The Best Practices Show with Kirk Behrendt

The 3 P’s to Avoid Burnout

Episode #610 with Dr. Christian Coachman

How do you enjoy dentistry for 72 years? To reveal that secret, Kirk Behrendt brings back Dr. Christian Coachman, founder of Digital Smile Design, to share the story of his father and the three things he does to keep his love for dentistry alive. If you're tired of it before 50, there's a problem! To learn how to reignite your fire and to hear how DSD can help, listen to Episode 610 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:

• Join Dr. Coachman on Facebook
• Follow Dr. Coachman on Instagram
• Learn more about Digital Smile Design
• Register for DSD Residency 1
• Subscribe to the Best Practices Show Podcast
• Join ACT’s To The Top Study Club
• Join ACT’s Master Class
• See our Live Events Schedule here
• Get the Best Practices Magazine for Free!
• Write a Review on iTunes

Main Takeaways:

Take good care of your physical health.

Find ways to keep your passion for dentistry alive.

Maintain your beginner’s mindset and be ready to learn.

Create a legacy through your dentistry you can be proud of.

Figure out the unique “cool factor” that you and your practice have.

Quotes:

“Dentistry is tough. It’s very stressful. If systems are poor, we go crazy very easily.” (2:42—2:49)

“Dentistry is an extremely stressful profession. It's known. We know that. It's scientifically proven. There are articles about it. It's one of the most stressful professions out there. It's an amazing profession. Amazing profession, but also a very stressful profession. And the distance between amazing and very stressful is very little. There's a thin line between, ‘I'm loving what I'm doing,’ and, ‘I'm not loving it at all.’ So, first of all, I think it's important for us to acknowledge how stressful dentistry is and to understand the reasons why dentistry is so stressful, physically and mentally, and then start to ask ourselves why some dentists are not stressed at all, why some people can just work, work, work and have fun working, and others — what I see, unfortunately, the majority are struggling.” (6:04—7:17)

“I always use, as an example, the story of my father. My father is a dentist. He's 72 years old. He's in great shape. He's still working more than ever, Monday to Friday, at least. He does charity on Saturdays, many times, treating patients. And in Brazil, it's very common that people work like 12 hours a day. He's been doing that for 50 years — five decades. I compare this to some of my friends, dentists — even good dentists — that are tired. They are not even close to the age of my father, and they're like, ‘Man, I want to do something else. Maybe I can start lecturing to break the routine. I need to diversify the way I make money because I don't know if I can do this for ten more years.’ These are common comments that you probably get as well, ‘I want to get out of it. I want to exit.’ When you're thinking and feeling like that before you're even 50, or around 50, you have a problem.” (7:20—8:40)

“I started to ask myself, what makes the difference between going in the direction that my dad was able to go, and going in the direction that you feel like you're struggling. And I was able to find three things that my dad — consciously or unconsciously, I don't know exactly — did that I believe are the magical recipes for him to still love what he's doing and every single morning say, ‘I want to do it again.’ I call it the three P’s: passion, pride, and performance. I was able to realize that my father, from time to time, is able to reignite his passion for dentistry, cyclically. He never lets passion drop, and he finds ways to be passionate about it. I realized that my father is always reframing his pride for what he does — expanding his pride, finding things that gives him more meaningful pride. And I realized that my father is constantly open to improving his performance, to challenging himself, to having an open mind for new things, new ways of doing what he's doing, even though he is a very good dentist. Thirty years ago, he was already a very good dentist. And he's constantly reinventing himself. So, for me, this is the magic formula. You're nurturing your three P’s. So, the question is, how can we nurture our three P’s?” (11:56—13:58)

“How can you keep your passion going? I believe that passion comes from knowing that you're doing something different. Many times, being different is more powerful than being better. I love analyzing the difference between being better and being different. For me, being different is more powerful than being better. As you find ways to do dentistry in a different way, you keep your flame alive. Being in the comfort zone is the killer of passion. Doing things the same way you always did kills passion, so you need to leave some time — of course, you cannot create chaos by changing everything all the time. And many times, you're doing things very well and you want to keep that. But you need to always leave some time every week for you to think about, ‘How can I be different?’ Not only being different, but making people see you as different.” (14:47—16:11)

“For me, a compliment that somebody tells me [is], ‘Christian, you are great.’ That's a good compliment. Fantastic. But if somebody comes to me and says, ‘Christian, you are different,’ that is, for me, ten times a better compliment. So, it's not only about being different, but making people perceive you as different. That makes you feel alive because you know you're creating an impact in a different way. [It’s] one thing for people to come to you just because it's convenient to go to you. [It’s] another thing for people to go out of their way and drive to the other side of town — or to fly into a different city — to see you because they feel like you're different. So, making your team also understand that what you guys do is different and special makes the team more passionate.” (16:11—17:14)

“I think that there are many ways to be passionate about what you do. One way is to practice this exercise of asking yourself, ‘How can I be different? How can I make people perceive me as different?’ Just this pursuit makes you alive again. So, I think that it's something that we need to exercise. And if that doesn't really fit you, you need to ask yourself, ‘How can I reignite my passion from time to time?’” (17:15—17:54)

“What I noticed in my father is that he's very proud of his work. He's very proud of his legacy. He's very proud of his team. He’s very proud, not only about his dentistry — and that's the difference here. Of course, when you do a great surgery, when you finish a great case, when you bond a great composite, when you do a great implant placement, when you perform something very well and you know you did well, you're proud. But that's a technical proud. Right? That fades. You're proud of your implant placement once, then twice, then ten times, a hundred. But when you get to 500 implants and you're doing it exactly the same way, and you're doing it very, very well, you're not proud anymore. It's just in auto mode. So, technical high performance makes you proud, yes. But it's not the type of pride that I believe will make you do dentistry for 50 years, or even 30 years. The pride that I'm talking about is the pride of generating a much deeper impact on the people around you. So, not only on the patient, but mainly on your staff.” (19:26—20:51)

“What I realized about my father is that he's proud of his dentistry. He's proud of the compliments that he gets from his patients, yes. But above all, he's proud of his team and he's proud of how his project made their lives better. That's the ultimate level of pride, for me. If you want to not be tired of doing dentistry, you need to generate an environment. You need to transform your practice into a project that makes the lives of your team members better. When you see that happening, you're so proud of yourself, and that pride feeds you forever. You wake up, and even on a tough day you find the strength to get through when you look at your staff. You look at the project that you started, your practice, your baby, your little company, and you realize that this does not belong to you anymore — it belongs to everybody. And everybody there feels like that, and they live for that. They are proud of being there, and they want to be there forever. Their lives are better because they are there, and their spouses are proud because they are there, and the kids are having a better life because they're there, and everybody is growing together. You look back, and you see people working with you for 10, 20, 30 years. My father has people working with him for 30 years. And you say, ‘Damn, this is amazing. I can do this all over again.’ That's the level of pride that I'm talking about. And so, my suggestion is to find that inspiration with your team by making changes and creating the structure to make your team have a better life because they work there with you. This is going to be an auto feed of energy that will make you not want to quit.” (20:52—23:09)

“Great leaders don't get tired of doing what they're doing. Period. If you see great leaders, they do what they do forever, and they're never tired. Why? Because of the legacy that generates this pride. One thing is to squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, get everything, save your money, build your financial situation. And then, of course, if you're working for that, you will always dream of the exit every single day because you're working for that. You created that scenario. And even unconsciously, your team feels it energetically. And I believe in energy. Energetically, people know when you are there to cash out . . . And then, you don't feed this circle with this beautiful energy that comes from pride of being there.” (23:33—24:42)

“My father was able to build a legacy where even patients felt like part of the project. It's amazing. Patients felt like part of the project. I would speak with some patients of my father, and they would speak to me as if they were partners of the practice. They felt like investors. They would defend the practice, and they would compliment — they would talk about it to others as if they were shareholders. They were emotional shareholders. That's how I would call them. Many patients and many of the staff members were emotional shareholders in the practice. I think you cannot be more proud of it than this. You look around, and you see this happening. He can see this, and that keeps him going.” (25:11—26:10)

“The third “P” [to help you avoid burnout] is performance, because you can be very passionate about something but very bad at it. I'm very passionate about guitars, but I suck. So, that’s two different things. You can be very good at it and not be passionate as well, the opposite. I'm very good at whatever, but I'm not super passionate about it. We see people with natural talent. So, the beauty is to combine both, to love something and to be very good at something. Again, being a good dentist by itself will make you want to continue to be a dentist. But that's not enough, because I mentioned the example of colleagues that are very good, and they are struggling emotionally, and they're tired. So, just performing very well is not enough.” (26:10—27:11)

“What I saw in my father when it comes to performance — being good is a given. You have to be good. Right? But the plus comes from being open-minded to reinvent your performance. It’s the beginner's mind. That's the lesson I learned from him, the beginner's mind. There's a beautiful Buddhist description of the beginner's mind and why, as we become good at something, we stop learning. And the key is to always learn. Become very good at something and continue to learn. That means that even if you are a master at something, you need to pretend you're not. You need to pretend you are a beginner. When you're listening to others, when you're going to a lecture, when you're listening to your assistant, when you're listening to your technician, pretend you are a beginner. Take your super expert hat off and put your beginner's hat on. And just by mentalizing and pretending you're a beginner, you already listen in a different way.” (27:12—28:28)

“Listen to learn. This is something that I learned because I was always very good at answering. I missed many opportunities in my life to learn because I was listening to...

How to be the Boss and a Nice Person at the Same Time

Episode #609 with Kirk Behrendt and Dr. Barrett Straub

Being a boss can be difficult, but it becomes even more so when you’re trying to balance it with being nice to everyone. This is one of the hardest concepts to master, but today Kirk Behrendt brings back the CEO of ACT Dental, Dr. Barrett Straub, to tackle the topic and explain how it’s possible to be the boss and a nice person at the same time. To learn how to find the balance, listen to Episode 609 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:

• Dr. Straub’s email
• Dr. Straub’s Facebook
• Dr. Straub’s social media: @bstraub10 
• Subscribe to the Best Practices Show Podcast
• Join ACT’s To The Top Study Club
• Join ACT’s Master Class
• See our Live Events Schedule here 
• Get the Best Practices Magazine for Free! 
• Write a Review on iTunes

Links Mentioned in This Episode:

Read Traction by Gino Wickman

Read Good to Great by Jim Collins

Read Who Not How by Dan Sullivan

Main Takeaways:

The desire to be liked often outweighs the necessary behaviors required to be a boss.

Clear is nice.

Seek respect, not being liked.

Establish value-based rules and be consistent with them.

The right “who” is the solution to most leadership challenges.

Don’t give orders—ask questions.

Help your team find fulfillment.

Quotes:

“I'd like to think we're all—most of us—are really nice people. I think that's true. And we're learning as we go. We graduate dental school, we get into a practice. We've become leaders, and we're learning on the job how to lead. And our human desire is to be liked. That's just an innate human desire that we all have. We want to be liked by other people, and so our first assumption is that if I am liked by my team, they will view me as a good leader. And the pain point is that that's not true and actually the desire to be liked pulls you further away from elective leadership.” (02:29—03:05) Dr. Straub

“I wanted to be liked. And then I realized you have to have like and respect. And I've learned a little bit, and as I'm still learning, like is a byproduct. You can start with like, but the real like happens as a result of doing the right thing, being consistent.” (03:17—03:35) Kirk

“I was chronically inconsistent. I was going with where everyone's emotions were, where I could go today. And what I found is that I made and more great people miserable over this process. And so leadership is hard, we have to learn this. And I would say leadership is not one of those things you just kind of figure out. There's a combination of learning while you're on the job, but then you also have to have a mentor, somebody who can teach you how to be a boss.” (04:00—04:31) Kirk

“We portray leaders as this autocratic, heavy-handed, rule by fear leadership. And that's so far from the truth. However, we have to start thinking as dentists and leadership, the whole being liked as a boss is a different mindset than being liked as a friend or an acquaintance. And so once we get that different definition of what it is to be liked as a boss, we can start to be more intentional about the things that that will make us a good boss and make us an effective leader. And really, you know, the first concept that we like to say is ‘What is nice? Being clear.’” (04:57—05:35) Dr. Straub

“I've always thought, I don't need to be liked. I'd like it. It'd be, you know, that would be beneficial. But we have to start with respect. So if my team respects me, I'm great with that. If they also like me, that's a bonus. But I'm not here to be liked, I'm here to be respected. And I think in the workplace there's an overlap between those two words. You know, but we talk about clear is nice, but there's another word that comes across along with clear. And that's consistency.” (07:07—07:41) Dr. Straub

“When I read the book Traction, it was an operating system that I could enforce these principles in. They are a set of rules. It's a real regular set of rules that when you stick to them, you can start to employ a lot of these. Let me be really clear about what this means. Let me be really clear about what we're looking to accomplish. Everyone else can see those rules too, and they follow them. So for me, I needed a framework, a system.” (08:03—08:29) Kirk

“You know, one of our first coaches that came in here was like, ‘Listen, this is a planning session. This is not a solution session.’ You’ve got to do a little bit of both, you’ve got to figure that stuff out, and you've got to be able to guide people ultimately in healthy communication. So I like the idea of having some type of rules. You know, when you have regular rules that everyone can agree on, it's good. I violated the rules because I tolerated bad behavior.” (08:48—09:12) Kirk

“I've heard people talk about ‘give your team a hallway, not railroad tracks.’ So railroad tracks, you are only going to go in one direction. But a hallway, you're still going to get to the goal. You're still going to go in one direction. But there's some latitude in how you get there. And your team wants that decision making, they want that autonomy, they want that fulfillment in that, ‘Hey, we're going to go there, but you're going to help me get there. And the path might deviate just a little bit, but we're going to stay within these guidelines called the walls of the hallway.’” (09:55—10:25) Dr. Straub

