saving 50 bucks a month. Well, now that's instantly a lot better deal than just yourself. So look at all these different things. Could you get like a Spotify plan and share it with family members and everybody's paying less? Could we get a Netflix family plan and be doing less? All those dollars, it seems like $2 here, $10 there, $5. When you add it up every single month, I look at my credit card bill and it's usually for 20, 30, $40 Amazon purchases that add up to 2000, 4,000, 5,000, 6,000, 10,000 of $20 transactions. So why not get the $20 savings, the $30 savings, the $50 savings, more money back to you on things you're already using. You're just being smart with it. So like I said, if you've got other…
Full show notes at the publisherTiff and Britt provide a play-by-play of what one practice did over the course of one year to go from producing $1.2 million to $2.5 million. This includes having the right systems in place and the right people in the right seats. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Join Dental A-Team Consulting Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:02.09) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. I am so excited to be here with you today. We are doing something really exciting. I have Brilliant Brain Britt with me today. I'll say that three times fast. I love it. It's sticking today. It's sticking. But I'm super excited to do this podcast today. This is something we don't always do. We're just trying to mix it in for you guys so that you guys can really feel a connection to other Britt (00:14.852) Thanks. The Dental A Team (00:30.767) human beings. That is something that Dental A Team works really hard on and this year in 2025, it's a really, really major focus for us is to have all of our doctors that are a part of Dental A Team to have other doctors and other practice owners and leadership people to communicate with because I think sometimes we feel like we're on our own little island in dentistry and there's a dentist on every corner in most cities and states but we still feel like we're alone. We really want you to have that connection piece that's really big for us this year and always has been. And Britt and I, Britt, I have you here today. We are going to talk about a practice transformation. This is a client that I think no names used, right? But I think this is a client situation and the statistics is something that we see a lot. This is a very common practice that came into the Dental A Team and then... Britt (01:13.221) you The Dental A Team (01:24.237) Honestly, the results that we saw were pretty common as well. Like this isn't something that I think preface this with that everyone gets the same results every time. It definitely takes a lot of parts and pieces moving together at the same time to make sure that the results are there. Everyone sees results, but. really looking at the transformation of this practice and I want you guys out there to think how can I see myself in their shoes? How can I see myself in what they're doing or what they're looking for? It's gonna be really huge today. So Brett, I'm excited for this one. How are you doing? How excited are you? What's life like over there? Britt (02:02.821) Good, you know, it's always fun. just think of right recently we wrote a bunch of cards to clients and it's just a fun time to sit back and think about, oh, look at, look at all that we've accomplished together. Look at how much fun it is. So I kind of feel like that's like this transformation day is talking about, oh my gosh, it's so fun to think about all that can be done and all the fun things we've done with our clients. The Dental A Team (02:23.888) I totally agree. And those cards were so much fun to hear, right? I love thinking about, I was thinking about them the other day. I'm like, gosh, I can't wait for them to like, I'm sure you guys have gotten them now and opened them and I've heard from a few clients, but I love bragging on results and I love bragging on people. And one of the biggest pieces that we work really hard with our clients on, I've said this a million times, but it's making sure that the business is working for them and not just them working for the business. a lot of... clients, a lot of potential clients, know, the clients that are coming in and doing practice assessments with you guys and looking at what could my life with the Dental A Team look like and what should I be focusing on within that practice assessment. Our clients that we have now, future clients that will come and a lot of you guys out there listening are really looking for very similar things. And the practice we're going to talk about today, that transformation today is, gosh, this is somebody who we worked just. so close with and we love them to pieces and in 12 months, so you guys know, we were able to take this practice, this practice and their consultant, they went from 1.2 million and their practice they were doing okay, right? 1.2 million is not bad, but they were kind of tired, they were exhausted, they had two young kids at home that they wanted to be at home with and they were working a lot of hours, they were trying to implement the systems, trying to get everything going. and just putting a lot of work into this practice to really get it to where they wanted it. What they wanted, you know, was more income. They wanted more profitability. They wanted to be able to take some time off clinically to be with their family and build a life outside of the practice. And I think a lot of the people we talk to, that's the space you guys are in too. Whether you've got littles at home, graduated kids at home, no kids at all, future family, no future family, like no matter what. I think everybody's in the business of getting time back and wherever you're applying that to doesn't matter. It's just not being handcuffed to what you're doing every day, but what you're doing every day to allow you to have the life of your dreams. And that's where this practice was. And within 12 months, I want you guys to know the pieces that we're going to talk about today. The Dental A Team (04:33.842) are just some implementables that we worked on with this practice that their consultant worked really hard with them to implement. Went from $1.2 million in their practice in 12 months to a $2.5 million practice. So they doubled their production and their collections. Collections stayed right in line with their production. You guys, that's a piece I want you to understand and know. Your production can double, but your collections also has to double. You've got to make sure you're staying in that 98 % or higher. They did that. So their overhead dropped as well significantly. They went down about 10 % in that year. So they increased their production collections, decreased their overhead by about 10 % and their hygiene, which we push, you know, I really want to see your hygiene to three to 3.3 times their rate of pay. This practice is hygiene went above and beyond and we're doing about five times their rate of pay. So there's probably, you know, some fee for services in their low PPO, you know, signups. They've got only a couple PPO's and high reimbursements, but I want those are all a part of those that puzzle you guys. So I really want to dive into how they did this and Britt just objectively, if you have a practice that comes in, you're doing a lot of these practice assessments yourself as well with the with the team, but a practice comes in and they're like, gosh, we're doing fine. Like we're decent. We're at one point two million. I've got two kids at home. I'm tired. I'm working a lot. I want to be home more like Objectively, what are some of the first questions that you ask or you're looking for to know where to take this practice with their systems? Britt (06:07.159) I think systems and people, right? I think that's two things within even this case is looking at what systems do we have running and what people do we have helping to run things that aren't just doctor. I think it's common, That sometimes, not sometimes, often we will have doctors come in and they're doing a lot of things on the business side or keeping track of front desk. They're doing a lot of pieces that aren't the most productive thing for them to be doing. The Dental A Team (06:22.77) you The Dental A Team (06:34.897) Yeah. Britt (06:36.365) And so looking for what are those opportunities of either gaps in systems to where we just don't have a plan for things, we need to shore some things up and if we're a little bit more intentional about what we're doing every day, we're gonna get better results. And then number two is how can we get the right people in the right seats that allows everybody to function at the height of their ability. And when we've got those two things like rockin' and rollin' with this transformation that we have. The Dental A Team (06:58.215) Yeah. Britt (07:05.445) it just runs smoother and especially for doctors, right? Then you've got a little more time and you can focus most of your energy on patient care and doing some of those bigger cases, you know, having even just more mental space and exams to talk about optional things, to the opportunity to do more work. And so that's kind of what I'm looking for. like, all right. The Dental A Team (07:20.381) Mm-hmm. Britt (07:26.051) What systems and what people do we have? How much is that doctor into and what can we start to transform on both sides to make the most of everybody? The Dental A Team (07:36.628) Yeah, it was just brilliant because this practice in specific that we're talking about, those were the pieces they were lacking. They didn't have an office manager or a leadership team. They didn't have a team. They were passing things off to you. They weren't delegating things. So this doctor comes in and two young children, and wanting more time at home, exhausted and not able to push the production and the collections in the ways that they wanted to. you look at it and you're like, yeah, because you're doing everything. So if we're holding all of the cards ourselves, whether we're the manager or the doctor or whoever it might be, if we're holding all the cards, I think of it as like, you're trying to hit each one of those pieces and your capacity is only so big. So what happens is You're managing the growth. You're also performing the dentistry. You're making sure that the patients are happy. You're making sure the team's happy. You've got your hands in so many different pots that you've only got a little bit. You've only got so much of you, right? There's only so much of you. The capacity is only so large. You only have so much to divvy out. And so when you have so many spaces that you're putting little pieces of yourself into, not to mention the things at home, you're actually decreasing the value. of what each of those spaces is getting of you. Because you can only give so much and that's what spreading yourself then is, right? You can only give so much of yourself to each one of those spaces. So if you were to take a step back and think, well, what parts of this am I doing that someone else could do if I had the right person in place? And I think that's the first space that they really worked on with this client was taking that step back and saying, if we had a manager in place, What are the things you're doing today that a manager could take off of your plate? That just alone, I think the concept and idea of having someone to delegate, that alone frees up so much space in your brain because it gives you a way out, it gives you an option and some clarity. So they worked really hard on this with this practice to really look at if we could hire the right manager, what would we delegate to him or her? The Dental A Team (09:44.211) And then they did it. And I know this consultant very, very closely worked very closely with this practice in the hiring, as well as all of us consultants do. We definitely help hire. We've definitely done interviews. I've done a million interviews for a few practices that really to make sure we're getting the right person, but they worked really hard on the hiring the right person and then training that person to take a lot of those tasks on. So Britt, when you have that office manager, cause you're saying like the people and the systems, right? So when we have that office manager in place that can take some of those pieces from the doctor, what does that open up for the doctor capacity and space wise? then what can, know, I told you a lot of our clients and a lot of our listeners are in the same place. The financials might be different, the numbers might be different, but the problems are usually the same. So if we can get that right person or train the person who's there now to do some of those pieces, what has that been allowing? What did it allow this doctor to do with their lives? Britt (10:41.283) Yeah, I think like I said, it's a mental capacity one, even like chair time, right, might open some of it up for you. Family time, it opens some of it up for you. And the thing is not only are you passing things off to office manager, you are also, that office manager can shore up things that we know need to be done that haven't been happening, right? So AR, we need stronger systems or we've had them, but nobody's following them. The Dental A Team (11:03.797) Mm-hmm. Britt (11:07.883) office manager can take on a lot of those pieces to help drive us forward as well. The Dental A Team (11:12.948) For sure, I totally agree. So I think some of the pieces that this doctor specifically had right were not the right, maybe not even the right systems for the right people. Because I think a lot of you guys listening can see yourselves in this doctor's shoes. Like I said, the numbers might be different. The problems are usually about the same. They just might be on a different level. So part of that and what Britt, you just said too, is really looking at where are we spreading ourselves then? What are the important pieces that only you can do, doctor? So one piece that we took with this practice alone was to say, dentist, what can you do? You are the only one who can perform the dentistry right now. We don't have an associate, we don't have anybody else, which if there's an associate with a whole other world of problems, we're going to keep it to you. What are the things that only you can do? And you are the one who's providing the dentistry. You're the clinician. Only you can do the exams, only you can recommend treatment, only you can perform the treatment, only you can run your business from these standpoints. So how do we get those pieces on you? And then how do we divvy out the other pieces? Typically, the stresses are going to come from like Britt just said, and I'm sure this practice had this as well, the AR, right? The accounts receivable, the collections, is the money coming in? And do we have a point person? appointed to watch those pieces. So that maybe your office manager, it may be a billing person, but ultimately your office manager is going to watch all of those pieces. So what we did with this practice, their consultant strategized with them and built a plan for that office manager. And I know I've done this with a lot of clients as well. What is the training plan going to look like? Who are we hiring? So what's the avatar of the human being that we need? What are the things that we need that human being to perform? How are we going to strategically train them to take these pieces on from you? And then we trajectory, we have this trajectory and we project when can you say, yes, these things are off my plate? So is it six months from now? Is it nine months from now? What does that look like that these things are off of your plate? And how are we gonna track those trends? So we wouldn't have these stats 1.2 to 2.5, five times the rate of pay and hygiene decreased overhead by 10%. The Dental A Team (13:22.695) if we weren't tracking the trends and tracking how the systems were being implemented and put into place. So space one, you guys, t…
Full show notes at the publisherKiera lists a series of questions listeners can ask themselves when they're feeling a lack of passion for their job, life, relationships, and more. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Join Dental A-Team Consulting Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:00.994) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and I hope today is just a great day for you. I hope that you're loving your life. I hope that you are enjoying being in dentistry. And if you're having a bad day, well, let's chalk it up. Hopefully you only have like 10 % of your days that are bad and 90 % of your days that are good. I believe that we are truly in the best profession. We get to change people's lives. We get to do dentistry for people. We get to help people in ways that they didn't know. The smile is the universal hello. And we're able to give people confidence where they didn't feel like they have. We're able to give people a way to give nutrients to their bodies, a way to communicate with people. And we're doing that through dentistry. So I'm just excited for you and I love it I hope that you do too. And remember, Dental A Team's mission is to positively impact the world in the greatest way possible. And we do that through expert consulting for dentists and teams. And so if this podcast is serving you, blessing you, sharing, you've taken any tip, please share it with somebody. Please help us get this podcast into the hands of every single dentist, every single practice. Because I believe that that's how we'll be able to achieve our mission of impacting the world in the greatest way possible Today I wanted to dive in to just a fun topic of how to recreate passion I think it's very easy to lose passion. We've been doing things for a long time. It's day in day out We've been working hard. We've been taking on the challenges. We're on opera like smooth operating wherever you are How do we recreate the passion in our lives? How do we get that passion back? And I can speak from personal experience on this. I lost my passion. I truly did. It was a grind for me. Work was no longer fun for me. And not to say I didn't enjoy my clients, because I always loved my clients. And I love podcasting. So those were still really fun things for me. But overall, being a CEO and dealing with the struggles, I had some really, really hard things in the business. And I think that's oftentimes when it like kind of sucks the wind out of us and we lose passion. We can lose passion when family life is hard. We can lose passion when it just feels like it's Groundhog's Day. Go in, say hello, do the same thing, leave. And so just trying to help you think of how can we reignite that passion? And I put on here, there's lots of different ways, but today I wanted to dive into the art of play. Kiera Dent (02:19.59) and bringing more play into our lives and realizing that I think sometimes we make our jobs and our careers be a one-stop shop for everything we're doing. We literally are sitting here saying like, needs to be my fulfillment piece. needs to be my significance piece. It needs to be my challenge. It needs to be my financial piece. It needs like, it needs to be the space where I feel loved, all these different things. And yet that's a lot to put on one space. I understand that we spend a lot of our time there, but when we lose the passion, One, I would ask, are there things that we could delegate off? I made a whole list over here of the things that I just don't like doing anymore and where I was getting like into the suck of losing my passion and realized could those things be delegated? Could I hire somebody for those? Could those things get off of my plate successfully? And the answer was yes. So we hired somebody new, we delegated some tasks and I got really, really super clear on what things do I absolutely love doing day in and day out of my life. I love working with my clients. I love doing numbers. I love the podcast. I love doing events. love speaking. What I don't enjoy doing are like all the little like nuances around all of it. And I've got a team. And so that was just also me realizing I'm in the wrong spot. I've been staying there with my hands in the pot for so long and I need to trust my team and I need to truly empower them that they are brilliant. They're more brilliant than I am and to remove myself. So that's one big passion suck is. Are we maybe doing things that don't bring us the passion that suck the passion that someone better than us who loves to do it could actually take on. that's step number one. Step number two is what are we doing outside of work and where are our hobbies at? And I remember sitting in therapy trying to figure this out. bought Simon Sinek's like, find your why. My why was there. It just got buried. My why has always been there is to positively impact the world in the greatest way possible. And it's through expert consulting for dentists and teams. Like my why is still there. I still know exactly why I do this. I understand it. And it just got buried and I forgot. I truly forgot and I believe I've got lots of whys. But that was like the big thing of like, why am I doing this? But I realized I didn't have any passions. I didn't have friends. There was a book I read a while ago called Find Your Tribe. I like it. I will say it's extra churchy. I mean, I am religious and it was a little extra even for myself. So if you can, if you could read past that or if that doesn't bother you, I just want to, I want to give a disclaimer on it. But the book is really good and she talks a lot about Kiera Dent (04:42.616) finding five people within a five mile radius of friends. And this is where play comes into play. I did not mean that play on words. So this is where play comes into play and not a play on words. There you go. But what are you doing that's fun? What are you doing as adults for play? Are you into pickleball? Can you get into sports? you, and not that you have to, it's like not kid sports or not hanging out with friends because your kids are that, like, what do do that's soul filling for you? And I remember sitting there thinking like, honestly don't know. It's almost like I lost myself and I needed to date myself again. You know how couples, they fall out of love because they forget to date each other. Like what they were doing when they were dating, they've stopped doing and in doing so, they actually fell out of love with each other accidentally. And so have we also like fallen out of passion with ourselves because we forgot what even makes us human. We've gotten to our careers. We've become the bosses. We've become, we've been working hard. We... get lost in the shuffle of kids and family and all the different pieces that we get lost in that we forgot what even makes us a human. And this is where the art of play comes in to play. What do we do for fun? And so I remember I was like, but a lot of these things for me, and I will just speak very candidly and you can judge me or you can like me. This is Kiera Dent, real and raw. I said a comment in therapy. I said, a lot of these things feel stupid to me because they don't make money. And I think about like buy back your time and who not how, and I know my dollar per hour and it's like, play does not equate to my dollar per hour. And yet my therapist said, but Kiera play is so much of life that isn't going to have a financial ROI. And can you do something just because you enjoy it and not have to feel productive, not have to feel like it has an ROI on it. And she's like, you can still love your work. You can still enjoy that, but there's this whole side of our lives. that won't ever have an ROI. It won't ever make you money, but it actually will make you money because you're happier and you're more fulfilled and you're more fueled. And then you're actually going to want to go work more because you're happy because as soon as you're done with work, you go play. It's like this whole thing of recess. Think about in school, we work hard and we go play and we have recess. We get done with the day and we go play outside with our friends. We would call up our friends and we'd have play dates all the time. And yet as adults, what are we doing to play? And it doesn't mean that we're just sitting in front of a TV and vegging and numbing our minds. Kiera Dent (07:08.47) It doesn't mean that we're drinking and numbing our minds. It means what are we doing to fuel our souls? What are we doing that makes us excited? And so we started listing off ideas and she was like, okay, Kiera. And I'm like, you want me to go book club with people? I was like, this is stupid. said, you want me to go craft with people? This feels so dumb to me. I'm like, you want me to go join a sports team? This also feels so dumb to me because it feels like, no, I need to be at work. Like my dollar per hour is this and I know I can produce that. And yet the play is where passion is. And so she said, Kiera, feel uncomfortable and do it anyway. And I want that to be your motto. Feel uncomfortable, do it anyway. So that means I feel uncomfortable at a book club, do it anyway. I feel uncomfortable going to the, like calling friends, getting my five friends within five miles and saying, hey, let's meet up for lunch or hey, like, let me have you over and have a party. I feel uncomfortable dressing up for a Halloween party and going to it. I feel uncomfortable carving pumpkins with people and I sit there and the business still chicks. But when we get into play, we actually forget. I feel really ridiculous going and painting ceramics with my dad. took my dad, said, my dad and I call it fun Fridays. And my dad comes up, he lives about two hours away and we went and we painted ceramics together. And my dad said, Kiera, why do you like to do this? And I said, dad, I like to just have mindless chit chat where I'm just sitting here talking with you and where like painting gives us an activity to do together. And so I feel ridiculous doing it, but do it anyway, going hiking. And then once I started doing a lot of these items of play, I started to realize like one, your mind gets distracted and then great ideas come for work. So it felt like like a double win. Two, there's more to who I am than just work. I now know I enjoy crafting, like going and doing those paint things with my dad. I love hiking and I really enjoy being outdoors. I fell in love with boating this summer. Like I got really, really, really good at wake surfing. I mean, you guys, I'm not a pro. I'll get better next year, but I nailed a 360 and it was so fun for me. And we call it wake weenie Wednesday and we have a bunch of friends come join us and we do a weenie roast on the back of the boat after we're done surfing for an entire night. And I realized like, that was where play came back in for me. That's where my passion came back in because I love to be out on the lake. I love to be outdoors. Kiera Dent (09:32.39) I started reading a ton of books with my sisters. would do like just dumb things. I would go meet friends and just go to Costco and go shopping with them and their kids. But having something more than work can infuse passion back into your life. You can feel dead and numb and just apathetic to the world. And the way we can infuse that passion is like I said, figure out what's causing that and let's get rid of it. And then let's give our minds a space where they can actually go and have fun. Let's go play, let's go hit it hard. Jason and I have an alarm where it goes off at 6 10 every single night. And we don't talk about work anymore. We talk about other things. And we don't just veg out in front of the TV, but we do fun things. We invite friends over, we go see people. And we always have an excuse not to do it. But why don't we make reasons why we want to do it? And there's a balance. Sometimes fun and play is taking a nap. Sometimes fun and play is sitting on the couch and doing absolutely nothing. Sometimes fun and play is writing in your journal. Sometimes fun and play is being active and athletic. Sometimes fun and play is gardening. Sometimes fun and play is doing household chores because you know when you're organizing your personal life, it's actually organizing your business life. You know that there's different ways that you generate, organize, and destroy in your life, but that infuses the passion back for you. Find a coach, find a therapist, figure out what's causing it back for you. But that is some tips of how can we reignite the passion for us. And I truly do believe there's an art of play. And I think a lot of us, think there's some people that I just admire and they're such fun doctors and they're playing and they're having a good time with their team. like life is always a good time. My dad is one of those people. Every time I call my dad, like he's just giggling and like things are just fun for him. And so it's like having more fun. Life is meant to be fun. Yes, of course there will be hard times. There will be struggles, but to me, I want a life that's fun. I want a life that's fulfilled. I want my life to be fun filled to pull from one of the doctors that I talked to. And that doesn't mean that we're oblivious to what's going on, but there's more created outside of us than just our practices. And that doesn't mean we have to give up the passion for working. That doesn't mean we have to not enjoy our work. Work can be so fulfilling for us, but it's having that mixture of play and work and fun that really can reignite the passion. And so try those things out. Don't go through it alone. Kiera Dent (11:51.118) I also think making sure you reach out to friends. You have a good group of people. I worked so hard. You guys, it's funny. People tell me all the time, Kiera, you're such a social butterfly. And I'm like, I am. But for me to have like true friends that I allow to see the good, the bad, the ugly of me. On the podcast, I want to show up and be the perfect person for you guys. I want to be an incredible consultant. And I feel like I leave my life at the door and I come and I serve and I want to be that. I don't, you guys don't need to know my whole life. But I also need to have friends that can be there, that can support me when things are hard, that can support me when things are great, that I can be unapologetically myself. I can be whatever version I want to be around those friends and they aren't necessarily work friends. They're people outside of that. They're people that just inspire you and make you want to be better. And then you do the things that really, really, really fuel your soul. like email me Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. Tell me what you do to ignite the passion and what do you do for fun? What are the ways that you brought back the art of play in your life or what things do you want to do? I'd love to hear from you. I'd love to hear your ideas. And if I can be a resource for you or our consultants can help you delegate those tasks, get your team on board, take those projects away from you and not to have you feel awkward about asking them to do it. I'd love to help you. Hello@TheDentalATeam.com And as always, thanks for listening. Go have so much fun. Make yourself a promise that you are going to have more happy fun days than you will have sad days. and I promise you your l…