“This concept really has been the foundation of how we coach our pro-coaching clients in that instead of saying, ‘Hey, here's 82 systems, you've got to do these 82 systems, do them exactly our way and then go to work.’ That's a railroad, you know, and so we've really taken this philosophy and put it into our own coaching in that we provide our clients a strategic system. ‘Hey, we're going to help you decide who you are, core values, where you're going, and we're going to provide the framework, that hallway’ that now the dentist can take their teams and walk them through, ‘Here's direction. I need your help getting there.’” (10:54—11:31) Dr. Straub

“When things get a little messy, you fall back on the system. You fall back on the method, you fall back on the concepts, and then that disallows us from getting way off of target because human nature is going to take us way off target unless we have that chance to pull back in, have the system, as you said, to fall back on.” (11:33—11:54) Dr. Straub

“We want your team to know what to expect. Meaning I don't know exactly how the day is going to go—I know there's going to be hurdles, I know there's going to be obstacles, but I know what's going to happen. We're going to figure it out, we're going to behave in this way, we're going to use our strategic plan to answer questions and make decisions. And so I don't have the exact picture, but I know how the day is going to go and how we're going to treat one another and how we're going to talk and how the doctor is going to expect me to come with solutions, not just problems. And when you can give that clarity to your team, they're going to help you lead. They're going to help you get to that outcome.” (12:51—13:29) Dr. Straub

“If you're not talking—the weekly team meetings—things are going to go awry. It's the date night analogy. You always use the family eating dinner together. As soon as you stop those habits, you're just inviting problems.” (13:55—14:10) Dr. Straub

“Each teammate on your team has their own life. They’ve got their own baggage, they’ve got their own stuff going on. And for many people, coming to work is like a release. It's a ‘Okay, I know how the day is going to go, I can turn off all the life stresses, and I can do what I love to do.’ And if we are providing a situation where they don't feel safe and they don't know what to expect, then we're just adding stress to their life. And they're not going to perform well, and they probably are going to leave eventually.” (15:23—15:51) Dr. Straub

“A lot of our challenges and our problems become easier to overcome with the right people in the right seats. So I as a dentist and as a detail guy, always am looking for ‘how’ and ‘what’ and ‘when.’ And you [Kirk] always coach me to say it's about a ‘who.’ Find the right person.” (16:40—17:01) Dr. Straub

“Don't try to figure out what, because when you get the right who, they figure out the what. And I found that to be absolutely true. Now, again, one more thing that you have to think about as a leader. You don't want to do everything. What you dream of is a day where you can go to somebody and go, ‘You're my person for this. How are you doing? How can I help you? How can I support you?’ And they go, ‘You go back to doing what you do. I got this.’ And then they come to you. And when they're stuck and you can add what you add best, which is the vision, sometimes the execution, creative problem solving.” (18:46—19:17) Kirk

“You only hire people for two reasons. Number one, they fit your core values. Number two, they get results. You don't hire them because they've been here for a long time. They're a nice person. They came with the practice. They're your neighbor. You think they might be good. At the end of the day, your favorite team members, they fit your core values and you've stated them—we have six of them here at ACT Dental—and I'll go back to what you said. It's core values. Core values is one of those phrases that, as time has gone on, people go, ‘Oh, yeah, yeah, that sounds great. What's next?’ And I'll tell you, there is nothing next. You get really good at core values because your favorite people you'll ever meet in a chair, at work, in your own personal life; they care about the same things you care about. The least favorite people you ever meet, it's not that they're bad people, they just don't care about the same things. And so you've got to get your core values right.” (20:08—20:55) Kirk

“When you wake up at 3:30 in the morning and can't get back to sleep, you're not thinking about the team members that share your core values. You're thinking and stressing about the one that's driving you crazy that doesn't fit.” (21:29—21:41) Dr. Straub

“My favorite part about core values is they guide behavior. And so when you have core values and you've talked about them with your team and you have them up on the wall and you talk about them and then you have some behavior that doesn't match, you have a foundation to fall back on. You can say, ‘Hey, this is what I'm seeing. It doesn't match our previously stated and discussed core values. We need to correct that behavior.’ Without those core values and without that framework, you just look like a bad guy.” (22:30—22:58) Dr. Straub

“But here's what's really cool when you do the Chief Repeating Officer thing—your values show up not only in just behavior, which is most important, but they also show up in tough decisions. You're going to be presented with difficult decisions and you can go back to your values and say, ‘All roads lead home to our values.’ So I'm going to repeat over and over again who we are, why we do what we do. And it's amazing how people pick that up.” (23:53—24:14) Kirk

“When it comes to core values, if you don't have them, identify them, and we have tools. If you have identified them, talk about them with your team—put them up on the wall and then repeat them, meaning you’ve got to talk about them every single week. We talk about them in our meetings every week, we identify them, we celebrate one another, we highlight a core value, because if it's on the wall, but you're not talking about it or repeating yourself, they're not living. They're not breathing. They're not part of your culture.” (24:38—25:04) Dr. Straub

“By asking questions, you are teaching your team members to become their own thinker, their own leader, and you can kind of co-diagnose with them the best solution to a problem versus just saying, ‘Do this. Do this. Do it this way.’ You can provide some guidance and like, ‘Hey, my goal is for us to get here, but help me design the path to get there.’ You know, now you're teaching skills that this person and this team can leverage for a long time.” (27:20—27:50) Dr. Straub

“When you ask open-ended questions, we force ourselves into the frontal cortex. And the frontal cortex is the region of the brain that deals with logic and reasoning. And so when we're in our practice and we're trying to solve problems, we know we have to be thinking rationally. If we're in our emotional rear brain, it's going to be harder. Emotion and logic don't go together. There are two different brain centers, and you can't use both at the same time. And so questions are a great way to get someone to think rationally and logically.” (28:01—28:34) Dr. Straub

“Given two choices, people will always pick the easy path. And what you have to do is you’ve got to draw a line through that and go, ‘That's the hard path,’ and here's how you're going to do it: . . . ‘Are you going to tell them, or am I?’ It's a moment of truth and it pauses what's going on here to say, ‘You have to take this to the other person.’” (32:10—32:33) Kirk

“And so when we talk about triangulation, when we have dentists in this room here in Milwaukee, everyone nods their head because every dentist knows exactly what this situation is. And the person is coming to you as a dentist only because they have been taught to know that you're going to take care of it. You're going to take their problem off of their shoulder and put it on yours and take care of it. So that's easy. I'm going to go dump my problem on you. But if I, as your team member, know, ‘If I go to Kirk with a problem, I know he's going to ask me to deal with it. He might coach me, but I'm going to have to solve it,’ now it becomes harder. And that's okay, because then I know when I go to you, I might say, ‘Kirk, I need to deal with this problem on my own, but I need some coaching.’ That's what you as a leader want instead of, ‘Hey, Kirk, solve this for me.’” (32:36—33:27) Dr. Straub

“You can be a boss and a nice person at the same time. You shouldn't try to be nice, just be clear first. Now, I'm not telling you to be mean. No, but the more clear you can be, people will enjoy that. They'll think well of you.” (34:02—34:18) Kirk

“We want to grow leaders. So if we grow leaders, if we give our teams skills to solve their own problems, to think outside the box, to have trust, then our job gets a lot easier. And we've made them better people. And they're going to in turn, help us be better people. We also want to provide fulfillment. So everyone wants to go to a job where they have purpose, where they have autonomy, where they have trust, where they can be themselves, when they know they can screw up and it's not going to be held against them. And that only comes from clarity, from knowing what to expect, from building core values. And our point is this is what people are looking for. They don't want you to be nice. They want you to just tell them how you want it done, give them some autonomy to help you get there. And they're going to love their job.” (34:32—35:22) Dr. Straub

Snippets:

0:00 Introduction.

02:19 We all want to be liked.

03:12 Mediocrity is chronically inconsistent.

04:35 What is “nice?”

05:42 It’s better to be clear than nice.

07:01 Respect is greater than like.

07:54 You need rules.

09:27 Give your team a hallway, not railroad tracks.

11:54 A system creates discipline.

13:29 You need to regularly talk.

15:13 Consistency keeps your team safe.

16:23 Find the right who to solve your challenges.

19:59 The right people fit your core values.

23:13 Be the Chief Repeating Officer.

25:04 Core values are verbs.

26:33 Don’t give orders—ask questions.

28:34 Don’t connect the dots of the triangle.

31:44 Make the easy path the hard path.

33:57 Final takeaways.

34:21 Being a boss means giving your team fulfillment in their jobs.

36:00 Last thoughts.

Dr. Barrett Straub Bio:

Dr. Barrett Straub practices general and sedation dentistry in Port Washington, Wisconsin. He has worked hard to develop his practice into a top-performing, fee-for-service practice that focuses on improving the lives of patients through dentistry. 

A graduate of Marquette Dental School, Dr. Straub’s advanced training and CE includes work at the Spear Institute, LVI, DOCS, and as a member of the Milwaukee Study Club. He is a past member of the Wisconsin Dental Association Board of Trustees and was awarded the Marquette Dental School 2017 Young Alumnus of the Year. As a former ACT coaching client that experienced first-hand the transformation that coaching can provide, he is passionate about helping other dentists create the practice they’ve always wanted. 

Dr. Straub loves to hunt, golf, and spend winter on the ice, curling. He is married to Katie, with two daughters, Abby and Elizabeth. 

17 Summers & Emotional Intelligence in Dentistry

Episode #608 with Dr. Nader Sharifi

There is so much opportunity to connect, whether with your kids, your team, or your patients. But if you don't take those opportunities, time will pass you by! To help you capture those moments and make lasting connections, Kirk Behrendt brings back Dr. Nader Sharifi with tips for improving emotional intelligence, emotional intimacy, and creating better connections with the people who matter most. To learn how to slow down time in and outside of your practice, listen to Episode 608 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:

• Learn more on Dr. Sharifi’s website
• Subscribe to the Best Practices Show Podcast
• Join ACT’s To The Top Study Club
• Join ACT’s Master Class
• See our Live Events Schedule here
• Get the Best Practices Magazine for Free!
• Write a Review on iTunes

Links Mentioned in This Episode:

Watch Dr. Sharifi’s Master Class - Implants and RPDs: A Challenging Combination

Read The Energy Bus by Jon Gordon

Main Takeaways:

Create safe spaces for yourself and others.

Ask others how you can best support them.

Find ways to help you with self-regulation.

Have someone you can trust and talk to.

Remember the acronym, WAIT.

Go see a therapist!

Quotes:

“You use those 16, 17, 18 summers to get the boomerang to come back. When that child graduates from college and they look at their opportunities, if one of their opportunities includes coming back home — some people might view that as a negative. Others view that as a positive. But if nothing else, it's an opportunity on both sides of that to say, now we have an opportunity to have some time together. We have an opportunity to impart more wisdom, to learn more, connect more. There's opportunity on the positive. If that kid didn't enjoy those 16 summers, that opportunity might not be there.” (6:14—6:54) -Dr. Sharifi

“[Dr. John Cranham] said, ‘Say no to meetings on Saturdays and Sundays.’ After that, I had one lecture on a Sunday. I'll never forget it. It was a huge room. There are a thousand chairs. I'm like, ‘Wow, this is going to be amazing!’ And like, 11 people showed up. I left my family to do all that. And what you learn in those moments is, somebody is trying to help you.” (8:50—9:12) -Kirk

“I was in a class a couple of weeks ago, and the speaker was talking about connecting with patients and was adamant, ‘Don't talk about yourself. You're wasting time. Whenever you talk about yourself, you're missing the opportunity to learn about your patients. That's a huge mistake. Don't do that.’ I thought about that, and I couldn't agree. I was disagreeing. I'm not saying I couldn't agree more — I was disagreeing. I've had patients give me wedding gifts, birthday gifts. I had patients buy me gifts when my children were born. It shocked me to start to receive gifts from my patients. I get letters from my patients, and that's a shock as well. But when they go out and purchase something for me after having paid me for doing these services — really stood out. And those came because they got to know me. Those came because of that relationship, and I could know them. If they know nothing about me, they wouldn't be participating with me in that way. And so, I do think that there's an absolute necessity that that speaker was sharing with me that I need to get to know my patient. But at the same time, I should be sharing with them who I am so that if I'm going to be able to have this emotional, intelligent connection with them, I'm affording them the opportunity to have it back with me.” (10:52—12:33) -Dr. Sharifi

“I'm not an endodontist. An endodontist sees the patient one time, maybe a post-op. There's one hour with them, and they're done. For me, as a prosthodontist, and for all the general practitioners out there, we're in this for the long haul, and getting to know these patients well is really important and beneficial to them.” (12:34—12:56) -Dr. Sharifi

“We have that opportunity [to connect] numerous times a day when every patient sits in our chair. We have that opportunity numerous times a day when we go into the hygiene room and check a patient. One of the key elements of emotional intelligence is the first five minutes we spend with someone. Well, what if you only get five minutes with them? That hygiene exam from hello to goodbye is around five minutes. And so, if we do not express that we are engaged with them, that we are present for them, that we have empathy for them, we have knowledge about them but we want to learn more, we're failing in that five minutes of being able to make that connection and make them want to schedule that next visit to see us again in another three, four, six months and return and do this all over again.” (16:42—17:37) -Dr. Sharifi

“[Patients] don't have to come to my office. They drive by numerous other dentists before they park and come to my office — and that's true for all of us. There are enough dentists out there. We do not see patients that only live next door. They drive by other practices to come to ours. We should never forget that.” (17:38—17:59) -Dr. Sharifi

“A mistake I made was I thought that having deep, complex, and in-depth knowledge of the history was more important than the now. I thought that that was a big deal. I learned that that's certainly helpful, but more important than me knowing about that patient’s three-years-ago history is me knowing what's happening right now. And so, rather than walking in with something that's very intricate and involved and shows that I know who they are, walking in and saying, ‘So, what's 2023 meaning for you so far?’ even if they've heard it from me before, they're like, ‘Well, I got a new job.’ And all I need to do is, ‘Tell me about that.’ All I need to do is ask that one simple question to let them open up more about that. It's not for me to think, ‘Oh my gosh, I remember when I got . . .’ I need to be able to share more, to get deeper into that first peeling of the layer of the onion.” (18:21—19:41) -Dr. Sharifi

“We built our office with our sinks in front of the patient so that I could talk to them while I washed my hands and use that as a part of my five minutes with them. I didn't want to be washing my hands behind their back where they couldn't see me. I wanted to do it directly in front of them and interact with them so I can turn, and create eye contact with them, and express my facial expression, ‘Wonderful! A new job? Tell me about that,’ and see how they light up and go.” (20:05—20:35) -Dr. Sharifi

“Certainly, it's very beneficial in that first five minutes with our hygiene patients when we start our restorative procedures, but also with our staff, that first five minutes with our staff. I've got a chronically late staff member. I tell her, ‘You miss out. You miss out on that first five minutes because we're in huddle, and you come in late, and nobody gets to connect with you. We never get to hear about what your day was like. We don't get to find out what your dinner was last night. We're already past that. That first five minutes is gone when you show up late.’ But that's the negative side. The positive side is everybody else, when you see them, that's our opportunity to reconnect.” (22:44—23:29) -Dr. Sharifi

“Adding vulnerability and adding safety is increasing empathy levels. This is a little bit deeper than maybe some would be comfortable doing with their patients, per se. But if we can do that with our staff, absolutely, you can do significant relationship building. And we should all be doing that with our spouses, absolutely. Emotional intimacy levels of showing vulnerability and being available to them and their needs is really important.” (26:10—26:49) -Dr. Sharifi

“One of our great coaches here, her name is Miranda. She gave us an acronym. The acronym is WAIT. You guys should use it. Why Am I Talking? We should use that acronym all the time, because sometimes I'm talking just to get attention to me. Sometimes, I'm talking just to divert the energy. Sometimes, I'm talking just because I want to hear my own voice. Sometimes, I'm talking because I have the solution.” (29:42—30:07) -Kirk

“I have one very good tip for self-regulation. My self-regulation improved dramatically when I treated my sleep apnea 15 years ago. Because I was getting bad sleep, I was irritable. When my sleep improved, my irritability went way down. My ability to manage my own emotion is way more important before I could try and understand anybody else's emotion. What's the phrase? You cannot be loved until you love yourself. Something along those lines. It's the same thing. You can’t understand someone else's emotions if you can't control your own. Because your own are clouding you so much, it's difficult to figure out what's happening around you.” (30:56—31:40) -Dr. Sharifi

“Some of the other things you talk about is, you work out, you earn your shower, you burn off excess energy in those ways. Whatever you can do to create the calm environment of yourself is the way to be able to self-regulate a little bit better. And then, the more we learn about emotions, the more we learn about our staff — I learn about my employees, and what keeps them from getting in and out of the door, and what stresses them at the end of the day, and how they want to get home, and what they're facing when they get home. One of my staff members, her husband travels. When he's around, she's chill. When he's gone, she's extra stressed — and that impacts us. Well, my understanding of that for her helps me to know, who's around this week, who's not around. And so, there are multiple influencing factors for us to use this emotional intelligence and help us run our office with our staff, run our practice with our patients.” (33:09—34:13) -Dr. Sharifi

“Brené Brown, who is probably one of the best speakers in the world, at the ADA, if you heard her speak, she gave this nugget to everybody in the audience. There were thousands of people in the audience. She said, ‘One of the best things you can do with the people around you is to do a quick check-in. And the quick check-in ends like this. What does support look like from me today?’ I love that . . . If I were to support you, what would that look like? What does support from me today look like to you? Because I might have an idea, but you might say, ‘No, I just need you to give me a little space. A little pat on the back might help. I might need a little time,’ because we can't assume. And just by asking the question, it sets the conversation up for a whole different level of understanding.” (34:23—35:21) -Kirk

“Why aren't we, as dentists, seeking more therapy? We're on an island. We're alone. We're working in a wet, dark environment where everything fails. The best dentists in the world — their dentistry will fail. The patient lives long enough that that dentistry won't last. It's going to fail. So, under this environment, who wouldn't need a little bit of extra support? So, Brené Brown, great resource. Reading and doing self-therapy, wonderful first step. Speaking to a therapist, excellent. You can do it via Zoom from your kitchen, for God's sake, from now on. You don't even need to go into the office to go where you want to go and meet with somebody.” (37:00—37:45) -Dr. Sharifi

“Therapy is an awesome benefit to so many different people because self-talk is the worst kind of talk. Some experts agree that 80% of self-talk is negative. You never self-talk like, ‘Hey, I love myself.’ No, you're constantly in a negative space. And I'll tell you, as a person who talks a lot to himself, if you don't talk to someone, it bubbles up. It bubbles out of your mouth.” (38:34—39:05) -Kirk

“Whether it be a coach, a therapist, a leadership team, you have to have somebody where you can talk or, I will tell you, that conversation goes around in your head, and it only becomes more toxic garbage. You have to have a release of that.” (39:13—39:31) -Kirk

Snippets:

0:00 Introduction.

1:50 Dr. Sharifi’s background.

4:04 How many summers do you have left?

7:22 Why emotional intelligence is important for dentistry.

18:00 The importance of the first five minutes.

25:14 Create safe spaces.

26:49 The challenges of self-regulation.

29:20 Tips for self-regulation.

34:14 How you can best support others.

35:25 We can all use some therapy.

40:14 More about Dr. Sharifi and how to get in touch.

Dr. Nader Sharifi Bio:

Having earned a certificate in prosthodontics, Dr. Sharifi is a refined general dentist with advanced training in the restorative aspects of dentistry. He received his DDS degree from the University of Illinois at Chicago, then continued his education to earn a certificate in prosthodontics from Northwestern University Dental School. Dr. Sharifi also earned a master’s degree in dental biomaterials from Northwestern University.

Dr. Sharifi is a nationally recognized dental instructor on the topics of dental implants, full and partial dentures, overall patient care, and restoring root canal-treated teeth. He travels every other Friday to study clubs, associations, and dental meetings where he has presented several hundred lectures internationally and nationally, reaching nearly every state. Dr. Sharifi was named to the select American Dental Association (ADA) National Speakers Bureau in 1996. In 2007, he received the coveted Gordon J. Christensen Lecturer Recognition Award for excellence in teaching and loyalty to the profession.

Dr. Sharifi has been honored with membership in the American Academy of Restorative Dentistry and American College of Dentists. He is active in the Chicago Dental Society, the Illinois State Dental Society, and the ADA – where he served for more than a decade on the Council on Dental Practice. Dr. Sharifi also is a member of the American College of Prosthodontics, for which he has chaired the Committee on Dental Insurance and Managed Care. For more than ten years, he has participated as a member in the Northern Illinois Dental Specialty Study Club, and recently joined as a charter member of the Seattle Study Club of Oak Brook.

Outside of the office, Dr. Sharifi spends the majority of his time with his family. He has three amazing daughters whose exploits on stage keep him busy and proud. He loves to read novels and will ask about what you’re reading when you arrive with a book in hand. Dr. Sharifi enjoys hiking, skiing, and – because he has only daughters, was raised with only sisters, and works in a dental office with only women – likes to attend car shows and photograph the beautiful restorations to spend time with some of the guys.

Redefining Early Orthodontic Intervention

Episode #607 with Dr. Rebecca Bockow

Adults with dental problems weren’t always adults with dental problems, so what happened earlier that led to that point? Today Kirk Behrendt brings on Dr. Rebecca Bockow, a true rockstar of the dental industry, to discuss why you need to redefine early orthodontic intervention. Orthodontics is so much more than just straightening teeth—find out how it can make patients healthier in Episode 607 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:

• Learn more at Inspired Orthodontics
•  Follow Dr. Bockow on Instagram
• Subscribe to the Best Practices Show Podcast
• Join ACT’s To The Top Study Club
• Join ACT’s Master Class
•  See our Live Events Schedule here 
• Get the Best Practices Magazine for Free! 
• Write a Review on iTunes

Links Mentioned in This Episode:

Check out Specialty Imaging: Temporomandibular Joint and Sleep-Disorded Breathing by Dr. Dania Tamimi

Learn more about Spear Education

Learn more about the Pankey Institute

Learn more about the Kois Center

Register for Dr. Bockow and Dr. Mike Gunsun’s course

Main Takeaways:

Orthodontics is about more than just straightening teeth.

Don’t just wait for the adult teeth to come in to deal with problems.

So much growth happens in the first few years of life.

Braces aren’t necessarily the answer for everything—use the right tool at the right time.

Keep asking questions.

Quotes:

“One of the things that really struck me as a restorative dentist was I saw a lot of breakdown that was really related to the foundation. The bones in the gums weren't in the right place, which led to a lot of the breakdown I saw as a general dentist. And I thought, ‘If I can help put the bones and the gums in the right place, and the teeth, of course, then I could partner with phenomenal restorative dentists to rehabilitate a patient.’” (02:37—03:07)

“Back in 2013, I sat through a three-day course called Airway Prosthodontics before [Dr. Jess Rouse] joined Spear Education, even. And I was blown away. Kirk, I sat in the front row and I thought to myself, ‘All of these adult patients have airway issues. They all have orthodontic problems.’ And I started talking to him about the things I learned about expansion. And really a lot of the things I learned I had to learn on my own because there wasn't a lot in the orthodontic literature, but there was a great deal in journals like Sleep and Sleep Medicine and stuff in ENT literature, and it's slowly, slowly been coming into the orthodontic literature and the general dental literature over the last ten years.” (03:32—04:17)

“And I think we're at the tip of an iceberg. And every year more and more papers are coming out and our understanding is increasing. And so I started really thinking. So I saw a lot of adult patients with the perio ortho background, and I saw a lot of adults that had a lot of issues. Generally, it's skeletal issues, underbites, overbites, crossbites, open bites, gummy smiles. And I thought ‘What happened early on in growth and development that led them to get to that point? Why? Why did we see the gummy smile? Why did we see the crossbite? And most importantly, is it preventable?’” (04:19—05:02)

“I've been really thinking a lot about growth and development, and I think we're just starting to understand even more the power of what happens early as it guides growth. And form and function are so interdependent. And we really have an opportunity to think about chewing and swallowing and speech and what's happening for these young kids that's having such a major impact on skeletal growth.” (06:12—06:48)

“If we think about a thumb sucker, I think historically we'd sort of throw our hands up and say, ‘Well, it's okay. We'll deal with it when the adult teeth come in.’ And I've even heard from families, ‘My pediatrician said “Don't worry about it until they're seven when the adult teeth come in.”’ But if we think about what's happening in growth, so much growth occurs during those first few years of life. And so a thumb pushing into the roof of the mouth creates a narrow maxilla. The roof of the mouth is the floor of the nose. So now you have a narrow upper jaw. Now you have narrow nasal passages. Ultimately that might look like crowding and that's just the upper jaw. Then you have pressure on the lower jaw, which does a few things. First, it prevents the lower jaw from growing forward and it pushes the condyle back in the fossa. So it might potentially change the way that this inner relates, whether it has to do with the disc, whether it has to do with the development of the eminence, whether it has to do with the directional growth of the lower jaw, and you train the tongue to rest low, The tongue coming up in full motion in a swallow not only during rest, but during speech, during functionality is what drives the growth of the upper jaw. And so you think about when you catch this kid at seven, let's say that's the first time they come to the orthodontist. We have to play catch up from seven years of the lower jaw not growing to its fullest potential. And we have to retrain the tongue to come up and forward. So it's not just about the teeth anymore. Orthodontics is not just about straightening the teeth. Now all of a sudden, we can reframe things. What can we do for that seven-year-old to help guide growth but also help retrain function?”