Full show notes at the publisherKiera summarizes a practice that was struggling with cash flow. She breaks down what the Dental A-Team did to pull back the curtain and find out where cash was hiding, and what was done to fix the flow. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Join Dental A-Team Consulting Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:00.814) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and I hope today's incredible for you. I hope you are having the best life. I hope you're just enjoying everything and more. I really truly hope that things are just going so well for you. Don't forget guys, we truly live in the best industry, the best time, all the things are here for us. And so let's not forget how great things really are for us. As always, thanks for being a part of our Dental A Team podcast family. I adore you. I appreciate you. I respect you. I look up to you. I want to be more like you, all the things. And I'm so, so, so, so, so happy that so many of you are a part of our family. If you guys remember, my mission is to positively impact the world in the greatest way possible. And we do that through expert consulting for dentists and teams. And so if you can share this podcast in a Facebook group or on your drive, us, share this with a colleague, share this with a coworker, share this with someone. Today's going to be an office autopsy. and leave those Google reviews, those five star reviews on whatever streaming platform you're on. That helps us stay top ranked so more offices and more teams and more doctors just like you can be infused with positivity, tactical tips that are going to make your life, your practice extraordinary, easier and happier and more profitable. So I think it's a win-win-win and that's what we're all about at Dental A Team. That's what our consulting's about is how to help you create and achieve that extraordinary life that you've been looking for. and do it with ease. Kiera Dent (02:06.531) If you are new to the Dental Inn Team podcast, my name is Kiera Dent. Dent really is my last name and I do love what I do. I started this consulting company wanting to help the students of Midwestern University's dental college in Arizona. And I took a practice from 500,000 to 2.4 million with one of the doctors. She was incredible. We did incredible work. And I thought, man, if I could help her. Maybe I can help other doctors too. And that's actually how Dental A Team started. I had never done consulting before. So everything you get within Dental A Team are things that I wish I would have had things that when we were scrambling, when we couldn't get our team bought in, when we couldn't hit goals, when everything seemed so hard, I wish I would have had these items. And so that's actually what the consulting company has been built upon has been created on is all of that. So that's what Dental A Team's about. And so for those of you who are new, Every so often, I will do what's called an office autopsy, where I take you behind the scenes of one of our consulting clients. Yes, I do keep them anonymous. And sometimes I will mix and mingle so you can't quite figure out exactly who I'm talking about. And that's just to keep the practices anonymous. I do have permission to share. And these are just things that we've done with a practice. So today, and I love to walk you through because When I was an office manager, when I owned my practices, we were just in our own silo place. And yet if I can share information with you, help the best practices win and thrive, that's what I'm about. Because I believe that we have a moral obligation within dentistry to help practices that are the best, provide the best dentistry for more patients and to help patients have the best experience. I really, really truly do believe that that's our moral mission. And so, and it's our ethical code and that's what we're here for. So with that, there was a practice. They were an amazing office. And I remember this doctor called me, I was sitting on an airplane. I used to fly a lot more than I do today. We fly to our practices. We also have offices come together and we meet together for business and leadership events that are so fun. And we basically like get naked on our business in front of other people. And I think it's one of the most beautiful things. They're not physically naked. I feel like I need to like have a massive disclaimer on there. But basically, like we stripped down your business to the bare bones of Kiera Dent (04:13.889) what is going on in your practice and what are the real things and what are the roadblocks with no nonsense. Like let's actually figure it out and then let's not spend our time fixing the 500 things that we could fix. A business will always have opportunities to fix and that's why it's a business. But the reality is I think as business owners and as leaders, our job is to sift through all the opportunities and pick the one, two or three items. that are going to exponentially move us forward in the fastest, most effective, efficient way that will be the best for our teams, the best for our patients. And so that's where we strip it down to the bones, what's going on in the practice, and then we're able to help us identify what do we need to do over these next three months to make sure our practice is flourishing and thriving. And we do this in a group of like-minded doctors. We do this where you are really able to exponentially grow and we have your office manager come with you. Because when I attend events, I love them and I get hyped up. but then I gotta go back and get my team hyped up. So we figured we are dentists and team consulting. We work with both. We don't just work with one or the other. We are comprehensive that way. And so really having this beautiful match made in heaven where the office managers also get to hot seat. They get to go through, they get to have these opportunities and they get to mix and mingle with other office managers to really pull and seep out the best of the best. So. That's what we do. either go to you or we bring you together or a mixture of both. And it's so magical. And so this doctor called me and I was sitting on a plane and he was telling me how hard his practice was and how the collections were just struggling a lot. And he said, Keira, can you help me? And I said, well, actually, yeah, this is our specialty. My hunch is there's a lot more than just collections, but usually offices will reach out when cash flow is low. Obviously, right? We're in panic. We need cash. How do we get this? Let's contact a consultant who's an expert consultant who's been there, done that, done that successfully multiple hundreds of times over and let's hire them. So cashflow, team turnover, culture, lack of vision, wanting to go to the next level. Sometimes there aren't really a lot of problems. I just want to go to the next level and what can we do for that? So those are usually the typical reasons why someone's going to actually reach out for consulting. And so this doctor, it was the cashflow, the cashflow issue. Kiera Dent (06:25.187) Other times offices will also reach out for systems. I think that that's a very, very interesting thing too, to see, what are the systems we could be doing? So depending upon where they are in a practice, if they're like zero to a million, usually it's more about systems and foundations and leadership. If they're like a million to about that 5 million mark, it's usually optimization, leadership, cashflow sometimes in that area. And then if they're 5 million plus, usually it's like, let's take to the next level or like, let's get our systems dialed in or where can we do those small refinements? And then when I'm hitting the offices that are like 10, 20 million, those ones are more like we're mass scaling. We're trying to get all the practices operating in the same direction. So, depending upon where you are, you may or may not fit. Maybe you're above, maybe you're below. Either way, that's really what they're looking for. So, this office, they're in that middle tier, the 1 million to 5 million range, but cash flow. Cash flow is hurting. They're struggling and they don't know why. So, going into the practice, first thing we did was we looked at immediately where can cash be hiding and cash can oftentimes be hiding. in your AR accounts receivable and doctors I always feel so bad for you because you did the dentistry and yet we didn't collect and I always tell people I'm like how would you like to go to work and you go do the work and then you don't even get paid for the work and so that's where with teams I'm very adamant of you have to be collecting the money you have to be helping your doctor like we did the work we did great dentistry and we can expect patients to pay for that and so we immediately went to the AR and their AR was sky-high and the money was right there. All the cash was there. Another practice we saw that there's $350,000 of AR sitting there. Well, no wonder our collections fell low because we've got AR there. So you need to put a system into this practice to actually start collecting the AR. So we started sending out statements. We had a process of when do we send the statements? How often do we send the statements? Who's working on these statements? What day are they working on the statements? Are we calling first, then texting, and then sending a paper statement? The answers are yes, we're doing those items. but they didn't have it. And within a couple of months, this practice was able to collect over $200,000. You better believe that doctor saw the ROI of our consulting immediately. And now they also feel like they've got cashflow. But how did we get here and how do we stay out of there? So a lot of times in consulting, we go in and administer CPR immediately. I guarantee you when you get into consulting, there's usually a burning fire. And so we love to go in, we perform the CPR, we bring it back to life. Kiera Dent (08:47.481) And then we're gonna check to see how can we prevent this from happening or what other areas can we optimize? And so with that, we came up with the follow-up, the collections procedure and how to get your collections and make sure we're watching that and have it as a whole team effort. So when patients are checking in, we're collecting, can we get credit cards on file so we're not having to call and chase these patients for statements? We are changing our verbiage of we collect at time of service rather than sending them a statement with insurance. We got better with our insurance verification so we could be more confident when we're presenting treatment plans and collecting balances. I would much rather collect rather than have to go chase money. And I would rather give refunds rather than having to chase and get payments. And I think all of us would feel that way, right? We'd rather get our paychecks upfront rather than having to wait and hope that someone's willing to pay us. So this practice now is watching, keeping the collections at 98 % immediately fix the cashflow area for them. Other things that they were able to do was from there was helping the culture and fixing the culture because when cashflow is tight, doctors are stressed. Like truly it just, and then it trickles down to the whole team, morale's low. Then we feel like we've got this desperation. We're constantly trying to get these patients to pay. And so helping them there. so then from there, what we did is we were able to help this practice focus on treatment that they actually love doing. And then brought on an associate to be able to do the treatment that the doctor didn't want to do, keeping the collections high, working on perfect handoffs, helping the hygiene team tee up treatment for this doctor. and then be able to thrive and allow the office manager to truly manage the practice. So the doctor then is able to focus on doing dentistry. And we say like, you know, have you ever heard that like running a dental practice is hard? Well, that only team comes in and takes that stress away from you. So you can focus on being a dentist and doing what you love again. And that's where we shifted over and help your office manager do what they love. And that's the practice stats, the HR, the business management, training and coaching that office manager up to truly be almost like a COO. of a practice to do the operations, to do the financials, to do the statistics, and managers love to do this if they've got the right DNA for it. So doctors love to do the dentistry piece, and office managers love to do the management piece. And so teaching both of them how to yin and yang together, so that way it could be this dynamic duo. It could be this incredible practice that's working, and then be able to let go of a lot of the admin pieces. So now this doctor is able to delegate to check in. Kiera Dent (11:05.337) to verify to know these things are being taken care of. And they're able to figure out the top KPIs that this practice needs to be watching with collections is number one, because they know that that's their danger spot that they can get into hot water pretty quickly. But they have the process, they have the protocols, they have the system in place to where it's not team dependent, but it's system dependent. And now they're all able to watch their collections, manage the practice and the doctor is thriving. And it's interesting to watch this doctor from when they called me and I was sitting on the airplane and the stress and the The true like despair, which this happens when I talk to offices and I truly like my heart and passion. say life is my passion, dentistry is my platform. I am obsessed with helping people have their lives that they want to live. I'm obsessed with giving people that freedom back. I'm obsessed with like unshackling the chains of practice ownership that can come. Like I'm obsessed with helping doctors be free and still be so profitable and love doing dentistry. And all it is is right person, right seat that's accountable to their tasks and they actually know what they're doing. And so being able to give this doctor their life back, being able to give this office manager the skills and the tips and the tools to be able to be so successful and drive this practice forward is literally why Dental A Team was created. Your success as a practice is our freaking passion. We want you to be successful in life, in business, in team, in patient care. And that's our passion and that's what we're dang good at. And so for this office, now what they're able to do is everyone's been able to rise to the occasion. They're able to attract and have great team members and patients come to their practice. It's less stressful, greater morale. They're not having to do as much busy work because we've got true, true, true, true engagement and interactions. We're collecting so cashflow is no longer an issue. We know what we need to produce. We've set up the block schedules. We set up the dollar per hour production. So now this practice knows what they need to produce. And now the whole team knows this is what I'm responsible for. This is how I can help grow the practice. Every person's right person, right seat, doing what they love, their zone of genius. Of course there's zones that we don't like within our zone of geni…