(06:49—08:50)

“The American Association of Orthodontics says you should have an orthodontic evaluation prior to age seven. And so that has become sort of the marker. ‘Okay, well, go see the orthodontist by age seven.’ I've never seen a paper, Kirk, that gives us any sort of reason why seven is a magic number. My best guess is that it's when the adult molars have erupted—they usually come in around age six to seven. So by age seven they tend to be in, and our bands fit best on first molars. And our appliances, maybe we historically didn't want to bracket baby teeth. I don't know, that's my guess. But I'd love to challenge that number because I don't know that there is any proof behind that number.” (09:14—10:09)

“And so going back to this seven-year-old that's a thumb sucker, Maybe we can reframe how we define intervention. Maybe intervention isn't putting braces on a seven-year-old or a three or four- or five-year-old, but maybe it's helping this child stop their thumb sucking habit. Maybe that's our intervention. Maybe it's helping them find a myofunctional therapist to retrain the tongue. Maybe it's looking at other ways that we can intervene and help these kids beyond braces. I don't know that braces is the answer for everything.” (10:11—10:49)

“And if we wait until growth is done, if we wait until this child is 12 and we focus on just lining up the teeth, we've lost all this opportunity of growth because so much of it is happening so early.” (12:29—12:43)

“I saw a young child a few weeks ago in the clinic. He's three and a half and his palate is so narrow, so V-shaped, that his tongue can't fit in the roof of his mouth and his lower jaw can't figure out how to fit with the top teeth. So he's sliding all over the place. When he chews food, he’s not getting a solid bite with his back teeth. He's not crisp when he speaks. He's seeing speech therapy because he doesn't know where to put his tongue, because his palate is so narrow. He's snoring at night. He's tossing and turning at night. He's constantly congested. And so, what is intervention? Is intervention putting braces on this young man? No, he's three and a half. But can we get him to speech therapy? Can we get him to ENT? Can we widen the palate? And if we're going to widen the palate on a three-year-old. How do we do that? Because maybe our traditional appliances aren't the best fit for a three-and-a-half-year-old. And so I don't know the answers. I just am excited about some of the new questions and new possibilities.” (13:03—14:22)

“The way we do things today is different than a year ago. The understanding, the depth of knowledge, and even just whether we're learning it from social media, we're learning it from our peers, or we're learning it from the literature, I feel like we're learning something new daily, weekly, monthly.” (16:46—17:05)

“So even just going back to that example—that three-and-a-half-year-old—so we got him to see ENT as the next step. We got him to get the adenoids and tonsils evaluated. We got him to see speech therapy. And so did we get started on ortho treatment? Not yet. He's not ready for us, but we got him to see new providers. Maybe he will be a candidate for expansion. But making sure that we help educate these families on growth and development, helping them find the right resources.” (18:48—19:26)

“We were trained to not intervene [on a lower lip entrapment] for some patients until they're teenagers. But if you identify a seven or an eight-year-old that's constantly biting the lower lip, what's that doing to mandibular growth and development? And so maybe intervention is something as simple as a retainer that helps reduce lower lip entrapment. And so thinking in terms of growth guidance, I think is really powerful.” (19:32—19:59)

“I think we're learning more and more. And I think with CBCT technology, we can more critically evaluate our outcomes in a very different way. I think with asking new questions and reframing questions we can ascertain new information. So if we base our conclusions today on how we practice on literature from two or three decades ago, we're missing a lot. We have new information today so we can ask new questions and therefore we have new opportunities to study new things in the literature.” (20:05—20:45)

“And to bring everyone into the same room and to really talk about what is it that we're seeing in our practices and in our patients and how can we learn from each other. And it's those ‘Aha’ moments, it's those ‘Wow, I didn't think that shifting the lower jaw forward and to the side would when in speech, would have an impact on condylar development.’ And you go, ‘Oh my gosh!’ And so thinking about the system, thinking about the importance of the system—the lips, the cheeks, the tongue, the teeth, the joint, the bite, the swallow—it's all in breathing. Of course, it's all important. (22:19—22:58)

“I would say to especially the younger dentist, but for the experienced as well, let's all keep questioning things. Let's all keep asking new questions. Dentistry is a really exciting time because it's not just about straight teeth anymore. It's about how do we make patients healthier? And that's so rewarding. It's so exciting. And it’s a great time to be a dentist.” (24:01—24:26)

Snippets:

0:00 Introduction.

01:44 Dr. Bockow’s background.

05:48 Orthodontics is about more than straightening teeth.

08:57 Why is seven (not) the magic number?

10:54 Early development is dependent on function.

14:22 Spreading the message via social media.

16:20 We learn something new every day.

18:29 Find the right tool to help the patient.

20:45 Dr. Bockow and Dr. Mike Gunson’s course.

23:53 Last thoughts.

Dr. Rebecca Bockow Bio:

Dr. Rebecca Bockow is a dual trained orthodontist and periodontist – the only dual trained provider in Seattle and one of only a handful in the country.

She grew up in the Greater Seattle area and attended University Prep for High School. She received a BS in Biology with Honors at Haverford College, where she also played Soccer, Squash, Tennis, and ran Cross Country and Track. She completed her DDS training at the University of Washington Dental School in 2007. Dr. Bockow practiced as a general dentist in Seattle for two years while simultaneously teaching at the UW dental school.

Dr. Bockow completed a highly selective dual-specialty program combining Orthodontics and Periodontics at the University of Pennsylvania. She is a board-certified orthodontist and periodontist. While simultaneously enrolled in two residency programs, she also received a Masters in Oral Biology, focusing on intranasal Ketorolac for post-operative implant pain management.

Dr. Bockow lectures nationally on periodontics, orthodontics, interdisciplinary orthodontics, airway, and skeletal growth and development. She contributes to multiple professional journals as an author and editor. Dr. Bockow is also resident faculty at Spear Education.

Tips to Improve Your Happiness as a Dentist

Episode #606 with Dr. Erin Elliott

Dentistry is an amazing career. You get to control your schedule, who you work with, your income, and your life. So, why are so many dentists unhappy? To explain why that is and what can be done about it, Kirk Behrendt brings back Dr. Erin Elliott, seminar leader from 3D Dentists, to reveal the secrets to improving happiness. Stop dreading Mondays! To create a happier practice for you, your team, and your patients, listen to Episode 606 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:

• Send Dr. Elliott an email
• Learn more on Dr. Elliott’s website
• Follow Dr. Elliott on Instagram
• Follow 3D Dentists on Instagram
• Subscribe to the Best Practices Show Podcast
• Join ACT’s To The Top Study Club
• Join ACT’s Master Class
• See our Live Events Schedule here
• Get the Best Practices Magazine for Free!
• Write a Review on iTunes

Links Mentioned in This Episode:

Learn more about 3D Dentists

Main Takeaways:

Figure out what you like about dentistry.

Create a great culture and environment.

Surround yourself with happy people.

Get your schedule and income right.

Delegate what you don't like doing.

Find a mentor and take great CE.

Focus on things you can control.

Add the right technology.

Set achievable goals.

Quotes:

“I feel like we have been blessed in the career that we have chosen, and it breaks my heart to think that you go to work every day dreading it, or the Sunday night paralysis that I hear about — the dread, the stress, the beaten down, having to go sit in the restroom to deep-breathe because that's the only place no one bothers you, just one thing after another. It breaks my heart because I do think we've been given a gift.” (5:23—5:57)

“Obviously, there are some things in dentistry you might have to do. But really, we are blessed to be able to create and change an environment that suits you. You don't have to conform to what we've been taught, especially nowadays. Nineties dentistry, you were told you drilled and filled, you referred, and you'll make a pretty good living. But now, you can make it what you want it to be.” (7:58—8:27)

“A good place to start is to simply write down what it is you do like about dentistry. Now, my dad told me this story one time — he was a dentist. He’s passed away now, but he never had an associate because he could never find anyone that he trusted with his patients or connected with. And I always remember this because he said he was in an interview once and he said, ‘Okay. So, tell me what you like about dentistry.’ The associate said, ‘Well, let me tell you what I don't like.’ I was like, ‘Red flag.’ Right? That's not the person. So, what is it about dentistry that you do like, and what can we do to promote that, create that? Sometimes, there are things that you have to do. But it's not all you have to do.” (9:26—10:19)

“I'm not afraid to let people go anymore. I'm really not. It took a little bit of time to get over that, but I want the right people in place, people that when I walk by, I hear them say, ‘Oh, I love this job.’ And some of it is creating a culture. I'm not a micromanager. I find people that take initiative. We have a very fun but professional, friendly — I mean, our tagline is “Join our Family”. I feel like we have that connection. We just had a 30-year anniversary party, and I could not believe how many people were there for 30 years.” (12:59—13:34)

“We create that culture where people feel comfortable. But then, there are still some duds that you get, and you have to not be afraid to let them go and just keep trying. What if you do a lean and mean? Like, we created this beast where we keep growing. But we have a large team because some of it is like, ‘Well, I want to be home with my kids. I only want to work three days a week.’ So, we navigate and negotiate some of that. But what if you had one hygienist, one assistant? That's not such a bad play. If you don't want to manage a big team and worry about schedules and hours and all that, just lean and mean.” (13:48—14:31)

“When you feel so overwhelmed, there's so much going on, life seems to be pressing you down with the family and everything else, what can you control? So, short-term goals are typically money-based, and it's something that you can accomplish in 90 days. So, it's getting a new team member, or implementing morning huddles, those little things that you can — my favorite, I still write out checklists because I love making that check. I love making the line through that I've got it done. And so, it's like, what can I get done, easy? And then, some of these longer-term projects, I set aside time for. So, the medium-term goals are like six to 18 months. Like, what equipment are you going to buy? Are you going to drop certain insurance PPOs? What CE can you schedule to get to your long-term goals? Those are more like creating flexibility and satisfaction, something you want to accomplish in two years. Is it building, or moving? Is it introducing new procedures, new technology, new team members to help you implement these things? Do you ever take the time to do that? Plus, it really does feel nice when you can accomplish some of those things and not feel like you're never getting anything done.” (16:50—18:11)

“So, the first step is goals, and then what you can do to get there. The second is, when you're looking at long-term, you're like, ‘Man, my life would be so much easier if I didn't have to work X amount of days. My body can't keep up. My work-life balance is out of control. I need to change my hours.’ So, for me, I didn't even realize I did this because I hadn't met T-Bone yet. He's my idol and mentor. I realized that if I worked till 5:00 and got home, the kids were in their monster phase, ready to eat. I'm rushing out of the office. But if I stopped at 4:00, I could tidy up all the tasks that I needed to get done and leave the office, get home when the kids were still okay, and I could spend time with them, help them with homework while my husband made the dinner — and it’s just one hour. One hour made a world of difference. So, my schedule since then became 7:00 to 4:00.” (18:17—19:28)

“Guess what? You get to control the schedule. My partner hated getting up early. He has older kids, so he's 8:00 to 5:00. So, the office gets to be open that whole time. We capture the 7:00 a.m. hygiene patients and the 4:00 p.m. Never in this world would we ever work past that, because in North Idaho everyone is coaching their kids’ baseball teams. They move here for the lifestyle, so I'm not going to ask my team to work beyond that. Just a simple thing like that.” (19:38—20:09)

“You might need to do a little bit of math, because if you want to make X amount a year that you need to for your lifestyle, what makes you comfortable, the area that you live in, write down also how many days a week you want to work, and then how much time you want off. So, you have to think about how many days a week in the year you want to work, essentially. And then, you need to find out how much you would need to produce a day to do that. So, simple math problem. What is your production now, and what does it need to be to make that happen? Well, there are a few ways you can make that production. One, you can do more on the patients you already have. Second, you can look at what procedures you're sending out the door.” (20:30—21:23)

­“I don't want to produce more stuff I don't like doing. I'm not going to go do root canals just for the money because I really — first, I don't think I'm good at them. Second, I really don't enjoy them. So, yeah, I'm going to dread going to work if I have a day full of root canals. And not everyone can get an associate. But it's not such a bad thing because when I leave, my patients are taken care of. I'm never on-call. We pay our assistants to take the emergency phone home. Rarely get bothered. What is it that you want to get rid of? What things can you delegate? Just do it.” (23:44—24:23)

“In-office payment plans have allowed us to do more quadrant, full-mouth dentistry and sedation too. Like, if you're already here, let's get it done. I feel like that's where we've really blossomed, is doing more, and not even in the way I treatment plan. Dr. Harness came into our practice, and she'd be doing two crowns on patients I've been seeing for years. And I was like, ‘Huh? They would never do crowns. I had to do big fillings on them.’ She goes, ‘I don't know. I just told them they needed a crown.’ I was like, you get comfortable, or you think you know people. So, really stepping back and evaluating myself and how I approach treatment planning and the co-diagnosis with hygienists. There are so many nuances that I wasn't even aware of but did it by instinct. And then, of course, meeting T-Bone and people like you, and listening to podcasts, I realized that there are a few tweaks with what I'm already working with that can make our lives easier.” (24:26—25:34)

“For anyone that physically is exhausted from dentistry, there are other things you can do that aren't so taxing. For sleep, like I shared earlier, it's like solving a mystery. It’s detective work, connecting with patients, helping them navigate medical insurance — things like that that I don't physically take anything. It saves my neck, my back, everything. But it's also a lot of it I can delegate too, so I could be producing if I wanted to.” (26:21—26:55)

“[We] also [added] technology. We added the cone beam. That increases case acceptance and shows you a lot more dentistry that needs to be done. We did go with the chairside milling, not just the chairside scanning, and we love it. There's so much flexibility that you can get. I have a whole new lecture on cone beam, and it's fun to show the potential of the possibilities and how you do get your return on investment. It's a big plunge, but one that we were — again, we didn't go, ‘What if . . .? What if . . .? What if . . .?’ I said to my partner, ‘What do you think if we buy a mill, oven, scanner, and a cone beam?’ And he’s like, ‘Okay.’ And it's been awesome. Not everyone can do that, but it usually does work out.” (27:00—27:47)

“I like to surround myself [with] people that push me a little bit, that show me a different way to do things than we've been taught in the past, and really like dentistry.” (27:53—28:04)

“This is one last thing I was going to say about what I do like about dentistry. I remember working on my parents’ boat. We had not put the cover back on, and so there was all this black mold thing that had grown. So, I went out there and I spent four hours cleaning it up. Didn't make one lick of difference. Couldn't see a difference. And then, what I realized is with dentistry I get to take this broken-down, diseased thing and make it whole again in a couple hours, and how satisfying that is. It just happens to be attached to humans. Some dentists don't like the human part of it. But you can find a connection because we’re all humans. One way or another, you can find the connection.” (32:32—33:22)

“There's a lot that we miss with communication. Like I said, even proposing a treatment plan — I was 16 years into it and thought I had it all figured out, and even have taken extensive communication stuff. And here comes my associate, and I'm like, ‘Oh. I have not arrived yet.’ So, got to keep it fresh.” (34:12—34:40)

“List all of the things you do in a day. Check the ones you can delegate and highlight what absolutely needs to get done. Not everything needs to get done today.” (38:05—38:15)

“Surround yourself with people that are happy too.” (41:45—41:47)

“It's infectious when you're around people that love what they do also. And it's not just in dentistry, just in life.” (42:09—42:16)

Snippets:

0:00 Introduction.

2:33 Dr. Elliott’s background.

4:24 There are too many unhappy dentists.

6:39 Important things to remember.

8:41 What do you like about dentistry?

12:11 Create a family in your practice.

15:28 Focus on your team’s strengths.

16:38 Do the math and figure it out.

23:11 Delegate what you don’t like doing.

26:05 Find a mentor.

28:29 Attend in-person CE.

30:34 Figure out your mix of services.

34:05 Always be learning.

34:55 Have regular huddles.

37:25 Figure out what you can delegate.

39:28 Find your unique ability.

41:38 Last thoughts on improving happiness.

42:37 More about 3D Dentists.

Dr. Erin Elliott Bio:

Dr. Erin Elliott grew up in Southern California but went away to a small NAIA school in Western New York, where she played collegiate soccer and graduated summa cum laude. She graduated Creighton Dental School in the top five of her class. After school, she settled in North Idaho and began her dentistry career. She has a passion for Dental Sleep Medicine, Short-Term Orthodontics, and integrating CAD/CAM and cone-beam imaging into a general dentistry practice. She regularly lectures on these topics.

Dr. Elliott is an active member of her local American Dental Association, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, American Academy of Dental Sleep Medicine, and was the president and a diplomate of the American Sleep and Breathing Academy. She teaches two-day sleep apnea courses with 3D Dentists and Dr. Tarun Agarwal. She also privately coaches practices about sleep!

Dr. Elliott spends her free time with her stay-at-home husband, Tom, and her two sons. She loves to spend time with friends, golfing, traveling, playing soccer, reading, and serving her community.

Dr. Elliott is dedicated to sharing the tools she has developed and honed over the years in the industry, and she knows these tools will help your practice succeed. 

The Art of Data Analysis: Transform Your Dental Practice as a WHOLE and for each ROLE

Episode #605 with Curtis Marshall

Are you looking at an ocean of data for your practice and letting the fear of drowning prevent you from making improvements? Today Kirk Behrendt brings on Curtis Marshall of Dental Intelligence to explain the art of data analysis and how to maximize its potential. Transforming your practice as a whole and for each role doesn’t have to be complex—find out how to simplify the process on episode 605 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:

•  Subscribe to the Best Practices Show Podcast
• Join ACT’s To The Top Study Club
• Join ACT’s Master Class
• See our Live Events Schedule here 
• Get the Best Practices Magazine for Free! 
• Write a Review on iTunes

Links Mentioned in This Episode:

Download the list of KPI benchmarks

Find out more about Dental Intelligence

Main Takeaways:

Data removes all emotion

Understand and track your hygiene department KPI benchmarks

Focus on the individual roles in order to improve the whole

Be transparent with your team about your metrics

Focus on improving specific metrics instead of chasing them all

Quotes:

“So the whole, meaning, ‘Hey, here's everything that's happening in your practice,’ right, the high level, everything that's going on. The role meaning as an individual, what should I be focusing on? And we have many different team members in different roles in the office. Some people might be two or three different roles, so I'm not saying people, we’re saying roles, like what you need to be looking at.” (06:15—06:41)

“We pull all the data and information out of people's practice management software, so all the ones and zeros, we don't pull the reports because the practice management software makes their own reports. We pull the raw data, clean it up, and give you a whole bunch of metrics that if you're like Kirk and his team, you're going to read those and understand it. You have a decoder, and you know how to read it. But for the roles in the office and what different team members, looking in that see could be very difficult.” (06:48—07:23)

“Here's what we typically do. We take the whole and then we go to the team and say, ‘This is the problem. Go fix it.’ And everybody goes in different directions to try to fix something, yet they don't know if it's going to be related to or not. And they come back and they're like, ‘I'm exhausted’ or ‘This is what I did,’ or ‘I forgot.’” (09:31—09:52)

“[For hygiene] you want to compare, know the delta, the difference between your active patients, patients who have been in your office in the last 18 months, versus how many are in your hygiene program.” (10:19—10:38)

“Okay, So I have my 2000 active patients. Out of those active patients, let's just make numbers easy. 1000, or 50%, of them are in my hygiene department. Of those thousand in your hygiene department, you want to know how many of those hygiene patients currently, as of today, have a future hygiene appointment. That is pre-appointment percentage. Let me say it again. Pre appointment percentage for hygiene is: number one, ‘Have they been in your hygiene program?’ Number two, ‘Do they currently have a future hygiene appointment?’” (12:31—13:13)

“Even if everyone left with a future hygiene appointment, your whole, everything is not always going to be 100% because patients will call and cancel and not reschedule. That as of today goes down. Great job on the day they were here. Good job. Everyone left. But of my whole, how many do not have a future appointment will be much less than how many they leave with.” (14:47—15:18)

“One area of the role is making sure everyone left with a future appointment. In this fake example that we're giving, do we need to focus and pay attention to that anymore? If everyone's leaving with a future appointment, do we need to worry about that? No. Hey, it's good. It's going great. You can celebrate, but you don't really need to track that 100% anymore, because everyone truly is leaving with an appointment.” (17:05—17:33)

“But if my whole is saying, ‘Hey, this is not right, there's something wrong,’ there's another role that needs to be fixed. And that role in this scenario would 100% be about breaking appointments. If they break an appointment, are we rescheduling them? Do we have a follow up with them? How is that system working?” (17:34—17:59)

“Let's now start tracking all of the broken appointments and how many of them reappoint. That is the role. The role we're now focusing on, in talking to patients and improving, the role is ‘Of my broken patients, how many are we getting to reschedule?’” (18:15—18:36)

“In order to accomplish the whole, to improve your 10% of patients in perio, to increase that 10%, the role is looking at two maybe three different roles, but one role being diagnostic percentage.” (26:49—27:08)

“The second would be acceptance percentage of perio. So those two roles now, I can now talk with the roles of diagnostic. Are the hygienist and the doctor working together to find true perio? And that's up to the clinicians—they'll decide that. Then we'd look at the acceptance. How well are they accepting? Now that could be the hygienist, the doctor, and the treatment coordinator, but those would be the two roles that we're going to be focusing on to increase the whole.” (27:14—27:51)

“I don't know necessarily what to do if you tell me the whole. But when we talk about the role of really, ‘Hey, this is what we're going to do,’ and if we do this, then I'm going to love the whole.” (28:04—28:16)

“Because so many times we see a number, and we either say, ‘Team, you need to go fix this big whole number.’ No, no. They're going to do things that may or may not fix it. Give them the role. ‘This is the area we want you to be focusing on. And I know I'm not necessarily going to say it, but I know it's going to improve the whole of the company. But I need you to focus on the role.’” (31:09—31:39)

Snippets:

0:00 Introduction.

02:16 Curtis’ background.

05:03 Whole vs. Role.

07:37 Hygiene department metrics.

09:09 How many of your active patients are hygiene patients?

12:20 Hygiene pre-appointment percentage.

15:28 The role of fixing broken appointments.

19:59 Hygiene reappointment percentage.

24:13 The power of being transparent with your numbers.

25:22 Importance of perio percentage.

28:17 Don’t try to improve every metric at once.

32:11 Last thoughts.

Curtis Marshall Bio:

Nationwide dentists have allowed Curtis Marshall to utilize his passion and skills to take

their practice to the next level. With over 10 years’ experience of marketing and

communication, and 8 years’ experience of practice management, dental coaching, and

operations, dentists love the advantage they get through working with him.

While working in a general practice Curtis used his expertise with systems and

marketing to help a single doctor grow from 20 new patients a month to being a 3-doctor

practice with 400 new patients a month, and $6 million annually.

Curtis is a fantastic motivator and has helped our company with numerous successful

marketing projects. He is energetic, charismatic, personal, and the kind of guy who

makes friends wherever he goes.

Unveiling the Hidden Paycheck Breakdown – Where Does Your Team Members’ Hard-Earned Money Really Go?

Episode #604 with Robyn Reis

Do your team members feel underpaid and underappreciated? If they do, there's a way to fix that! Today, Kirk Behrendt brings back Robyn Reis, HR consultant from Bent Ericksen, to share how one conversation can change the mindset of your team, improve retention, and increase workplace satisfaction. A paycheck isn't all that you offer! To find out the best way to talk about everything your practice provides, listen to Episode 604 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:

• Send Robyn an email
• Join Robyn on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Best Practices Show Podcast
• Join ACT’s To The Top Study Club
• Join ACT’s Master Class
• See our Live Events Schedule here
• Get the Best Practices Magazine for Free!
• Write a Review on iTunes

Links Mentioned in This Episode:

Learn more about Bent Ericksen

Receive coaching from Robyn

Main Takeaways:

Plan how often to have compensation conversations with your team.

Communicate the total compensation that your practice offers.

Compensation goes beyond the dollars your team receives.

Having these conversations can improve retention.

Be authentic when having these conversations.

Quotes:

“Money, of course, is important because we need to have a life and pay our bills. As much as work-life balance and culture is important, money is also a top priority. What I think the missing link is with compensation conversations that doctors have with team members is that the entire package isn't really discussed. Of course, team members are only looking at, ‘What is my paycheck? What are the dollars going into my pocket?’ And I think it does a disservice to the practice if they're not having the conversation about the total compensation statement, the total reward statement, by saying, ‘Here's all that we've invested in you. Yes, that final dollar goes in your pocket. Yes, we want to be competitive and we're contributing to your retirement. We've got X amount of paid days off, paid holidays, uniforms, continuing education. We're investing in you personally, professionally.’ That sometimes isn't viewed in the paycheck.” (5:13—6:17)

“As people talk about raises and engagement and getting to a higher ceiling, at some point, it gets to the top and you really can't continue to add to the bottom line for hourly wages. And so, other non-monetary or other perks then become part of that conversation and part of that reward. And I think what is really key to consider is a lot of people, right or wrong, associate their worth with how much they make, and sometimes they feel underpaid and underappreciated. That's when having these regular compensation conversations play such a key role in employee retention and satisfaction.” (6:27—7:17)

“[The Total Compensation Statement is] a document that helps take the emotional pieces out of it. It lists out line item by line item, here are the taxes that have been paid for you, the PTO that you earned and was paid out, which most states will consider as wages. Here are the dollars, the gross hourly wages that you earn, as well as FICA, SUTA, city taxes, Medicare, Social Security, all of that. And if you live in a city and work in a different city, there might be some reciprocity city taxes that you have to pay as well. So, it really line items everything out so that you know. And you mentioned the retirement compensation and employer match. So, that's being paid on the employees’ behalf. It lists out everything so that the team member can really look and say, ‘Wow, this is what the practice has invested in me. I see a small percentage of that.’ Knowing the value that they have on the team, I think, goes a long way.” (9:06—10:22)

“As we well know, team members talking about their compensation is a protected concerted activity under the National Labor Relations Act. So, gone are the days that doctors can say, ‘Hey, I'm going to wheel and deal and make this deal with you. Please don't tell anybody else.’ We're finding that more and more pay transparency laws — and there are, I think, six or eight states that currently have those laws that say you have to publish a pay range for this particular role. Having those conversations amongst team members can sometimes create that angst. So, it has to be looked at as an authentic, valid conversation that every team member is going to have, that every team member understands where they are on the team, where they are with compensation, and how the practice invests in them.” (10:25—11:21)

[Employment law doesn't follow logic sometimes]. The key word is, in some cases. Obviously, the law is there for protection, just like anything like HIPAA or OSHA is for protection for the practice and for the team member . . . For example, somebody's team member had a sick relative in the hospital, a sick parent. Texted the doctor at 4:00 a.m. and said, ‘I'm out. I've got to go be with my family.’ There was no discussion. It was just, ‘I'm out.’ And empathy, of course, you feel for that person. Of course, they want to go be with their family. Of course, you want to give them guidance and prayers and hope that things work out. But according to the employee manual, there's an approval process to take days off. They're not a large employer, so FMLA doesn't apply. And unfortunately, this was a small enough team that they can't allow or approve an indefinite leave of absence for somebody to stop coming in to work. Is there a legitimate reason? Of course, there is. But here, they were essentially in a position that they had to accept that as somebody’s resignation. It doesn't make sense. It doesn't seem like, ‘Wow, I can't believe she lost her job and lost a family member at the same time.’ But the reality is, businesses are still businesses, and they can't function if people decide, ‘I'm not going to show up today.’ So, that's an extreme example of where employment law and the team member can get very upset and say, ‘But I didn't resign. I had to go do this.’ And this is still a business. We still expect team members to show up, and be on time, and perform the job that they're hired for. So, if they had allowed that person just to up and go, what makes somebody else not do the same thing? And then, if you treated somebody else differently, then the employment law works against the employer to say, ‘Hey, there was some discrimination. You allowed this person to leave unexpectedly without approval, and now somebody else wants to do it, but then you penalize them. That's not fair.’ And so, again, the law is written in a way that we may not like it, it may not follow logic, but it's something we have to follow as an employer.” (12:55—15:24)

“A lot of doctors are under the misguided assumption that at-will employment saves them. Like, that's their get-out-of-jail-free card. I'm at-will, so I can pretty much do anything. That was true a long, long time ago. However, there are nine other laws that supersede at-will, so you have to make sure that you are following those other nine before at-will really kicks in.” (16:46—17:09)

“The difference between exempt and nonexempt is really — again, don't shoot the messenger. It's a federal law, and it's based around wage-an-hour law. An exempt position is when somebody meets four federal work duty requirements that would allow them to be exempt from making minimum wage and overtime. So, those are typically salaried positions. But again, it doesn't matter how you're paid, such as regional managers, practice administrators that have authority to make decisions in matters of significance for the practice. And having a recent conversation with a doctor when he wanted to recruit an office manager, we got into the duties and responsibilities. His expectation would be an exempt position, meaning she could work 80 hours a week and he wouldn't have to pay overtime. And so, the conversation centered around, ‘Well, what is her responsibility?’ The bottom line is, ‘Can she hire and fire or make significant equipment purchases without your permission?’ And he said, ‘Well, no. Of course not.’ And I said, ‘Well, then she's not an exempt employee. In order to be an exempt employee, you have to have this high-level authority.’ And so, we clearly identified that it's a nonexempt position, which 95% of employees in a dental practice fall under. And that is, they have to make minimum wage, and when they work over 40 hours in a seven-day workweek, they have to make overtime with this time-and-a-half.” (17:11— 18:52)