Full show notes at the publisherLoneliness and social isolation are factors in an epidemic across the United States. Kiera takes the time to talk about ways to fight back the loneliness in our everyday lives. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Join Dental A-Team Consulting Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:00.9) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and I hope you're having a great day. I hope things are going so good in your world. I'm so grateful you're a part of the podcast family. I really enjoy podcasting. enjoy, gosh, we're coming up on what is it? Our fifth year. gosh. I think even maybe our sixth year. The podcast is released in 2019. So yeah, we're coming up on its sixth birthday this year. my gosh. I'm gonna have to fact check myself. Let's just say, Dental A Team is gonna be six years old. That's insanity to me. Maybe it's five years. Might be five? It's gotta be six though. Happy birthday Dental A Team podcast. But if you've been with me, I've enjoyed it. I enjoy the time. I'm so grateful for each of you. And I hope that I've been able to give you tactical practical tips and infuse your world with positivity, truly, because my mission is to positively impact the world in the greatest way possible. And I currently do that through consulting, expert consulting for doctors and teams. So today I wanted to talk to you about something that I think a lot of us are seeing. It's interesting because there is something we have leadership, we have solo practices and loneliness. And there's some studies that have come out. So this one's from The Guardian, just recently released. And they're talking about how loneliness, it says more broadly, lacking social connection can increase the risk of premature death as much as smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day. In addition, poor or insufficient social connection is associated with increased risk of disease, including a 29 % increased risk of heart disease and a 32 % increased risk of stroke. That to me is astronomical. And so I was thinking about it, like literally they're showing that loneliness is actually worse for us than 15 cigarettes a day. can kill you faster than that. And yet like smoking was one of the greatest like killers of the world. And so thinking about this of like, what causes this and like, you know, leadership is lonely. Owning a practice is lonely. Being a CEO is lonely. I'm sure hygienists and dental assistants, we can feel it's lonely. And yet we're working with so many people, but yet it's a lonely space. so realizing that loneliness is such a prevalent piece and it actually is shown to kill more people. What do we do for this? And they say loneliness is as bad for our bodies as it is for our minds. There's doctors Kiera Dent (02:27.95) The US top doctor surgeon general Vivek Murthy is so worried that last year he issues an urgent warning about the epidemic of loneliness and social isolation. These are not quite the same thing though there is a big overlap. Social isolation describes an objective lack of social connections while loneliness is all about perception. You can be lonely without being socially isolated and if you're lucky, vice versa. And so just looking at this like we used to be in a society that was so connected. Right? Like you think about communities and you think about tribes and we think about going back to even archaic times where people were in tribes and there were cavemen and cavewomen and we all hung out. And then you think about like when my husband, I went to Bali, families live together in these communities and you don't leave them and you stay with them. And there's such a community and camaraderie and everybody knows what's going on and you're there. And I think in, in the U S especially social media came out. Right? So we're We're more connected, but we're actually more lonely than ever before. And they also were talking about in this article that people are actually afraid to admit. It says many of us struggle to admit we are lonely. There is a tremendous stigness, says Mark Rowland of the Mental Health Foundation. And so looking at this, it's like... Kiera Dent (03:47.214) How do we combat this? Leadership's lonely. Owning a practice is lonely. And on this one, says, like, loneliness is not insurmountable at any stage of life. But it's very difficult when it's, let's say, rusting away at your mental and emotional life without you even naming it. Bringing it into the light and sharing with yourself and then with others is really the first step of breaking the cycle. And so today, I just kind of wanted to talk about What can we do to combat loneliness? They have some ideas in this article of what you can do. They say, you know, try to keep busy, have hobbies like gardening, jigsaw puzzles. They also said it's important that these things are fun or fulfilling. Be careful about working too hard or watching TV shows simply as a distraction. They will only delay or suppress your feelings and could actually make your mental health worse. And then they talk about like stimulate your mind. So podcasts kudos to you on being on podcasts. comedy, fitness, like work related, whatever, get moving. Physical exercise can help with loneliness. Try to engage with the people you meet. And I think about how often do we go to Starbucks or are we on a train or are we at a coffee shop or are we at the grocery store and we've got AirPods in, we've got our phones up. I mean, so often I think our phone is our best friend. I was at a bachelorette party and I don't drink. And so I'm always the DD with my Shirley Temple and they were all dancing and I kind of just felt like I would and I also watch all the stuff. So that's kind of my world. And I remember sitting there and I felt very lonely and yet I'm in a room of a ton of people. Instead of talking to someone, what do I do? I grab my phone and I instantly look at my phone to make myself not feel as lonely and like look at social media and feel like I'm doing something to connect. But like talk to people, say hi, ask them about themselves. I think we've lost the art of communicating with people. I remember talking to someone and they said that they, excuse me, that they did, they have a, some of them they're dating and they don't even see each other and they're just like 30 minutes away. And I thought, my gosh, like, no wonder we're so lonely. and they also said in this article, find people who get you, spend time with pets, try to use social media in a positive way. And then talking to therapists can also help. And I was just thinking like, Kiera Dent (06:09.124) These are really, really, really important things and like prolonged social isolation and loneliness are truly like so close to smoking. What are we doing with it and how can we stop it and what can we do to combat it? And so I was just thinking for you, what are you doing to combat your loneliness? Do you have friends? Do you talk to people? Are we so on our phones and social media all the time? Do we put our phones down and do we engage with the people around us? Do we build hobbies? we go to the gym? I will tell you, I am not a gym human. But I actually am now. And I love going to the gym because it gave me people around me so I didn't feel as alone. Talking to family members, but having people around you and I think having five friends within five miles is so paramount, true friends that you can talk to that you can tell things to. But even within leadership and in a practice, I found it's always super helpful to have mentors to have a community to have people who get me. I joined Tony Robbins because those are entrepreneurs who go through the same struggles I do. I made a friend group within that group and we meet every single quarter and we talk about like, what are we going through and how can we help each other and where are our numbers at? And we work through the pieces of it. And I'm so grateful for that. My team, we're all a virtual team and yet we communicate all the time with each other, but I miss the in-person engagement. And so we are bringing our team together. more consistently and meeting with each other face to face to combat that loneliness. But for leaders, where are you going and where are you communicating? And do you have a network? For me, my coaches are huge for me. And yet I think that there's importance for loneliness to combat it, to have coaches that we pay for and to have mentors and mentees and communities, but then to also have our own personal. Do you have friends? Do you have people that you talk to? Do you have hobbies? Like, Jason and I, I love the memes that are going around of like when my extroverted self makes plans and my introverted self has to fulfill those plans. And I keep saying like, I want more friends and I want to have more people around us. I, cause there is, it's a lonely world. And the way that you're able to then share with people is by knowing them and getting to know them and spending time with them allows you to open up and to share your struggles and to share your life. But without that, it's tricky unless they're paid as like a therapist or a coach. Kiera Dent (08:29.732) And I remember there was one night we were invited to a birthday party and I'm like, my gosh, it's the weekend. I don't want to go. I've output so much energy at work this whole week. I just want to recuperate and recover. And there are times to do that, but it was so fun because I'm like, okay, we'll just go for like 15 or 30 minutes. And sometimes I think that's all we have to do for ourselves is it's 15 or 30 minutes that we're going to go, but we're at least going to go socially engaged. And it was actually so much fun. And we ended up staying for three hours and had the best time and we were so fulfilled and it was so good to spend time with friends because then we saw them the next day and like that's how you build these things. But I do think it takes intentionality. I don't think it just happens. But I think realizing everyone's lonely. Everybody is sad. I mean, I think it's varying degrees, but a lot of people feel like people don't like them. A lot of people feel like what's wrong with me and why does everybody else like them? It's socially perceived like falsehoods. They're not. It's not real. All of us feel the same way. And so how can we combat this? Because if we realize that loneliness is as deadly as cigarettes, 15 cigarettes a day, that's a lot. And then it's also increased risk of disease, like heart disease and stroke. Well, I think that it's time for us to combat this loneliness. And so I think join a community, be a part of a community. I don't care if it's working out. I don't care where it is, but like, It's going to feel uncomfortable. Do it anyway. It's okay. You're going to be uncomfortable at the beginning. Join a group. That's honestly why Dental A Team is bringing our people in person because I got so tired of hearing our offices are so lonely. They feel isolated when I'm like, you don't have to be, you don't have to be alone. You don't have to do this alone. There's so many people around us, but I think it's also proximity. Proximity makes things easier. I know I can attend virtual events with Tony Robbins and talk to people online, but when I go to the actual event, Even though I drag my feet and I don't want to go and I'm a social person, you guys, like I enjoy people, on the culture index. I'm literally in the like 99th percentile of liking people. Like truly I like people and I drag my feet and I don't want to go to these things, but when I'm there, I meet people and you talk and you have the side conversations and our doctors coming in person, they go and they hang out with each other. And so many people say like, yes, the content is great, but meeting people in person and sharing. Kiera Dent (10:49.692) a drink with them or hanging out with them at the coffee shop the next morning. That's where bonds are formed. That's where friendships are made. That's where that's where we're able to help serve and lift each other up. And we do it for doctors and office managers because leadership, business and leadership can be very lonely. Can is the key word. does not have to be. It's a matter of how are you doing it? What are you doing? And like, what are you doing proactively to prevent the loneliness? But I think being aware of it, knowing that it's very real, not doing it alone. is something I'm very pro. I'm very pro mental health. I'm very pro having a therapist. I'm pro having a community. I'm pro having a coach. I'm pro those things because I know that like we've combated so many things in this world. We've beat hunger for the most part. And I understand there's countries that don't have it. I'm not here to sound like I'm not aware of that. I think for the bulk of us here in the US, hunger has been something that's been eliminated for us. And I think that we do have an effort to help other people. Even people in the US who are struggling with that, but I think the bulk of the people listening to the podcast probably are not struggling with hunger right now. Most of us aren't struggling with where we're going to be living. Most of us aren't struggling with household duties. We have washers, we have dishwashers that we don't have to do those things. We can go to the grocery stores and have food at our fingertips. We don't have to make our own clothes anymore. And yet the next zone that I think we're facing is truly like an epidemic is loneliness. before it was like, what are we going to eat? We had to like send out hunters and gatherers and go get our food every single day. And then it was, how are we going to survive and have shelter and not have someone come murder us? And now that, that it's not perfect, but it is less. and then it's like, then how do we like get food that's affordable? And we've gotten like that down exponentially that I think now it's, it's loneliness and having friends and having community and having people around us and supporting us. we've tackled so many things and we've helped on so many levels that now how can we stop this epidemic of loneliness? And I would say today, I encourage you to share this podcast with one person and have them become a friend. I would also encourage you to get five friends within five miles, not just remote friends, but five friends within five miles. I'd also recommend you get a coach within your industry to help you. So if that's management, if that's leader dentists, if it's us, if it's someone else, phenomenal. Kiera Dent (13:10.48) But have somebody who can be there who can guide you through your business decision So you don't have to do that alone and then I'd really encourage you to do a hobby that gets you out of your house We figured out like we have Instacart. We have things that deliver for us. We have uber eats We don't have to go anywhere but force yourself to go somewhere and when you're there put your phone away and say hi Engage in a conversation. It feels awkward. It feels awkward for me every single time But it's also the way that we're able to combat this we're able to to bond to forge and to make it to where we actually are thriving rather than killing ourselves o…