“[The frequency of compensation conversations] would depend on how many team members you have. If you have 30 team members, you’ve got to be more strategic about it. I don't know if I would wait till the end of the year to have all 30 conversations. So, I would say at least once a year, maybe in the middle of the summer when perhaps the schedule isn't as busy as it is normally. These don't have to be one-hour monologues either. This is a 10 to 15-minute, establishing a baseline. We're going to have these conversations on a more regular basis. As we've always coached, it's never performance and pay happening in the same conversations. You really do want to separate them because they really are different conversations.” (19:35—20:21)

“Having that compensation conversation on a regular basis could be every six months. It could be once a quarter. I'd say if you have ten team members or less, you could probably get away with once a year. More than that, you're probably going to want to rotate it maybe every four to five months, checking in, ‘Here's what we're doing. You're on track. Here's where you've grown. Here's the increase.’ Or, ‘Hey, we've stayed steady. The practice hasn't been profitable.’ And so, we're still having those kinds of conversations too, ‘Our hope is we will achieve these goals. If it doesn't, this is where we're going to be. We still want to retain you. We're still doing other things. We appreciate your contributions.’ And again, that acknowledgment and recognition is key in having these conversations.” (20:22—21:14)

“Go into it very authentically. If the doctor is feeling awkward about it, you know what? Say that. Say, ‘Wow, this is the first time I'm having this kind of conversation, but I know it's important. You're important to me, and I am pushing through my uncomfortableness so that we can begin this dialogue.’ And it is just the beginning of a conversation. So, having it written down — I love what you said about data doesn't lie and it really takes the emotion out of it, and, ‘Hey, this was a great learning piece for me too when I broke down everybody's compensation,’ and having that conversation, allowing the team member to ask questions. Like you said earlier, bringing that awareness, letting the team member know, ‘This is how much we've invested in you from there,’ and, ‘Gosh, I didn't know the practice really paid all of this on my behalf.’ It really, really, I think, starts to build that retention stickiness to the practice because they see how valued they are and the investment that the practice is making.” (21:30—22:37)

“A quote that comes to mind is, ‘If you think good employees are expensive, try bad employees.’ That truly does impact the relationship. The more transparency, the more genuine approach to, ‘I care about you. I believe in you. You're an important part of my team,’ let's have this conversation knowing full well that that employee has every right to walk out and talk about it with other team members. So, it also, I think, keeps the doctor on his or her toes on being straightforward and fair and equitable.” (22:38—23:18)

Snippets:

0:00 Introduction.

2:17 Robyn’s background.

4:30 Why this is an important topic.

8:53 The Total Compensation Statement, explained.

12:20 Employment law logic, explained.

15:24 Exempt and nonexempt, explained.

19:17 How to have the compensation conversation.

21:18 Last thoughts.

Robyn Reis Bio:

Robyn began her dental career in 1998 as a marketing and communications director for a large group practice, and instantly fell in love with the world of dentistry. She has spent every waking moment since learning, growing, and collaborating with dentists and their teams, utilizing her expertise in all aspects of dental practice management, marketing, communications, HR, continuing education, and laboratory sales. Robyn's personal goals are to make a difference in someone's life every single day and to give the best of herself to those around her. Robyn and her family live and play in Northeast Ohio. 

Why Freehand Direct Composites will Thrive in the Digital World

Episode #603 with Dr. Dennis Hartlieb

Digital workflows are becoming more and more popular, but what happens when the results aren’t perfect? Today, Kirk Behrendt brings on Dr. Dennis Hartlieb, an expert in cosmetic dentistry, to explain why freehand direct composites are still important in an increasingly digital world. To find out how freehand direct composites can help you have happier patients and more satisfaction in your practice, listen to Episode 603 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:

• Subscribe to the Best Practices Show Podcast
• Join ACT’s To The Top Study Club
• Join ACT’s Master Class
• See our Live Events Schedule here 
• Get the Best Practices Magazine for Free! 
• Write a Review on iTunes

Links Mentioned in This Episode:

Dr. Christian Coachman’s Digital Smile Design.

Learn more about Dental Online Training.

Listen to the DOT Sharecast podcast.

Join the DOT Study Club.

Main Takeaways:

Composite is a first-rate material, but it’s not as strong as porcelain.

Digital dentistry isn’t perfect, so you need to be able to use your hands.

Differentiate yourself from your competition.

Composite veneers are more fixable than porcelain.

When it comes to doing a direct composite veneer, contour is king.

Find satisfaction in your work.

Quotes:

“There's great materials in dentistry, and composite is not a second-rate material at all.” (06:06—06:10)

“The reality is, and I've done enough of this interplay between digital and analog, there are times when you have your digital, you bring it to the mouth, and it's not quite what you thought it was going to be. Also, there's a can't that you weren't anticipating, even though you did everything that you thought was right. Maybe the teeth are too long, maybe the teeth are too short. Even though you use your digital smile design, that's not exactly what you thought it would be. So it's incumbent that as dentists, we still recognize that we have to use our hands. You know, this is what we're about. We still need to be able to use our hands. And for me, freehand composites mean the ability to be able to layer composites, place composites, be able to contour composites and polish composites by hand to create the shape and the texture and the contour and the form that we want and that we need. And while I think it's fine and great to be able to use guides to help us along, I think ultimately, if we're just going to be dependent on a digital workflow, there's going to be times when you're going to fall short and you're going to need to have the skills to be able to meet the expectations of the patients or maybe meet your own expectations of what you want the smile to look like or want a particular tooth to look like.” (14:30—15:40)

“There's going to be, I can tell you, continued break between types of dental practices. You're going to have the practices are going to be doing more boutique type dentistry. There is going to be more of a competitive demand where you're competing against DSOs for more general and maybe traditional practice. So when you get into these boutique practice, you have two differentiate yourself. Part of it is the dentistry you're going to deliver. But part of it is also sort of the artistic view the patient has of you. And so, I mean, patients typically like every week, patients are saying, ‘Oh, Dr. Lieber's such an artist,’ and I'm not. I mean, if you ever saw me draw, you know, I'm not an artist, but I do know how to make teeth look like teeth, or I know how to make composite, or I know how to make acrylic, or, you know, porcelain. I know how to make those look like teeth. That's a skill that I think brings patients into my practice. That's what differentiates my practice from other dentists in my community, is that I'm recognized as being this artist dentist.” (16:06—17:08)

“When I talk to patients and we're talking about cosmetic dentistry, I tell them you have two options when we're looking at materials: we can do plastic or we can do glass. Okay, so glass is going to be porcelain. I'll tell patients ‘You're probably familiar with porcelain veneers, you may have friends who've had them or maybe a porcelain crown.’ And I'll explain the technique. You know, dentist’s going to drill the tooth. I'm going to take an impression either with the putty material or digital material, whatever. We’re going to take an impression, we're going to send it to a laboratory, or we’ll mill it here at the office, but it’s going to be a hunk of porcelain that gets glued on your tooth—but we have to drill your tooth to do this. With the other material, composite or bonding or what you might want to think of as more of plastic material, very often I have to do no joint at all in your teeth. And if I do have to do drilling, it’s going to be a lot less than if I have to do porcelain.” (18:22—19:09)

“When I'm talking to patients, I say ‘One of the things you have to decide is, “Are you someone who wants the least amount of tooth structure removed from your tooth, or are you looking for the greatest longevity of the material?”’ Because that's going to be the biggest difference between porcelain and composite. Porcelain is going to give you the longest, most likely the highest longevity. Composites, it's going to most likely give you the least amount of tooth structure removed. We can make both of them look beautiful. What's in it for you? The advantage of composite, I tell them also is it's immediate. We do it, we're done. If we don't like it, we can change it. When I do porcelain, once it's on, it's on. And if we’re going to change it, we’ve got to drill it all off. We're going to start from the beginning, and I've done that too many times in my career, man. And I hate it. And I tell you, on any given day, on any given day, I'd rather do composite veneers 100% over porcelain veneers any given day. (19:10—20:02)

“[I’d rather do composite veneers] because if patients aren't happy, I can fix it. I can change it. And if ultimately, because I do so much minimal to no preparation, I've had a couple of cases where I've taken it right off and give them their teeth back.” (20:03—20:15)

“It gives you that chance to get out, because once you put a burr on people's teeth, man, you're married to them and they own you, man. It's tough.” (20:45—20:51)

“The better you get at this, than the more challenging the patients you're going to attract.” (21:41—21:46)

“I love my labs, and I'm blessed to work with some really very, very talented people. But number one is the cost factor. And that's something I talk to patients about. You know, if you’re going to do this in porcelain, this is my fee plus the lab fee. So my fee for a porcelain veneer is the same as my fee for a composite veneer, except add the lab fee to the porcelain veneer.” (22:20—22:39)

“I have to explain to the patients, I say, ‘Look, my lab costs are variable. I'm not quite sure what the lab is going to charge me for doing a single and central incisor. We're going to do a single tooth and the fee may be 2 to 3 times, right? If they if they have to make their crown five times to get it to look great, there's going to be an additional cost. So that cost is on you. I'm going to be eating my costs on how many times I have to try it in, but I have to have my costs. I have to have my fee structure to support my dentistry.’” (23:55—24:23)

“In the composite world, I think it's really just about executing at a higher level and just getting better at it. I'm not seeing anything that’s going to be revolutionary, that’s going to be changing the way we're doing composites. I think essentially, we're just getting better at understanding how to handle the materials and how to make everything look natural.” (25:29—25:46)

“I tell patients this all the time, if my composites were as strong as porcelain, I would never use porcelain again. The reality, though, is that there's going to be advantages with the strength of porcelain. But I think that our composite materials will get stronger, and I think that's where we have issues. Just the flexural toughness of composites.” (26:31—26:51)

“This is what you’ve got to figure out, is where do you want to be in 30 years? Dentistry is hard, man. I tell you, doing clinical dentistry is tough. Now, I'm better at it, but it's still hard. You know, working on tooth number two. Forget them. It's hard, right? Working on, you know, distal number two, Distal number 15, you know, tongue is in the way—dentistry is hard. Managing patients sometimes is difficult. Managing teams, you know, can be challenging. So I would say for the young dentist is, ‘Where do you want to be, what type of dentistry do you want to be doing 30 years from now? When you retire, what do you want to be looking back at? Do you want to be looking back and saying, “I've been able to do some really awesome dentistry?” Or do you want to say that, “Look, I've been able to, you know, accumulate this kind of wealth and I, you know, the type of dentistry I'm doing doesn't matter.” Then just grind it out and that's cool. But if the type of dentistry does matter, then I think you got to set your compass.’” (28:38—29:34)

“You don't have to rely on lab technicians, you don't have a lab bill, your material cost is very low. You're really only expense is learning—it’s the education on being able to do that. But once you've invested in yourself beyond the fact that you're able to satisfy so many other patients, it's not like it's just a one for one, you're paying a lab bill and you're getting this. When you're learning, you're growing and it's going to be more enjoyable. You're going to love the experience more. You're going to draw a different type of audience into your practice as you develop these skills. It's going to be more enjoyable. Your team is going to enjoy it more. They're going to be applauding the dentistry you're going to do because you're going to be changing people's lives in a way that you're not going to if you're just going to be doing, I think, you know, sort of the bread and butter and PPO-type stuff.” (31:03—31:53)

“I think the two biggest mistakes or failures to understand is contour is king. I don't care what composite you're using, I don't care if you're off by a shade, it is contour is king. You have to learn contour. And unfortunately, it's the hardest part, I think. I think layering is difficult, but contouring is the hardest part. It’s what takes me the longest when I'm doing a direct composite, like a direct composite veneer, contouring is king. And then second, I think there's the polish in the surface texture, surface finish. I think that's the two keys. The third is learning how to block out so that you don't get shine through with your composites.” (32:15—32:54)

“I believe we have to have satisfaction in what we're doing in our service. As we serve others, I think we make sure that we are serving ourselves as well, making sure that we have satisfaction that we love what we're doing. And not every day is great, you know, sometimes you're like, ‘Oh God, that did not come out the way I was thinking it was going to come out.’ But, you know, you go every day, you know, you get 1% better. You just keep on trying, try and get a little bit better, try and get a little bit better. And evaluate your work and just be truthful and be honest with yourself.” (34:07—34:39)

“We’ve got to make a living, right, and we deserve to make a good living. We've worked hard, people are investing a ton in their education. We deserve to make a good living, but we also need to feel good about what we're doing. We need to go home and say, ‘You know what, we are making people's lives better.’ We're servants and we're doing great, but we're getting this internal satisfaction as we're making people feel better, too.” (35:43—36:07)

“I think in the digital world, if everything goes well, it's awesome. But too many times and I mean, whether this is with implant surgery or if you're doing composites. I mean, anyone who's done, or they've brought their prototype provisionals to the mouth, and all of a sudden there's a can't they didn't anticipate. Even though they thought they did the workflow correctly, something just went wrong. We have to have the hand skills to be able to make corrections. We have to develop those skills. I mean, this is still dentistry. We still have to have these hand skills. So as great as digital is, and I think it's improved dentistry without question—it's made it more efficient, I think there's a lot of things we can do in the digital workplace that we're not able to do so easily in analog—we still have to use our hands. So we have to spend the time, we've got to educate, get educated on how to do techniques better so that we can be even better at what we're doing.” (36:23—37:16)

Snippets:

0:00 Introduction.

01:42 Dr. Hartlieb’s background.

07:14 Dr. Hartlieb’s trip to Spain.

10:05 Learning how to communicate what you’re doing.

13:18 What are freehand direct composites?

15:40 Find a way to differentiate yourself.

17:59 Differences between porcelain and composites.

20:51 The higher the fee, the higher the expectation.

21:51 Benefits of not working with a lab.

24:55 The state of composites.

27:15 Figure out what you want your future to look like.

31:54 What most dentists get wrong about direct composites.

33:23 Taking gratification from your work.

36:07 Last thoughts about freehand direct composites.

37:16 Dental Online Training.