Full show notes at the publisherWhen it comes to owning and operating multiple dental practices, not everything runs the same. That's a common surprise for those overseeing multiple practices. In this episode, Tiff and Britt discuss where practices often fall short in keeping things running smoothly across all offices, and how to set yourself up for success. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Join Dental A-Team Consulting Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:01.134) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. I am back today with, I've got a new nickname, brilliant brain Britt, triple B, brilliant brain Britt. I like it. I'm back here for some fun business talk today. are working hard, Britt and I, I hold her business brain for a few different podcasts today and we're working hard to make sure you guys that you've just got some really, really successful business tips and tools early on in the year. Britt (00:09.18) I'm going get some The Dental A Team (00:28.014) going to be all year long that you're getting business tips. Like always, we love the business side of dentistry because we really, really want your business to work for you, not you work for your business. So we work really hard with all of our clients and all of you listeners to make sure that you have the tips for success there. But today I've pulled Britt on a few different items. We just got done chatting some about really starting your 2025 off right, which was a little bit of a review of how to end Q4 and get prepped for 2025. but I wanted you guys to have all of those goodies. So if you haven't listened to that yet, you don't have to do it before today. Listen to today, but they can go backwards and listen to that one as well. Today though, Britt, you have, this in your background. Like this is something that you've done. We've both had our hands in it, but you have like honestly and truly just managed multiple practices and really helped set them up for success. You've done transitions, like you've done it all. So I really wanted to bring you on today to pick your brain on some of the pieces that. are super important and paramount in learning, maybe prior to would probably be, you know, helpful, but a lot of us are not in that situation. A lot of, a lot of doctors listening today already own multiple locations. And so really knowing what they can do and what they can learn and what they should be looking out for is kind of what I'm interested in today for multi-practices. Before we pop in though, how are you today? How is, how's Britt's beautiful brain doing? Britt (01:53.724) It's doing good today. It's it's not too early. Britt's brain super early is not always the best. I gotta have a little time to warm up with the day. That's that's how I work or late nights. That's that's my brain time really. So everybody works a little different, but I'm good. It's not too early. I get to sit here and chat with you about I don't know this kind of stuff is fun. Growth is fun. Different ideas are fun, so it's going to be a good time. The Dental A Team (02:18.394) I agree. I agree. And your brain just works like this, like numbers, the black and white of it all. Like I've given you kudos before, know, you do really well at seeing the gray too and working through the gray to find the black and white, which I think in business is incredibly, incredibly paramount to success. Working with people is not always the easiest thing in the world. I tell all of my doctors and my office managers that the hardest part about your job is going to be managing the people. But you do really well with it because of that aspect. So I think it's really, really important to say that now because I think doctors listening and managers listening, whomever business owners are listening, that's a space for you to learn to utilize that black and white data, but to bring in that personal side and to bring in that emotional side without letting the emotions take over the results, I guess. so, Britt, that's something I really want to pick your brain on, but From the tactical standpoint, what are a few things going into multi-practice ownership, or maybe they already own, right, but hopefully going into, what are some key pieces that they should really be prepped for, looking for, tracking, to know that they're on the path for success for both of them, and what should those look like? Should they be the same? What's the easiest way to go about this when you're taking on a new practice? Britt (03:43.098) Yeah, number one thing is have a practice, have your flagship running really well and strong systems in your flagship before you start taking on another one is the ideal way to do it, right? Learn how to manage what is one location before you start multiplying that stress or management of all the locations. And with multiples, it's a different mindset. And I think that's where The Dental A Team (04:01.624) I agree. Britt (04:09.562) We work with a lot of private practice and even multiples that are private practice and people that are like maybe even transitioning to DSO because it's one of those scenarios to where like the same thing doesn't work for everyone. So that's, do a lot with our practices that are custom and it's like, all right, where are we going? What are we doing? What's it going to look like? What's the feel you want behind it? And when you start, when you know that you want to potentially even go multiples and you're starting with one location, I want you to put like the multiple brain on. The Dental A Team (04:21.478) Yeah. Britt (04:38.192) We don't have them yet, but we want to start building things to where there are systems that can easily be transitioned into multiples. What I mean by that is, yes, there are going to be some steady things that are like, great, the way we do AR and send statements is going to be the same way we send statements all across all locations. The way we budget for supplies is going to be the same way we budget for supplies across all locations. But make sure you're keeping things really clean bookwise and especially at The Dental A Team (04:45.956) Yeah. The Dental A Team (05:07.051) Mm-hmm. Britt (05:07.356) when you start getting into multiples and thinking bigger. So for example, let's say, great, now we've got a couple locations, great, we can share resources. shoot, we ran out of something. Great, go grab some from the other location. You wanna track all those things and pay it from the appropriate business so that each business independently is going to look like the reality and the numbers will be the reality and it's not getting mucked up by the other. And so you actually know how to, one, drive each individual practice, and then two, know like, all right, when we pull those numbers together, what does the organization look like with all offices together? So it's a little bit of a different mindset when you're doing all the pieces. So great, accounting-wise, that's gonna be one piece that you wanna think of. Hiring team members even, great, what's our onboarding? It's not just gonna be one location, we're gonna be working towards more, so we wanna have a strong system. The Dental A Team (05:45.157) Okay. Britt (06:04.024) Systems awesome what things can be easily translated across all offices and then where is that great to where each office has a little bit of room for their interpretation on specific things and especially if you're wanting to Let's say I know some that they've got like a PPO practice and then a fee-for-service practice If you know that's the direction you want to go then all right create systems that can work for both And then we just customize some pieces of it based on the location So big things I think are accounting, planning systems for multiple locations, and also leadership and mindset. Going from a team that's at one location and they think that's what it is, teams get scared of change. so prepping the team or getting them on board that like, this is the direction we're going. This is what we ultimately want. So they're on board to help. And when you get that next location, they... The Dental A Team (06:32.997) Mm-hmm. Britt (06:58.46) even though it may not really even impact them, but they get scared. What does that mean for us? What are we gonna look like? How's the culture gonna change? All those pieces. So those are some of my most important ones is just thinking multiples, even if you're only a one to start with, and that's the direction you wanna go. The Dental A Team (07:15.827) Totally agree. Yeah, I have a few practices, a few practice owners that I've chatted with that they're like, okay, so like, I'm just going to open a second location and restart. I'm going to try again. And I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa. I totally understand that. But it's kind of like, we're driving our car and like the wheels, you know, are a little looser or they need air, the tires are like something like, you know, mechanically is just not right. And we're like, scrap it, or just, I'll keep this car and I'll keep paying for it, but I'm just gonna get a new one that might be a little bit better. It's kind of what I feel like when they say that, right? Like, just fix the things. You can do that. You can have to. You can have an old car and a new car if you want both. You could sell the old car and buy a new car if you want to do that, but don't keep an old car and keep paying for it when it's broken and then get a new car and start paying for that too. an absurd waste of money and resources. So I think of it like that. And I have had a few practice owners that are like, but this one is just like, I'm racking my brain like, cool, we haven't found the root cause yet then. So when you're digging into those pieces and really looking at why is my now this is gonna be my flagship. So how do I operate this as my flagship practice? How do I make sure that this practice is the practice model that I want my next practice to look like? And it might be. It might be a little bit different. said, you know, PPO practice and a fee for service practice. I've got a couple of practices that run similar to that. I've got, I've got one doctor that has three locations that two of them are like PPO style, but they operate as a fee for service. Cause that's just the level of care that they put into everything. But then he's also got a Medicaid practice that's like obscure on the side. That's like, that's a little bit of an uphill battle, but they're, they're so different, but they. Team-wise, they try to operate very similarly or just, you know, the fee-for-service and the PPO standpoints, but operationally, making sure, like you said, that those systems that we have in place, I want your patient experience to be the same no matter what type of practice you own, right? I want your accounting to be the same. I want it to be super clean no matter what. And the space that you mentioned there with the accounting that gets really muddled and mucky, The Dental A Team (09:36.583) is when we don't keep those books clean, especially, no matter what, you've got two different sets of bills, right, of outgoing money that's coming with each practice, no matter what. Well, even if you have one entity and one business name that owns two practices, you still have to separate that in some way. And a lot of you guys are going out and you're getting associates who want to partner in to one of them or... I know a practice that opened a specialty practice with her best friend. And I was like, super clear from the get-go, we've got to make sure these are super separated. making sure, again, one's paying the other. And an office manager who may act as a regional-ish, you've got to dial that in. How are we paying her when she's on board? Britt (10:09.788) Thank The Dental A Team (10:27.763) And she's doing hours for the second practice. What does that look? Who's paying for that? Because if our flagship practice pays for everything and now our flagship practices at 80 % overhead and tanking in our second practice, isn't making money yet. We've got an issue there because the books are so confusing. and Britt, just to spiral down that one, when we don't have super clean books like that, what are the negative implications as far as like taxes and just. Why is it so important from the get-go that this is clean? Britt (11:00.836) Yeah, it just it can just get wild like you said even taxes what business is it coming from what's getting paid by whom and Some things that can get really wild like you said and I'm all for right economies of scale or a thing That's part of the reason of going into multiples. So just make sure it's being allocated correctly You've got a regional manager Maybe there's or an om that's maybe doing 50 50 or 75 25 then great just split their salary right 25 from the smaller one 75 from the other one I'm just thinking that sense also because you want goals and you want your office managers to be responsible for helping you reach them including overhead So you just don't want it to get mucky to where one we've got excuses that we're like, it's just this right? We're human beings We will all will try to find any reason to like justify why we are where we are instead of digging in to see what's going on and So having it really clean gives honest numbers so people know exactly what they're responsible for The Dental A Team (11:54.005) Mm-hmm. Britt (12:02.268) They know if we're shooting for a goal, we're shooting for overhead, if we're working to control things, it's really clean for them to do so and it's fair in how we're doing it. then correct, valuation for businesses, right? Even for that, ultimately it's gonna come from like, yes, your EBITDA, but like profitability is gonna be a factor. so, and... The Dental A Team (12:21.425) Exactly. Britt (12:25.208) If someone comes in and they start looking at things and maybe there was a shift at some point, they're like, two months ago you decided to sell and it's looking real different, it's gonna raise some questions that might be concerning. So keep it clean from the get go if you need to sell one or even just for valuation purposes, if you need to leverage those practices to go buy more locations, you just wanna keep everything clean, because if not, it just creates a lot more questions and it may hinder you from. The Dental A Team (12:35.989) Yeah. Britt (12:51.59) getting finances or being able to hold team members accountable and also knowing which practices really need some attention or may or may not be doing well. The Dental A Team (13:00.277) Yeah, I love that. So it sounds like you need a really great CPA. You need a really good bookkeeper that knows multiples. Yeah, a really great bookkeeper. I do have some doctors who are their own bookkeepers and I'm okay with that, but you gotta be really good at it and a really great payroll company that probably comes with. Britt (13:04.746) that most multiples are left. The Dental A Team (13:18.199) those two options to make sure that everything's super clean. And then I think, like you said, the office manager situation, making sure that she or he knows where the money's coming from too. And if they're employed now, like if they're getting paychecks from both, that's…