Dr. Hartlieb Bio:

Dr. Dennis Hartlieb is a graduate of the University of Michigan School of Dentistry. He maintains a full-time practice, Chicago Beautiful Smiles, in the Chicago suburb of Glenview, Illinois. Dr. Hartlieb is an instructor at the Center for Esthetic Excellence in Chicago and is an Adjunct Associate Professor at the Marquette University School of Dentistry in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He lectures extensively to dentists throughout the US on the art and science of anterior and posterior direct resin techniques. Dr. Hartlieb is an Accredited Member of the American Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry. He is also a member of the prestigious American Academy of Restorative Dentistry, and the American Dental Association. He is the president of the Chicago Academy of Interdisciplinary Dentofacial Therapy, and officer for the Chicago Academy of Dental Research study club. His dentistry has been seen in many dental publications and he has contributed articles on his techniques in restorative dentistry.

Change Your Hours, Change Your Life!

Episode #602 with Courtney Dalton

Do you like working late hours, missing family time, and not having a life? If your work hours aren't working for you, it’s time to change it! To help simplify the process, Kirk Behrendt brings back Courtney Dalton, one of ACT’s amazing coaches, to share three steps you can follow for the schedule you’ve always dreamed of. Change your hours, and you will change your life! To start taking control of your schedule, listen to Episode 602 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:

• Send Courtney an email
• Join Courtney on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Best Practices Show Podcast
• Join ACT’s To The Top Study Club
• Join ACT’s Master Class
• See our Live Events Schedule here
• Get the Best Practices Magazine for Free!
• Write a Review on iTunes

Main Takeaways:

Time is the new rich!

Prioritize creating a work-life balance.

Set up a scheduling agreement with your team.

Protect your schedule by always sticking to the schedule.

Run with your new schedule. You won't ever regret changing it!

Quotes:

“You spend so much time with your work family — and it is a family because you spend a significant portion, not even of your day, but of your life, in your practice doing what you love to do, which is great. But there's a balance that we're probably missing, and that’s to be able to be present for your family and for your life outside your practice and outside your work obligations. So, it's really important to strike that balance, and find your “why”, and take the steps to make the change.” (2:37—3:11) -Courtney

“Dentists have been classically misled to believe that they have to expand hours to attract patients to do more dentistry. That is just not true. Maybe when you start, to get it rolling. But eventually, the mark of a truly professional practice is when people come to you because of you during the hours that you work.” (3:36—3:57) -Kirk

“There are other people that will teach you, ‘Expand your hours. Work on Saturdays,’ and all that stuff, to grow your practice and grow your gross production. That is true. It will work because you'll be seeing a lot of different insurances and all those kinds of things to grow that. What you lend yourself to when you have less desirable hours is less desirable talent. The best people in the world know that they're good. So, if I'm a great hygienist or a great chairside assistant in your town, I know I'm good, and I'm going to go to a practice that values my contribution and the fact that I want a life. People don't think about this when they expand their hours. They just think of the financial opportunity. But you also have to staff a practice. When you're writing off a third, you've got to staff a practice that has to produce a third more. And it's naturally going to put you in some waters that are dangerous out there. So, I think changing your hours to fit your practice life is one of the greatest things you'll ever do.” (4:01—5:06) -Kirk

“Time is the new rich. I'm going to say it over, and over, and over again. People that have the ability to do what they want with their time are the richest people ever. I don't care how much dentists produce. Actually, that's the most boring conversation of all time, how much you produce, because most people are writing off a third — or more — which means you're working one out of every three days for free. So, that doesn't tell me anything. I think if you really want to change your life, you have to change your hours. Everybody has 24 hours. What separates the best from the rest is how you use those 24 hours.” (5:11—5:45) -Kirk

“We just had an amazing ACT client post a photo on social media of her three beautiful daughters. The caption said something along the lines of, ‘The gift of time. Isn't it wonderful to have this gift of time to be present for your family, for your kids?’ I immediately jumped on — and I beat Christina to it — and I said, ‘Time is the new rich. This is what we fight for.’ Getting more hours in your day is the biggest victory because it puts you in such a healthier spot.” (5:50—6:22) -Courtney

“Knock on wood, none [of the practices that changed their hours have crashed] — none of them. No one has ever changed their hours and said, ‘Man, I wish I could work until 7:00 p.m. again. Man, I wish I could come in at 9:00 a.m. on a Saturday in the summer.’ We don't see that. Maybe it's because we have really great clients, but I think it's really because our clients see the value in that shift. And really, you can't physically be present at work past those 32 hours. For some, that's actually less, I think. We hit a wall at a certain point in the day, in the week, and we can't be our best selves. And if you're giving it all at work, then you don't have anything left in the bucket to give after those work hours. So, is it hard to do it? Conceptually and physically, no, it's not. I could almost guarantee that every person listening to this show right now is like, ‘Oh, I would love to do that.’ Maybe where they're stuck is, ‘How do I get there?’” (6:38—7:42) -Courtney

“When you change your hours and you explain to them why, people will go, ‘Okay.’ Here's a second thought. Don't get into the how. Just explain the why. When the why gets clear, the how gets easy. We've had so many dentists take photos of little kids that are important to them, put them right on the counter, and say, ‘Mrs. Jones, I'm going to point to this photo, and I'm going to let you know we're going to be changing our hours, and that's the reason why. Those gorgeous little faces are the reason we're changing our hours.’ And people will get it. They will all get it. If they don't get it, I really wonder if this is somebody you should give up your dinner time for to serve.” (8:21—8:55) -Kirk

“Never tell anybody what you don't have. You only tell them what you do have. So, when people say, ‘Can you see me at 8:00 at night?’ you don't go down that road. Say, ‘Mrs. Jones, unfortunately, we cannot. But here's what we do have. We have early morning hours, and I can see you at 7:00 a.m. Let's see, I've got 7:00 a.m. next Tuesday.’ You see how I didn't even invite you into the conversation of why I don't have evening hours? Now, you can point to photos if you want to go down that road. But ultimately, we're going to stick to the why. When the why gets clear, the how gets easy.” (9:01—9:35) -Kirk

“The first thing that you have to do is make the balance of work, home life, and personal life a priority. You have to decide and commit that this is a change that you want to make and that you're ready to make. Work is important. It's always going to be there. So is your family. And although they'll be there, they're going to get a little older. Your kids are going to get older. Life moves on. Everything is going to change. So, if you can find the balance between work and home and figure out how to be present for both, that's part one. And really, before you even get there, you have to decide, ‘I'm ready to do this. This is for me, and I want to do it.’ And I think that you have to choose what that schedule looks like based on what works for you, and maybe even what works for your team. Take a few things into consideration.” (9:41—10:37) -Courtney

“[One practice] decided [to change their hours to] 8:00 to 4:00. Here's why. They're a big team. They have four doctors, a lot of wonderful hygienists, a lot of great assistants, admin — great team. Seven to 3:00 didn't work for them. The doctors are very passionate about family — their own and their teams’ — and they have a lot of parents that are on the team. Something that they thought about in regard to changing hours was, ‘Our team is going to be able to be present for either school drop-off or school pick-up. As a group with some of their team members present and the doctors present, they talked it out. The team members vocalized and said, ‘I think drop-off is going to work out better. I would like to be present at drop-off.’ Done. Eight to 4:00 was agreed. It was presented, it had input from the team, input from the doctors, and they start that change in about four weeks. I’m so excited for them.” (11:15—12:16) -Courtney

“When you said changing the hours isn't going to be right for all of your patients, I agree. And here's what happens. In that very same practice, a patient was finishing their hygiene appointment and they were getting scheduled. This particular patient wanted that 6:00 p.m. time slot. They have one day a week where they work until 7:00 at night. This was a patient that wanted the 6:00 timeframe, and this patient did not want to schedule. He didn't want to hear about the value. He just saw that, ‘I can't get my 6:00. I'm not going to schedule.’ So, the hygienist walked him up to the front. And, of course, there was still conversation. There was the doctor exam. There was still business as usual. By the time that patient got from the hygiene chair up to the front desk, the hygienist told the team member that was checking the patient out that, ‘He's decided that our new hours don't work for him.’ That patient put his hand up and stopped her, and said, ‘You know what? Just give me the last appointment of the day. Give me the 3:00. I'll make it work.’ Sometimes, they just need to sit on it for a little bit and decide, ‘You know what? I do value your services. You are wonderful. I will make it work.’ I think that's amazing.” (12:23— 13:41) -Courtney

“One of the best things one of my mentors ever said to me was, ‘You only get 16 summers. That's all you get with your kids.’ My first thought was, ‘That's terrible. Why would you say that?’ He said, ‘Because it's true. You get 16. That's all you get. Make sure you utilize them.’ And what's so cool, if you're listening to this podcast, we're in dentistry — there are no rules. There's none. You can have whatever hours you want. You can finish whenever you want. And patients don't want to leave work. You can say, ‘Listen, let's get you started early in the morning and minimize your time away from work. You could probably be at work by 9:00 or 10:00 a.m.’ All you have to do is believe you can do it, and you'll find that people will follow you.” (14:21—15:04) -Kirk

“Once you decide that you're going to make the change, and you do make that change, now, you need to protect it. Protect your schedule. I am a big fan of intentionally blocking your schedule. This does so many things for productivity, for predictability, for balance. It is absolutely the way to go, especially when you're thinking about adjusting your hours, starting earlier, finishing earlier. Once you've set whatever your hours are going to be, carve out your schedule because you want to make sure that we're going to hit our production numbers — which, side note, you will. You want to make sure the patient flow is still going to work for your practice between the restorative side and hygiene side. So, you really have to protect the hours and stick to what those blocks are going to be in order to ensure predictability and productivity.” (15:09—16:09) -Courtney

“Scheduling agreements are the agreements that you make with your team for how you're going to treat your schedule. So, where do the emergencies go? What is an emergency? What is this high-production block for? When could we lift it, and what will we fill it with if we have to? [Scheduling agreements are] basic agreements around how your framework, your schedule, is going to be honored by each and every person on your team. So, once you decide you want to make the shift, once you make the shift, once you set the schedule, now we're going to sit down with your team and really iron out the details. Go back to your why. ‘Why did we do this in the first place? That's why you can't move these blocks around. That's why you have to stay committed to the framework that you implemented.’” (18:57—19:50) -Courtney

“[If you think your schedule is out of control], it probably is out of control because you're not doing it the right way — and that's okay. We don't know what we don't know. A lot of our doctors are S [personality] styles. They're caring, they're compassionate, they're healers. And that's wonderful. So, they're yesers. ‘Yes, we can fit you in. Yes, we can put you there. Yes, that's okay. I can be in five places at once. Just do it.’ The doctor is usually the saboteur of the whole schedule — but not maliciously. It's with good intent, and it's the reason why we need scheduling agreements so that we can remind Dr. Smith, ‘Hey, remember when we sat down, and we said this is the schedule that works for us and for our patients?’ Just give them a little reminder of what that was in the first place. I have several doctors that are guilty of this.” (20:01—20:52) -Courtney

“You have to have scheduling agreements in place. You have to have agreements with your team. You have to put a container around work because if you don't control it, it controls you. You never say no, and you keep saying yes. And what you do when you say yes to patients is you say no to your family. You say, ‘I'm working so hard for you guys.’ And your family says to you one day, ‘Oh, thank you so much for working so hard for us. We don't see you.’ Don't get yourself down that road. Remember, you're a dentist. You make the rules. It doesn't have to be super hard. You can put a container around work, and you have people come in your schedule.” (21:04—21:42) -Kirk

“Once you make the balancing of your schedule a priority, protect it, set up your agreements, now, run. Don't walk. Don't ever look back. Be super excited that you're never going to regret making this change. There will never come a day when you say, ‘Boy, I wish I work till 7:00 on a Tuesday and I could miss T-ball, or I could miss volleyball, or I could miss the school concert.’ There will never be a day when you look back and regret making this change.” (21:48—22:22) -Courtney

“Dentists think in terms of exceptions. If you're a dentist listening to this, here's what you're thinking. You're thinking, ‘There's one team member this is not going to work for,’ or, ‘There are four patients this is not going to work for,’ and you stop your life because of the exceptions. Trust me, the exceptions will follow you, in most cases. This is called leadership, and you have to lead your practice where you want to go so you have a life.” (23:59—24:24) -Kirk

“If you're even mildly considering doing this, do it. Make the shift. Make the change. I had a team that made the shift from their normal 8:00 to 5:00. They pushed to 7:00 to 3:00 for a week because they were down a team member. It worked better for their schedule. By Wednesday, they decided they loved it, and they redid their entire schedule following that. Now, I'm not saying to do that all the time. But it's amazing. Kirk, to your point, you only get 16 summers. You only have so much time. Don't wish it away. Don't bury yourself in what you have because you feel like you can't get out of it — you can. We can help you. We can absolutely help get that balance and get the change for you so that you can have, as we love to say, a better practice and a better life.” (25:02—25:55) -Courtney

“When you change your hours, 7:00 to 3:00 or 8:00 to 4:00, you have a whole day after your day is done! People tell themselves, ‘I don't have any time. I don't have any time. I don't have any time.’ That's one of the biggest lies we can ever tell ourselves, is we don't have any time. When you change your hours, you change your life, and you truly have a better practice and a better life.” (26:14—26:33) -Kirk

Snippets:

0:00 Introduction.

1:39 Courtney’s background.

2:26 Why it’s important to change your hours.

5:07 Time is the new rich.

6:23 Do practices that change their hours crash?

7:45 Don't subscribe to self-imposed limitations.

9:35 Prioritize balancing work life and home life.

10:37 One way changing hours can benefit your practice.

12:16 Sometimes, patients need a little time to think.

13:45 You only get 16 summers.

15:05 Protect your schedule.

18:50 Scheduling agreements, explained.

19:50 Why your schedule is out of control.

21:43 Run with your new schedule.

22:22 Don't overthink.