Full show notes at the publisherKiera is joined by DAT Consultant Dana Morsell to talk about common leadership pitfalls, and how you can overcome them. They discuss such points as: Thinking you have to make all the decisions Navigating a lack of creativity or problem-solving Being too focused on goals, and not enough on happiness And more Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Join Dental A-Team Consulting Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:00.758) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and today is a great day. I have the one and only Dana Morselle on the podcast. Everybody who works with her loves her. She won our review challenge. If you want to help Dana out and you love her on the podcast, go leave us a Google review. Make her even the more triumphant winner. But really, like it would be awesome. We have a goal to hit 100 Google reviews before the end of the year. So you guys do it for your practices. We're asking you now help us out. If you love this podcast, go leave it. Dana, how did it feel to win the Google review? Like most loved consultant apparently, according to those reviews, how did that feel for you? Dana (00:34.995) It was awesome. It felt really good. I wouldn't say most loved. I think that I have some viable competitors that are amazing. And it just felt good to see the love, not just for me, but I think for Dental A Team and all the things that we bring. I think being able to make an impact is so special to me. so, you know, seeing it in words just brought a lot of joy. Kiera Dent (00:40.836) you Kiera Dent (00:57.732) Mm-hmm. Kiera Dent (01:01.856) I agree. It was actually so incredible because I think that that's the proof, right? That's the proof of what we do. it's the proof of our clients showing up as well as the proof of our consulting works. Our consulting gets results. Our consulting changes lives. Like I say often, life is my passion and dentistry is my platform. so helping people have their most dreamy lives and doing it through dentistry and helping the systems and the pieces and helping evolve these leaders and Day in day out loving them. I'm so excited 2025 we are doing in person events for business and leadership and I'm so excited to meet people more face to face and to have more collaboration and to have these brilliant offices and Offices who feel like they're not doing so well All of them are brilliant in their own way and helping them see that they have a special sauce even if they feel like I'm less than I know when I go to groups, I'm like, what the heck do I have to bring to the table? And I think that that's just so unfortunate that as humans, we've trained ourselves to think that we're less than when as children, we were brought into this world believing that we're more than and so helping people realize they have something to bring to the table and what do you have to give and what can you share to help these other offices flourish? Gosh, this is what I'm here for. This is what we're about. So bring it on. If you want to be a part of our inner circle, reach out Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. All of our clients were super pumped to have you, but yeah, reach out. is limited spacing. And so our venue has been booked. It's in Scottsdale, Arizona. And so if you want to be a part of that, reach out. Hello@TheDentalATeam.com have virtual and in-person, so be sure to check out. But Dana, on the topic of leadership, so business and leadership is really what we're focused on. You had an interesting point of on-call that we're always talking about, like leaders, leaders, leaders, and what should leaders do? But Dana, brilliant. Bring in the topic for today and let's dive right in. Dana (02:49.661) Sure, so today I thought it would be fun to take a look at the flip side and like what are things that leaders commonly do that they should stop doing or are barriers or are holding them back? Kiera Dent (02:59.536) I love it. Like the flip side of leadership, because you're right, like, leadership can feel like you've got to do, do, do, do, but actually, there's a lot of don't do and stop doing. So Dana, take it away. Let's get into this juicy. I'm really excited for leaders to hear. I actually think it's a breath of fresh air for leaders. Like, there's something I can stop doing. Amazing. I'm like pen and paper in hand. Let's go. Dana (03:22.781) Yeah, yeah, and I think number one is stop feeling like, for me, that I've been talking about lately, is stop feeling like you have to make all of the decisions. And I think that as leaders and as practice owners, we feel like I have to be the one to make all the decisions. I have to be available for everyone to come to me with everything. And I think that going in with the mindset of stop doing that. because you have capable people around you. That's why you hired them. That's why you brought them on. And so I've just been talking about it so much lately and it is understand that your team has the potential to make decisions and to find solutions and to do the things alongside you and with you and you don't always have to be the decision maker. Kiera Dent (04:14.76) Amen to that. And I think it's tricky because I think we're so I'm almost like attuned to speaking up so quickly. And I know I was just in a leadership meeting with our leadership team. And I literally had to sit there and bite my tongue. But you're right, Dana. You want the team to come up with the solutions. You want them to struggle. You want them to throw out ideas that aren't the best ideas. Allow them, because that's how you actually got good at making decisions as a leader. And I find so often, Like I think about, I want robots or do I want humans that think and take responsibility for their actions? The more they do it, yeah, they're going to fail. But like, is it really failing or is it actually just learning? Some things will be wrong. but ask the team. And I think a good way to redirect, if you're like me and it's like, I have the answer. I have the answer. I have the answer. Like, I just want to keep giving them the answers and telling them is what do you guys think? And then I literally have to sit there and in my mind, like count to 10, like one, two. Like let there be silence because if you can let there be silence, they'll start to realize you are not going to always give the answers. And what do you think? And asking maybe some of your quieter team members, like, what do you think? What do you think would be the solutions? Our quietest team member is Shelbi and Shelbi sits and observes and Shelbi has wisdom beyond. But sometimes unless prompted, she won't speak up. And so really giving some of them an opportunity to might help you. So I love that, Dana. What happens if your team has a really dumb idea though? Like that's a real thing. Like, okay. I'm not gonna have the solutions, but they come in and it is like, no, what do you say then? Cause you don't want to disempower them, but you also don't want to be the one who's like making all the decisions. How do you navigate that? Dana (05:55.793) Yeah, and I think if there's any part of it that you can take that is good, right? Consider that. And then I think, you know what? Keep bringing those ideas. I love that you spoke up today. Keep those ideas coming. You don't have to say that it was a terrible idea. You also don't have to necessarily acknowledge that it was a great idea. But what you want to do is keep the focus on keep bringing them to me. Keep speaking up. Like so proud of you for being confident to share an idea today. Kiera Dent (06:23.14) Mm-hmm. And I also think like another piece on it is asking your team like what What what do you think we should do about this? So instead of it like I know we'll have in our slack chat of hey I have this question What do you guys like what do you think and I love to redirect and be like hey? Why don't you tell me what you think first? And then I can give you some solutions and say I want you to do this because I always want you coming with solutions I always want you coming with answers because I like what if I'm not here one day? I need to make sure I'm training you all to be able to make decisions just as good or better than I am. And if you have that mindset and the team knows that, now they're empowered to do it. So tip number one, leaders, stop making all the decisions and empower your team to do. All right? I love it, Dana. What else? What else do you have for leaders to stop doing? Dana (07:07.528) So one thing that I have been thinking about lately is, it's going to come up, you have to hear me out on this one, right? so, it stopped being so goal focused in that don't put goals over happiness. Kiera Dent (07:15.722) Okay, I don't know what she's about to say, it's surprise for me too. Kiera Dent (07:29.188) you Dana (07:29.201) And I feel like so often I keep seeing that like, yes, we want to build goals. We want to talk about goals, but also need to assess that are these goals that you're setting just because you want to achieve something or you want to win or you want to just go to the next level, but yet they don't bring you happiness. So when I say don't be so goal focused, is be happiness focused too. Kiera Dent (07:51.556) Yeah. I think a good, as you were saying that it made me think of like, is it ego focused or is it happiness focused? And Tiff actually gave me some really good feedbacks. I'll speak to this. She said, Kiera, I think you need to stop and enjoy where we've been and where we are. She said, I think it's really hard for you because like I am a driver and I want to keep going. But she's like, but Kiera, you being happy with where we are does not mean we're not going to work on goals as much. It doesn't mean that we're not going to keep growing. It doesn't mean that you're becoming a lazy boss. She's like, it really is appreciating and being happy with where we are. And Jason says it to me all the time, my husband, he's like, Kiera, like, why is life so good? And I'm like, what are you talking about? We have all these other things that we to be working towards. But I think it's right. Like it is, it's sacrificing the happiness and the joy that the goal is even supposed to bring you. Like if the, if the goal is not bringing happiness, then what the heck are we doing other than feeding egos? And happiness is a much faster drug than ego. Like it's very much, it will, it will be longer term. It will help you so much more. It's more fulfilling. It's more sustaining. actually really love that. I think it's like make sure that these goals are actually driving happiness and maybe not just ego too. Dana (08:59.399) Yeah, I agree. I feel like sometimes we build goals and then we lose our why we're even doing it to begin with. And so I think resetting and looking at that, and it doesn't necessarily mean we don't set goals or we don't focus on the goals. Sometimes it is just like, what is our perspective on the goal and what it brings to us? Kiera Dent (09:16.101) Yeah, because a lot of goals, I actually had a epiphany this year. I've got these goals and these numbers and they mean nothing. Like they're just numbers that are arbitrarily put there. Do we still as a team, you want to work towards that? And now the goals are funnier. Like they're, they're fun goals that like the whole team's rallied behind. And I, I had to take a step back to see when I set the goals originally, they were meant to serve a purpose, but is it still serving that purpose anymore? Or do I need to redirect and reconsider? because sometimes I think we put ourselves in a pressure cooker trying to hit this goal that we said, rather than being like, let's have a redirect, let's have a reassess of where my life is today. And do I still want those same things? And I think it's very important. That's why I love our quarterlies. That's why we do our, the way we're setting up our consulting is checking in quarterly to make sure are we still headed on the path we want to go to, checking in annually, where are we going? And like helping you really build those maps. to make sure and then giving you the permission to recreate the canvas because you're not the same person you were when you built these originally and your life looks different and you look different and you're like for me, shoot, we went from like this wild out audacious goal to like, let's do something that's actually sustainable and more fun rather than this crazy audacious one. It doesn't mean we don't want to grow, but we don't want to grow just for the sake of growing. We want to grow because it's fun and it's intentional. And I think that's brilliant of being intentional with your goal setting. and being happy with it rather than just striving. And both are good. So don't feel like we're saying like, schmuck. Like, no, you don't need to. You can do both. That's brilliant. All right. What else do you have? I love these, Dana. I had not thought of this. Dana (10:43.549) Yeah. Dana (10:49.039) Okay, yeah. I think one thing is for leaders, stop feeling like you can push your team from behind. And what I mean by that is just listening to a podcast and they just kept saying it over and over and it resonated with me so much when thinking of my clients and that is like leaders go first. And making sure that if you want a team that is accountable, you are accountable to them first. If you want... a team that prioritizes the growth of the practice or prioritizes the practice, you also have to do that. so oftentimes I think we just think we can either drag them behind us or we can shove them through the hole without stepping forward and leading from the Kiera Dent (11:29.122) you Kiera Dent (11:35.414) Yeah, that's a really good point, Dana, because leaders need to lead. Like you're leading, you are guiding them, you are showing them. And I think like going back to the first point we talked about though, within that is leaders guide, but just because you're accountable, or just because you're proactive, or just because you're driving for this, does not mean you then go and do for each other person that's not doing it. It's hold them accountable to it and have agreements and expectations with each other. of this is what we're agreeing to. We heard in our leadership meeting, like, let's not have expectations, let's have agreements. Expectations feel like they're placed on us, agreements feel like we agree to it. And so it's like, we have the agreement that we're accountable. These are the items we're accountable to. What's getting in the way, and I do expect you to rise up and own your piece in this as well. But I agree with you, Dana. It's very hard to say, like, do as I say, not as I do. And I've, gosh, it's been like something. I was not super good with follow through when I started the company. Like it was my greatest like Achilles heel. And I just thought I can sit here and say like, I'm not good at this. Or how am supposed to expect a team to follow through? How am I supposed to expect a team to show up if I don't show up consistently? And so I think it's brilliant. Like you do need to set the example and you do need to hold them there, but not do it for them at the same time, especially those high drivers. I know I love to do. like, it's…
Full show notes at the publisherFiguring out how to drink from the firehouse of the new year can be overwhelming. Tiff and Britt give suggestions on where to start your journey to improving your practice's growth, or perfecting your scheduling, or addressing high cancellations — or whatever your goal is in 2025. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Join Dental A-Team Consulting Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:00.983) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. I am so excited to be here with you today. I have pulled in the one and only Britt. We still need a really strong nickname for you, Britt, but I'm just excited to be here with you today. And I love Britt. People call me Tiff. I love Britt. I feel like it's just like rolls off the tongue. So we'll just, we'll stick with that for now, but we're here in the new year. I'm excited to have these conversations. I've pulled you for a few podcasts today and I just think that you are going to be so stellar. at the content that we're gonna talk about. And doctors, I hope you're here to freaking learn. Britt, one of her nicknames is No BS Britt. So welcome to that. And I say that today because we're gonna be just talking a lot of business in a lot of the podcasts that we're recording today, but especially this one and some planning for the year. We're in 2025 now. So I wanna make sure you guys are just totally prepped and planned for it. So Britt, how are you on this fine, beautiful morning in Arizona today? Britt (00:56.718) mean I'm great. It's a sunny day every day pretty much here. So you got to love it. I love that. I'm like, I mean, there's a few nicknames out there, but I don't like spiffy Tiffy is such a good one that like, I don't know if the rest of us will get one that's like that same level, which is deserved. But yeah, so I've got a few but nothing quite like spiffy Tiffy. The Dental A Team (01:09.455) I know. The Dental A Team (01:17.303) I know, you had to come in early, you know? The nickname game started earlier than everyone else got here. That must be what it is, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. think things just, my grandma called me Tiffy my whole life growing up. I was Tiffy. And so I think things just rhyme with Tiffy better, you know? It's like a hard end at Britt or Tiff. So it was easy to, it was easy to monopolize on that one. But it is. Britt (01:19.266) I know. Britt (01:24.137) It just takes some years. Eventually we'll get there. The Dental A Team (01:45.709) It is always sunny. I feel like this year I decided, or not this year, I guess last year, I told my son, I said, I think we just need to stop pretending like we live in a state or a space of life that actually has a winter. People who live in the tropics, they just realize, guess what? It's just going to be tropical. Like we're not going to get a winter and that's okay. And I think in Arizona and Phoenix, at least, like that's the life we need to start living. Stop pretending like it's going to be sweater weather. It's not going to happen. So here we are. Yeah. Britt (02:15.414) saying, it's warmer this year. Every year we say like, it should be cooler. Like exactly, like it is what it is and you know what? I'm happy for it. I am perfectly fine not having freezing weather. The Dental A Team (02:21.603) Yeah. The Dental A Team (02:27.672) I agree. I agree. The 70s in December, I will take it. It's fine. We'll just see what the summer looks like. So we'll chat back around on that when the summer comes. Britt (02:32.161) Absolutely. We'll sound a little different then, but it's fine. It's short. It's short. The Dental A Team (02:38.928) Yeah, yeah, I love it. this kind of, honestly, all of it kind of goes into itself and the plans and the prepping and looking forward. And we are in the business of constantly looking at where we're going. But you also have to look at where you've been. And so in order to make sure your 2025 is super, super strong, you guys, we kind of wanted to revisit some of the pieces that we chatted about towards the end or towards the last quarter, Q4, of 2024. some of those strategic planning tips and tricks that we had given you back then. We want to make sure that you guys actually implemented them and then look at, okay, implemented, now how do we use them? So I brought Brett here because Brett, think your business brain is brilliant and I want to make sure we don't miss any of the pieces. So guys, I know we chatted about this. It might be a review. But I really want you to dig deep sometimes when you re-listen to a podcast or when you listen to something that has similar information, you're like, gosh, I didn't hear that last time or this means more to me today than it did when I listened to it three months ago because I'm in a different space. So I really want you to dive deep. I want you to listen in. One of the biggest pieces I think practices can miss is the opportunity to look at the stats and really, really look at where you've been. where you're trying to go, but where you are right now. for it, correct me if I'm wrong. I think 99.9 % of the people who come to us, the clients, the potential clients, the future clients, the listeners are here saying, we need systems. And WATM is here and we get to build systems. And we come in and I'm like, gosh, you have so many systems. Like the reason that you feel chaotic is because you don't know where to start. Britt (04:03.172) you The Dental A Team (04:25.893) Right, Britt? So how do we help them? I really want them to learn how to check trends, know where to start, know what like 2025's focus needs to be, because systems, like you've got a whole dental practice, you've got multiple departments within your dental practice, and to say systems is quite overwhelming. It's like, you know, trying to pull a raindrop out of a rain cloud, it's just not possible, and it causes a lot of chaos and confusion, and I think narrowing that down helps people to be able to see. What needs to come next? What's that next step? So Britt, you do work with a lot of clients and you've worked with a lot of clients over the last three years that you've been here with us. Thank you so much. A little longer than that now, but almost four. But how do you help them to really see that space, especially going into the new year to say, okay, what do I need to do this year to be super successful? Britt (05:18.5) I think Tiff, comes from planning for systems, yes, and also our big picture like ultimately shapes our priorities. So like, that's why I think even in Q4, we harp so much on like, all right, what's happened this year? What do you want to do next year? What are our goals for next year? Because having a path or having something we're shooting for helps us to prioritize some things. For example, let's say, great, we want to grow 15 % next year, right? We've got the space, we know our schedule's not full, we want to grow our revenue, our collections by 15%, and then it's like, all right, then if. what's going on that's keeping us from getting there. So then we like walk it back and those are some of the important stats that we need to set goals around and make sure we're tracking. If our schedule's not full, then it's like, all right, do we have enough patients to fill the schedule? Do we not have enough patients? Do we need to get more? Is it a marketing thing? Is it just better scheduling and follow up on our end? And that's gonna start to shape some of the systems. So like with this example. The Dental A Team (06:10.801) Go. Britt (06:16.824) Let's say our schedule's not full. All right, do we have block scheduling and how are we following up with people who don't have appointments? Those would be two systems that we would start with to get things rolling in the right direction to set us up for success in 2025 if you've got a growth goal like that. The Dental A Team (06:17.234) . The Dental A Team (06:31.046) Yeah. Yeah, I love that. I love that you narrowed it down from big to small. And that's what the trends will show us. And the mark that I think is truly must right is seeing the bigger picture, like you said, but on a small level, which sounds confusing and contradictory. you're like, how do you go like you're saying big, but you're saying small when we're looking at those big pieces, when we're tracking them. And I do love there's like a side tangent. I do love the companies that come in and they pull your stats for you, right? So you've got an outside source and you log in and you can see all your stuff. You guys know what I'm talking about. There's multiple different companies and different systems out there. I do love those analytics companies and resources, but I really, really love too for you guys to know the actual numbers and to know how to pull them yourself, even if you're using an analytics company. I want you to be able to see both of them because I believe that if you have your hands in it yourself, you're soaking in the knowledge. So either way, I want you to just verify, clarify, verify all the pieces, but having a space, I know we've got a lot of our clients, if not all of them by now, on our scorecard system. It's a simple, well simple is probably the wrong word to use there, but it's simple for our clients. It was a labor of love for us, but it's an Excel spreadsheet and I love going old school. Britt (07:48.055) You The Dental A Team (07:54.48) with those kind of simple tools like Excel, because I think if we can get all of that data and metrics onto one screen, right, even in a lot of the analytics, like you've got to, flipped between screens and you don't always see how one trend leads into another trend or one metric can negatively or positively affect a metric that it seems like it wouldn't. So you might have hygiene data on one screen, right, flip to another screen and you've got. your production collections, and then another screen you got your AR. Well, guess what? There are different systems within each one of those screens, right, that affect all of them. And when we've got them all in one space, you guys, and you're looking at them, your brain is like, wait, this is a puzzle. Let me put this together. And you start seeing how they lead up or lead down into one another. So, Britt, like you're saying, our schedule's not full, right? This is a common, common, common statement. from dental practices, my schedule's not full, or I have high cancellations. And it's very easy to be like, oh my gosh, I have all of the answers for that. Like, Britt could come up with like 15 different things for both of those problems. Schedule's not full, high cancellations. We can tackle it all, and I could implement, and Britt could implement 30 systems today, but the question is, are those systems the actual problem, or are we kind of like putting a band-aid? over a bigger issue that's underlying that we may not be seeing underneath, right? So I love, Britt, that you said that like, great, let's talk, let's look at block scheduling. And you said, you didn't say let's do block scheduling. You said, do we have block scheduling in place? Because, you know, practices do that. Practices know how to do it. There's a million freaking podcasts. We're not the only company who does block scheduling, number one. And we have so many podcasts on block scheduling. So a lot of people are doing it. So then we dig into, Britt (09:41.86) Thank The Dental A Team (09:48.735) how are we doing the block scheduling instead of just saying, this is how you should be doing it. Because I do think that's the mark that a lot of people overlook as well. know, coaches come in and they're like, well, this is how I want you to do it. Well, your way might be working. It might be something else. So really digging into those pieces. So Britt, as you're looking at these scorecards with your clients and we've used analytics companies, we still do, right? We have analytics that we use from companies and we have clients who use different companies. What is it that you look for the most and like big overarching that these practices and these doctors can really start keying into that show a space that like, want growth this year. That could mean anything. What are some overarching numbers that you like to track with your practices that will help them key into their focus this year? Britt (10:39.78) Yeah, and I'll go through some of those numbers and we want both like leading and lagging, right? So for example, if I want to hit 15 % growth and revenue, tracking that revenue is going to be a lagging measure. So we need to work on, all right, what are some leading things to get us to that end goal that are going to be helpful to track and see what's going on? Another reason for tracking is one, if we're implementing a system or adjusting a system, Feelings are fleeting and numbers are facts, whatever that saying is. But the numbers actually will tell you, one, did you implement something that's actually having the impact you want it to have? And number two, if we shifted something, is it shifting it in the right direction for us? So is it useful or not? And sometimes there's things that we'll implement that are so cumbersome and it doesn't do anything, then it's like, why are we doing it? It should be easy and it should be effective at the end of the day. The Dental A Team (11:10.741) Mm-hmm. The Dental A Team (11:18.439) Yeah. The Dental A Team (11:31.304) Yeah. Britt (11:34.756) And so that's kind of my little plug for also tracking numbers is one, knowing where we're at and two, knowing if the things that we're implementing are having the impact we want them to have. So some important ones, you're gonna have your big picture ones, right? And that's, you'll notice my brain thinks big to little. That's just kind of how I think, where's the end goal we wanna get to? And then what are the things that build up to that top most important thing? So if it's revenue, right, then of course production and collection. We're only gonna collect as much as we produce and we've got to make sure that we're collecting everything that we actually do the work for and can have the potential to collect. The Dental A Team (12:02.645) Yeah. Britt (12:07.64) So that's gonna be one. And then it's like, all right, next level beyond that, what leads into those two things? Production is gonna be case acceptance, how we're scheduling, right? Those are gonna lead up to that production. And then on the collection side, it's like, all right, what's our AR? Where are all our buckets at? What's sitting out there? What are we not getting collected from patients? That are gonna be some of the big pieces. And then you can kind of walk it down from there and great track by provider, track by hygienist. And then what are the other things? What's our SRP that's going to feed to our production? What's our fluoride that's going to be feeding to our production and what are the doctors diagnosing? Right? Cause we're the buckets are right. We're only going to make as much as we ever diagnose. And we only are going to make as much as we actually like get scheduled and complete from what we diagnose. The Dental A Team (12:30.134) Yeah. The Dental A Team (12:49.525) Yeah. Britt (12:54.756) and then w…