24:53 Last thoughts on changing your hours.

Courtney Dalton, BS, RDH Bio:

Courtney Dalton is a Lead Practice Coach who focuses on establishing a solid foundation in order for a practice to thrive. With over 15 years of experience in the dental industry, she is as passionate about patient care as she is about those who are providing it.

Courtney has an A.S. in Dental Hygiene from Manor College and a B.S. in Exercise Physiology from West Virginia University. Outside of coaching, she enjoys teaching group exercise classes and spending time with her husband, Dan, and children, Lola and Levi. 

The Triple Threat: Unmasking the Struggles and Successes of Being a Mom, Entrepreneur, and Dentist!

Episode #601 with Dr. Katie Satula & Dr. Casey Dorsch

It’s incredibly tough being a mother, but when you add the extra challenges of being a dentist and an entrepreneur on top of that, it becomes even more complex. Leadership can be lonely, but to show you that you’re not alone, Kirk Behrendt brings in Dr. Katie Satula and Dr. Casey Dorsch, two members of the Dental Entrepreneur Program, who share their experiences of being mothers, entrepreneurs, and dentists. To learn from their struggles and success, listen to Episode 601 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:

• Subscribe to the Best Practices Show Podcast
• Join ACT’s To The Top Study Club
• Join ACT’s Master Class
• See our Live Events Schedule here 
• Get the Best Practices Magazine for Free! 
• Write a Review on iTunes

Links Mentioned in This Episode:

Learn more about the Wisconsin Dental Entrepreneur Program

Read Traction by Gino Wickman

Main Takeaways:

You need your village.

Find your balance.

Leadership is a lifelong learning process.

Get your values in place and help your team buy into them.

Belonging to a community will help you learn and overcome obstacles. 

Quotes:

“One of the things that scared me [about ownership] was the finances, obviously. You have a huge student loan debt, a huge debt now from the practice, so that was really nerve-wracking, but something that helped me get over that was the thought of like, “Okay, someday I’m going to be able to say, ‘Hey, I’m the owner, my kids have soccer at 4:00 today and I’m leaving.’” I really wanted that flexibility not to feel guilty, not to feel bad, not to feel like a bad employee if I decided to leave early or take vacation with my husband or whatever. So the ability to be flexible. And my dad had that; he was an owner and he was at every one of our soccer games and he tried to be there for everything and he still owned a business. So I thought that’s what I want—I want to be able to have everything, have it all.”  (06:31—07:14) Dr. Dorsch

“I was the complete opposite. I knew from early on in dental school that that was a big draw for dental school is that I could be in healthcare and treat patients and be a dentist and have a fulfilling career, but also be my own boss and own a practice and do all that. So for me that was always my end game mostly because of what Casey’s second point was, is I wanted the ability to have that work-life balance. Be there for my kids, my family, be there for the patients that are in the office and have that. There’s obviously pros and cons to it—yes, I can be there for my family, but you also get a call on Saturday afternoon and sometimes have to go in and things like that, but the goal was always to at some point be a practice owner.” (07:22—08:12) Dr. Satula 

“I’m fortunate on the other side that my husband is in business and finance. That’s his whole background, so we kind of make up a team, and the two of us sat down and started looking at the numbers and that’s where, again, to kind of speak to what Casey was saying about the debt, I learned the hard lesson of good debt versus bad debt and really being able to analyze cash flow.” (08:28—-8:51) Dr. Satula

“I think nowadays we definitely—not to sound biased or sexist or anything like that—but I think men are more involved than they were years ago. I think dads are certainly more hands-on, which is helpful. But I still think the emotional load and the mental load really still falls on the mom. Making sure all the bags are set out for daycare the next day and that your hair is done and this and that, where dad's like, ‘Hey, they're fed, let's get them out the door’ kind of thing, which is great. I'm happy they're fed. And so but being able to be a mom, you know, as we kind of alluded to earlier, it's the fact, you know, and perfect example, last week I got the phone call that our daughter had been really sick for about a week and she a couple days in took like another turn for the worse. And they called my front desk and was like, ‘Hey, we need to get her back to the doctor immediately.’ And I looked at my schedule and I said, ‘Hey, can you call these two patients and ask if they can come right now and let me get this taken care of?’ And then I walked out of the rest of my day and my team handled it and moved what needed to be done.” (14:14—15:25) Dr. Satula

“That does not happen very often, but in the heat of the moment when it needed to happen, I had that ability to be there for my child when she needed it, and I had that ability to have an awesome team that I knew I could walk out and do what I needed to do and they would handle the rest of the day and what needed to go will go on with that. And so I think really the big thing about being a dentist and a mom is creating your village and you know, you have your people around you in the practice that help you succeed, but you also need your village at home, whether that's in grandparents or your spouse or whoever it may be.” (15:26—16:06) Dr. Satula

“I had an awesome rock star of a mom who showed me that there really wasn't a glass ceiling, that you could go as far as you wanted to go. And now having two daughters and looking at them, they obviously have absolutely no idea what any of this means or what Mommy's doing now. But I hope one day they'll look back and see that like I can be anything I want to be. I can have it all. I can be a mom, I can have a family, I can have a very fulfilling career. I can be involved in my community.” (16:29—17:00) Dr. Satula 

“You can have it all in the having the ability to have an education and a career and own a business and not only that, but have a meaningful and purposeful career that I'm showing my daughters that they can do this, too. Or if you have sons, to show them that like what it takes to have a spouse and support them as well as then creating a village around me that's going to support me in both my career and at home is huge. It's phenomenal. And it definitely can be a lot at times. I think Casey and I are in a bit of the thick of it with young ones, but at the same time, it's going back to life. There's no regrets. It all can be done at the end of the day.” (17:06—17:46) Dr. Satula

“So when I joined my current practice as an associate, I was very intentional about saying, Listen, I have a young, young baby at the time, like three months old, four months old. I said, I want to work three days a week, and that's all I'm going to do is three days a week. And then I became owner and that was still the conversation. I'm really lucky. I have a really great partner. So we were partners in this business and he's great. He has kids, so he gets that too and I told him I’m going to work three days a week, that's it. And they're like, ‘Yeah, we get it.’” (17:54—18:24) Dr. Dorsch

“I think one of the hard parts about being a mom dentist is the CE, right? Like you want to keep up with your male counterparts. You want to be going to CE, you want to be doing all that stuff. And I think that's the best thing that came out of COVID, to be honest, is that all this, like amazing CE across the country is virtual. You can do most CE virtually now, and that has been a game changer because I feel like I'm able to take all these CE that before you had to travel. And that's a big deal when you have young kids and you have to find someone to help watch them or you know, you have to coordinate all that stuff, it's a huge deal to be traveling and stuff all the time.” (19:16—19:52) Dr. Dorsch

“I think overall, like the day to day, it's the balance. It's like you're at work, you're feeling guilty a little bit. You know, ‘I have to work, I'm going to the sea this week and it's a nice week out and I want to have them outside the day doing stuff.’ And then you're at home and you're thinking, ‘Am I keeping up enough? Am I doing enough CE? Should I be working on the business? I have a stack of magazines on my desk right now. Should I be reading those right now instead of, you know, going to the farm today with them?’ So I think it's just like that constant struggle in your mind, kind of always like back and forth, trying to find the balance.” (19:56—20:29) Dr. Dorsch

“I think having kids makes you more patient and compassionate for your patients . . . I just feel like it's changed me as a dentist. So when I have young kid patients, you know, you don't look at them like, ‘Oh, they're screaming and crying and trying to be bad.’ You're like, ‘Oh, they're just scared.’ Like, you got to take time with them. Or you do the tricks that work for your kids on your kid patients. And you're just more patient and have more grace for people. I think when you're a mom, it changes you.” (21:59—22:27) Dr. Dorsch

“This profession, you can, especially as an owner, you can make it what you want. And one of the things that I wanted out of this profession and being an owner is this feeling that I am truly a family dentist. I live in the community that my practice is in, I run into people at the grocery store and, you know, my kids go to daycare with some patients and, you know, things like that. And I have really strived and taken pride in cultivating this family practice atmosphere. So my practice does have pictures of my kids all over. And when I had my first daughter, the amount of gifts and handmade blankets and just beautiful things that patients got was overwhelming.” (22:39—23:28) Dr. Satula

“My personal preference in this has been that we are truly a family. So if you walk into my practice on any given day, you may see my husband sitting at the front desk and you may see my daughter playing, reading a book in the waiting room. Sometimes even my dog is in the office. And so it's just kind of going back to that to like, ‘I'm the owner. It can be what I make of it.’ And then the patients that I gear towards who come into my practice are the ones then who value that family aspect and that cultivating of that culture and knowing that I'm going to treat you the same way that I have my own family because we're all a part of this practice.” (23:53—24:33) Dr. Satula

“I think the other thing is like having a vision for where you want things to go and following it. Like we're busy, we're with patients all day, we don't have time to sit there and work on the practice when you're working in the practice and then you go home and you have the kids and you know you're not spending the night like at your computer typing away ideas or anything. So I think having a vision and then finding time to execute it and follow through with it.” (27:30—27:56) Dr. Dorsch

“I came into [leadership] with this mindset that I need to do everything as well as this mindset of like, ‘I am young, I am a female, I need to make sure that they know who's boss and who is going on,’ and quickly realizing, though, that A, that's not the best approach. And I still struggle with that. I mean, I think a huge part of leadership is delegation—being able to delegate things properly, knowing when to lead, when to follow.” (28:48—29:19) Dr. Satula

“I think one thing that has really helped at my practice that we did through ACT was setting up those core values, and as Casey alluded to, getting a vision and a mission and just knowing what your purpose is, because then as you do come up with new ideas or run into new situations or things like that, I'm finding my team now is starting to realize like, ‘Well, this is what our practice is centered around, so how can I make a decision on that that reflects that of the practice without having to come to her with every little thing?’ And sometimes it works out. Other times I'm like, ‘You should still come to me,’ and other times then I take things on. I think the hardest part about leadership is really just finding that balance. But I think exactly as Casey said, having a clear vision and core values and goals helps to shape that in your leadership into what direction you're going to go, whether it's delegating tasks, knowing when to lead and when to follow, when to implement new things.” (30:21—31:17) Dr. Satula

“That was one of the biggest things that the DEP brought to me was that you can own a business all you want, but if you have no vision, no goals, no mindset of where you want this to go and what's going to shape it, how can you expect all your team to get on board? So once we did that, once we went through our new review process, what I learned through this, that got amazing feedback from my team. Things really like shifted in our office a lot.” (35:25—35:53) Dr. Satula

“I've learned to be able to really look at certain key things and pull reports and see where we need to improve and kind of know that it doesn't all have to be done, but sit down with the person who does the ordering and say, ‘Hey, let's try and let's try and cut this back by 2% over the next month’ and just start to get small, measurable goals that brings in other members of the team. So I'm starting to delegate more, learn more; they understand what the value is they're cultivating that I'm trying to grow leaders, and that is stemmed from like each and every session of the DEP. I've pulled something out that we've been able to implement immediately into our practice to then continue to kind of hopefully start to shift things and change things a bit.” (36:01—36:45) Dr. Satula

“The couple interviews I've done of new employees, first thing they get at the interview is ‘These are the core values of our practice.’ And I explain what each one of them means to both our personal and our professional lives of the practice.” (37:25—37:39) Dr. Satula

“I think it just overall creates an environment that they want to be there and kind of take pride in ownership of the practice. And at the end of the day, we're there to treat patients and then that's reflected on to our patients. (38:20—38:35) Dr. Satula

“Part of my favorite part about this program is when we get to do office hours or have lunch or something like that because you get to talk to all these other dentists. And that's where I think you start really learning stuff. You talk to them about their practices, what they do that works, and little ideas they had or things they tried. And I think that's a huge benefit too, just have this like, little community.” (40:29—40:49) Dr. Dorsch

Snippets:

0:00 Introduction.

01:40 Dr. Satula’s background.

02:37 Dr. Dorsch’s background.

05:03 The journey to becoming entrepreneurs.

13:10 Being a mother and an entrepreneur.

21:57 Impact of having a family on being a dentist.

26:07 The challenges of leadership

33:32 Learning from the DEP

36:46 The importance of core values

39:16 Learning from the dental community

42:30 Last thoughts

Dr. Katie Satula Bio:

Dr. Katie A. Satula has deep roots in the local community. She graduated from Muskego High School, then attended Carthage College in Kenosha, earning bachelor’s degrees in biology and neuroscience. While attending college, she volunteered in dental clinics in Nicaragua, Jamaica, and the local community. That volunteer work confirmed her desire to pursue a career in dentistry, using her talents and passions to help others. Dr. Satula earned her Doctor of Dental Surgery (DDS) degree from the Marquette University School of Dentistry.

Dr. Satula began her career practicing dentistry in Greenfield and in June 2017 purchased the practice of Dr. Thomas Raimann. In January 2021, she then purchased the practice of Dr. Richard Mueller. She looks forward to continuing the tradition of high-quality dental care that Dr. Raimann and Dr. Mueller began over 30 years ago. Dr. Satula loves working with patients of all ages and prides herself on providing caring, comfortable, and comprehensive dental care to all of her patients.

Dr. Satula enjoys spending free time with her husband, Steve, and their friends and family. She also enjoys cooking, reading, and cheering on all of the great Wisconsin sports teams.

Dr. Casey Dorsch Bio:

Dr. Casey Dorsch is a native of Muskego, WI but has called Green Bay home for the last 6 years. She attended University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and majored in Biology with minors in Chemistry and Pre-Professional Health Sciences. After graduating Summa Cum Laude from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, she followed in her father’s footsteps, attending Marquette University School of Dentistry, where she completed her Dental Training and graduated with honors in 2017.Dr. Dorsch resides in De Pere with her husband Alex, their two small children, and yellow lab. She believes in treating all patients as if they were her own family and is passionate about delivering individualized quality care.