Full show notes at the publisher"Humans want to move, and life gets in the way." Those are the words of Laura, Kiera's personal trainer, who's the guest for this episode. Together, Kiera and Laura discuss overcoming the often quite sedentary life of dentistry professionals by bringing on a source of accountability. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Join Dental A-Team Consulting Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent (00:00.9) Hello, Dental A Team listeners, this is Kiera. And today I am so freaking pumped to introduce you to one of my dearest friends, someone who has transformed my life and that I just cannot wait to introduce to this audience. Welcome to the show, Laura, my personal trainer, macro guru, the one who knows all the things, who's helped me through so many personal injuries and actually has been able to like make a busy life, work with working out. Laura, welcome to the show today. Laura (00:04.089) And so, we're going to end it here. Laura (00:27.021) Thank you. I'm so happy to be here. Kiera Dent (00:29.614) I'm so happy you're here because I think that you have changed my life and you and I were chatting at the gym the other day and we actually talked about, well, I work with dentists, dentists are very busy, entrepreneurs are very busy, office managers are very busy and yet figuring out how to fit in this working out, eating healthy, taking care of ourselves. And you made a comment, you said, Kiera, they invest in their businesses, but their businesses require them to be their highest self like. Let's do a podcast and talk about that. So I'm super jazzed to have you here today. Talk about all things. And as a fun side note, I did look up some data and believe it or not, if you work out, you make more money. So let's just add a little plug there too. But Laura, like let's kind of tell our listeners a little bit about you. How did you get into working out? How did you get into being this macro fitness guru that you've become that's changed the lives of so many? Kind of just walk us on your journey today. Laura (01:00.461) Yes. Laura (01:09.049) There we go. Laura (01:21.921) Yeah, I would love to. My journey started in college. I, like many other women, grew up insecure, like judging myself, comparing myself to other women. And I just came to a point in college, I remember the moment where I just realized I don't want to live my life this way anymore. I want to feel confident. I want to feel strong. I felt disconnected to my younger self in a way. I grew up not necessarily in high school, more like actual elementary school. In my childhood years, I was very active. I did sports, I did gymnastics. And then you get into high school. I didn't do anything in high school. And then comes college and I just felt very disconnected to myself. And I wanted to get back to that playful, confident, able person, able to do the things I wanted to do. And so I started going to the gym, had no idea what I was doing. I would just climb the StairMaster the whole time. And slowly, the gym I was working out at was kind of the StairMasters where upstairs and you could look down into the rest of the gym. And I would just see at that time, this was like a decade ago or more, there were no women in the gym and all the girls were upstairs on the ellipticals and the stair masters and then all the dudes were downstairs. And I don't know, I just, started to see what they were doing and copied a little bit, you know, did a couple of the machines that I knew how to do, started to get hooked. and was like, you know what, what if I made this a career? And I got certified in 2014 and the rest is history. mean, there's actually a lot more to it, but that's basically how it started. And fast forward to now, I feel extremely connected to my younger self through my movement. I have created a beautiful life that I'm able to do what I love and... Kiera Dent (03:13.978) you Laura (03:29.613) And yeah, help other women connect to their own bodies and their younger selves as well. Kiera Dent (03:33.914) I love it. And I love that you went through this journey because I think so many of us, well, I'll speak for myself. I'm not gonna speak for all the listeners. I feel like an idiot at the gym. They have reels about people at the gym of like idiots using like equipment so many times and we're at the gym. Laura was originally virtual. We started out virtual and I actually wanna get into like virtual versus in-person training and if there's a difference because when people are busy, there's solutions that way. Laura (03:43.629) Thank Kiera Dent (04:01.028) but I felt like such an idiot. And I think something that you've done for me, and that's why I wanted to bring you on here is because I feel like I was the worst workout person in the world. Like honestly, I feel like Laura should have fired me as a client. So we had a really rough start and I think it was honestly fear of my, like where I was at, fear of not knowing what I'm doing. Also, I do run a busy life. Laura, you told me I'm the second busiest person that you know, second to a lawyer. So I felt like that was like, all right, my life is a little bit more exciting. but I also had a lot of injuries. And so that was why I hired a personal trainer is because I was actually losing so much muscle mass that I was starting to get more injuries because the current injuries were causing me not to do anything, which then was leading to more problems. And so was thinking about how many dentists and how many team members do we sit there all day long? We're very sedentary. I remember as an assistant and doctors, you're like, I don't sit, I don't even have time to pee, which I get, hear you. but we're sitting there and yes, you're ergonomically correct, but it's like we work all day long. Where do we actually put in time for this body that's serving us? That's creating like the experience for our patients. Like where do we do that? And so even in the time Laura and I have worked together, I changed it from working out to honoring my body. And so Laura, I really wanted to dig into this of like, you've worked with a lot of people, you're a personal trainer, you're freaking genius at it. I love that you have modified so many workouts for me to be able to lift, to get strong. Like just yesterday we were working out and we saw back muscles on me and like, that's something I haven't had for seven years. And so I'm excited because coming from a space where I couldn't lift, couldn't squat. couldn't lunge. Like literally none of those things were in my life. I have a very strong issue with food. I grew up anorexic most of my life and Laura, I know that you've been on a journey with that as well. And I think just all these different factors. I'm busy. People are busy. You were able to find like this, like. little crack of sunshine in my life and then expand it more to where in my week I look out like look forward to working out. We've like reworked my schedule to make that a priority. And so I'm just curious, you work with a ton of people you worked with me. Let's bring this to the table. How do people when they're so busy, when they're so exhausted, when they've got the kids, they've got the job, they've got all the people like how do you even start working out? How does this even become a reality for people? Kiera Dent (06:22.136) What do you tell people when they're in that spot? Because I think every person listening to this podcast is probably there. Laura (06:27.225) Yeah, I think we all have some desire inside of us to move. Humans want to move and life gets in the way. And I think the determining factor of are you going to do this or not is are you willing to think deeply enough about why it's important in your life? Like what happens if you don't do this? Take yourself five, 10 years, 15, 20 years down the road. What does life look like once you've retired and you have all this money to spend and all this adventure to have, but your body is not working properly and you can't truly experience life in the way that you want because your body is failing you. Like take yourself there, take yourself to that hard, reality that if you don't figure this out, you're going to have this experience of life. Or what if you do look at your life one year from now, if you decide to just commit 30 minutes a week. Even if it's 10 minutes at a time, Monday, Wednesday, Friday, 10 minutes, first thing in the morning, I wake up and I get on my Peloton or I do three sets of 20 squats. Like just start so small. What does life look like in a year? If you start that now and you don't stop in 10 years and 20 years, the trajectory of your life will be so different. And I think it's, that is the, like I said, determining factor, whether or not someone commits to this for the long haul. You have to be very realistic about your about your situation and what you want out of life, know We're so serious about building businesses and making money and being successful But what happens once you get there and you don't have the vessel to carry you through that's that's very that's scary to me So that's that's where I take people Kiera Dent (07:57.722) Hmm. Kiera Dent (08:09.496) I agree. I completely agree. And I love that you did this because like at Tony Robbins, he calls it the like Ebenezer Scrooge experience where you like, he literally makes you walk down. It's like terrifying. You hear all these like thousands of people screaming like how awful it'd be. But I don't think we actually like make this as much of a reality. I don't think we see it. And for me, I thought, okay, I really do have a vision of myself. Tiff will tell you, gosh, it's awesome. Tiff and I have committed that we're gonna be like. 98 year old grannies. I'm gonna have cotton candy pink hair. She's gonna have cotton candy blue hair We're gonna be driving jazzy's with NOS like not because we have to but just because we want to we'll have our own drones like I got this whole vision, but I thought about it and I thought If I don't have a body to get me between let's say 35 when I started thinking about it to 95 like that's a huge span of time. We're talking 60 years Laura (08:41.12) huh. my gosh. Laura (08:47.705) haha Kiera Dent (09:02.104) I can't just hope and pray that my body is going to last. Like this is an engine and I remember thinking, I love cars. I really love cars. And I thought like, Kiera, if you had a Ferrari sitting in the garage, how would you take care of this? And I'm like, I'd put the highest level of gas. I would wash it. I would like keep it protected. I would drive it so kind. And I remember I was on a podcast with another person and they said, you literally, your body is a billion. That's with a B as in body, a billion dollar asset. Do you treat it that way? Laura (09:31.833) Mm-hmm. Kiera Dent (09:31.95) And I thought, well, if I'm willing to give that love and care to a Ferrari, what if I thought about my own body as a Ferrari and how would I treat it? And it's crazy because for me that worked. And I started thinking like, I would eat better. Like I truly would take care of it. I would work out. I would prioritize it. And just like you said, starting with where we are, I think like any amount of movement is going to help. So even reading the book, Atomic Habits by James Clear, he talks about like habit stacking. and just starting and like other books, essentialism, they talk about if it's too hard, we don't start. And so it's that startup effort. So I love Laura where you're like, okay, you get out of bed and you do one squat. Fantastic. Like you could start there and that's not as hard, but I think we go from like zero to 700. And I think that's the gap. so like, let's dive into, all right, I'm committed. I've decided I see the Ebenezer Scrooge. I see where I'm gonna be. I've got 60 years that I need to keep this. Laura (10:06.935) Mm-hmm. Kiera Dent (10:25.174) amazing body that I've been blessed with going. I also think about, here's another thought that's helped me too, of this body is not Kiera. This body is something that Kiera was given to take care of, just like a business, just like a team. And I've thought about my body and I'm like, when I separated the thought of like, I am this body and I started to see this body allows me to have life. Laura (10:37.933) Mm-hmm. Kiera Dent (10:49.71) This body allows me to podcast. This body allows me to work. This body allows me to work with clients. This body allows me to do all the fun things, to travel. And if I don't take care of her, A, like who am I with this body doing so much for me? And B, how can I take care of her even more? So it kind of became this fun game of like, this isn't for me. I'm good at serving a team. Why not serve my body as well when I realize that's not me? So if that helps you as well. So, okay, we're here, we're committed. Laura, it's like kicking off the new year. We're going to work out. Do they need a trainer? What's the purpose of having a trainer? Like, can I do this on my own? Do I need a trainer? Is virtual or in person better? What are your thoughts around that? Because obviously I went for a trainer because I'm really terrible at accountability and also I had injuries and I didn't want to hurt myself. But like, how do you coach people through this? Laura (11:36.385) Yeah. I think, you know, and this is speaking from personal experience too. I also need the accountability. I love having a coach. I think having someone on your team, like linking arms, let's do this here are our goals is such a useful tool. And you're not, if you don't show up, you're not only not showing up for you, your body, but you're also not showing up for this person that's linked arms with you and put in effort and, like actual love. Like I will just say, I truly love working with my clients. I, and I don't speak for all trainers, but I do know so many trainers that feel the exact same way. Like you really, it's, I don't know how to say this. I'm like about to say emotional attachment, but you really do become so attached to your clients and so committed to their goals that when they stop showing up or something happens and they get sidetracked, it's, it's Kiera Dent (12:19.906) Yeah. Laura (12:31.189) It affects you as a trainer too. So what I'm trying to say is if you feel like you need that accountability, 100 % get a trainer, find a trainer that you connect with. Don't just go to a random, I mean, you can do this, but it's not my recommendation going to like a chain gym. I won't name any names of gyms, but just a chain gym where there's trainers there, they're paying their trainers minimum wage. These people probably have very little experience and are not looking to create that relationship with you. Kiera Dent (12:49.326) Bye. Laura (13:00.089) I think it's important to find someone that you really connect with that feels like an ally and listens to you, sees you. That is very important. As far as online versus in person, it's completely what the plan that's going to work is the one you can stick with. So if you can get to a gym and you can see someone in person, you found someone in person that you connect with, great, go that route. But a lot of busy busines…
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