Thriving Practice with Tracy Cherpeski

Most private practice owners have a feeling they're not being paid what they're owed by insurance payers — but very few can prove it. In this episode, Tracy Cherpeski talks with Brett Spark of Aroris Healthabout why payer underpayment is so common, and why visibility into your payer contracts might be the most overlooked lever for practice profitability. 

Brett's path is unique: he spent the first half of his career inside a large regional health system before being recruited into a private practice CEO role. That shift exposed him to how differently independent practices operate — and to a problem almost every one of them shares: not one of his clients has ever had their own contracts, amendments, and fee schedules fully organized in one place. 

You'll hear how underpayment happens, what Aroris Health's software does to catch it, and why Brett believes doing something is always better than doing nothing when it comes to your payer relationships. 

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Are you the one still writing every patient email, every social post, every practice announcement? In this solo episode, Tracy Cherpeski asks the question most practice owners don't want to answer: is that actually your job? 

This isn't a time-management talk. It's an honest look at one of the most predictable tipping points in founder-led healthcare practices — the moment when caring so much that you do it all yourself quietly becomes the thing capping your growth. Tracy walks through a real client story (two locations, one human bottleneck), the guilt loop no one talks about, and the root-bound plant metaphor that just might be the most accurate picture of where your practice is right now. 

You'll leave with three gut-check questions to test where you actually stand — and a clearer sense of what it would take to finally let the season end. 

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Private practice ownership comes with a particular kind of loneliness that no one warns you about. In this SNACK episode, Miranda Dorta turns the mic around and interviews Tracy Cherpeski about what isolation actually costs practice owners, and why so many high-achieving providers resist the very support that could help. 

Tracy gets honest about a pattern she sees often: practice owners who don’t even recognize their own isolation until someone else names it first. It’s rarely a lack of support at home, she explains; it’s reluctance to burden the people who already have full plates of their own. 

You’ll also hear why generic networking falls flat compared to peer-specific community, what visibly shifts in a practice owner’s body language once they let their guard down, and why “I don’t have time” is often about more than the calendar. 

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Five missed phone calls could be costing your practice $5,000 to $10,000 a month — and most practice owners have no idea it's happening. In this episode, Tracy Cherpeski talks with Erika Sanchez, CEO of Healthcare Call Center, about the hidden gap between marketing spend and practice growth. 

Erika's team, built almost entirely of stay-at-home moms working from home across the country, has helped healthcare practices triple their lead-to-new-patient conversion. She breaks down why nearly half of new patient inquiries come in after hours, why speed to lead can make or break a new patient relationship, and the simple three-question framework her team uses to build trust in under two minutes. 

Tracy and Erika also dig into why patients still want a human voice, not a bot, when it comes to their health — and why the disconnect between marketing agencies and front desk teams is one of the most common, and most fixable, problems in healthcare practice growth. 

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What if getting financially clear had less to do with being a "numbers person" and more to do with leading your practice with confidence? In this episode, Tracy Cherpeski sits down with Luisa Alberto, CEO of People First Finance, People First Foundations, and Kindredly — three companies built around making self-employment less overwhelming and more sustainable. 

Luisa shares her own path from philosophy student to business finance expert, and why she believes that financial clarity is one of the most underrated leadership tools a practice owner can develop. She breaks down the real cost of doing it all yourself — from missed compliance to the emotional weight of carrying unresolved financial questions — and explains why knowing the difference between a bookkeeper, a CPA, and a CFO could be what stands between a practice you love and one that slowly drains you. 

You'll also hear why building your practice to be a sellable asset matters from day one, and what "burnout brain" looks like — and costs — when you're trying to make strategic decisions from a depleted place. Partingadvice: keep going.  

Read the full show notes, memorable quotes, and key takeaways. 

Find Luisa: 

Websites: PeopleFirstFinance.com LuisaKAlberto.com 

LinkedIn 

Instagram @peoplefirstfinance 

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Something feels off — but you can't quite name it. In this SNACK episode, Tracy Cherpeski joins Miranda Dorta to talk about what Tracy calls "practice identity drift": the gradual, hard-to-see process by which a practice owner's original vision gets buried under the weight of compliance, overcommitment, and reactive patterns. 

Tracy breaks down why drift looks different from burnout, why overcommitment isn't just about saying yes too much, and what it actually takes to course correct without overcorrecting. You'll hear about her 90-minute onboarding process, the one-lever-at-a-time method, and a simple three-question framework to help you figure out if — and where — your practice has drifted. 

If you've checked all the boxes but still feel disconnected from the practice you set out to build, this one's for you. 

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What if the most powerful marketing tool a physician has isn't a website or an ad campaign — it's themselves? In this episode, Tracy Cherpeski sits down with Ginger Allen, founder of Your Medical Liaison and president of the Florida Medical Association Alliance, to talk about what actually works when growing a functional medicine practice or any independent healthcare practice. 

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With 12 years of medical marketing experience, Ginger has seen it all — physicians who invest in $100,000 machines before they have a patient base to support them, marketing companies that take the money and disappear, and the slow grind of burnout that sets in when doctors are trying to run a business on top of practicing medicine. Her antidote: get marketing off your plate, lead with your personal brand, and build a practice where you're the draw — not the decor.

You'll hear why functional and integrative medicine requires a fundamentally different marketing strategy, how Ginger helps physicians show up on camera without hating every second of it, and what she's consistently noticed about doctors who make the shift to root-cause care: they're genuinely happier. 

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Every practice owner has a moment when they do the math — and quietly wonder whether they'd be better off just becoming a barista. If you've been there, this episode is for you.

In this solo episode, Tracy Cherpeski introduces the Alchemy of Change: a three-stage framework for understanding why the hardest seasons of practice ownership aren't signs of failure, but of real transformation in progress. Drawing on the medieval concept of alchemy and the surprisingly rich etymology of the word "quicksilver," Tracy breaks down calcination (the burning), dissolution (the messy middle), and coagulation (the solidification of something new) — and explains why you can't skip or force any of them.

She also shares what it actually looks like on the other side: not perfection, not done, but a practice that fits the person you've become. And what a guide's real job is in this process — especially during the stage when most people want to quit.

If you're questioning the call right now, this one is worth your full attention.

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What if the biggest obstacle to a thriving practice isn't your clinical skills — it's everything around them? In this episode, Tracy Cherpeski sits down with Damien Adler, co-founder of Zanda Health and a practicing psychologist, to talk about how the right systems can take administrative burden off your plate and give you your practice — and your life — back.

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Damien and his wife built and ran a private psychology practice for 14 years before selling it, and they learned firsthand how fast admin can overwhelm a growing practice. What changed everything? Building systems so good that the practice ran while they were in Europe for a month. That experience is what became Zanda Health. 

In this episode, you'll hear how simple automations can improve patient experience before they even walk in the door, why patients actually judge your practice on things that have nothing to do with clinical care, and how Zanda's AI features handle transcription and charting securely — compliance first, always. 

Plus: Damien's one piece of advice for practice owners who feel overwhelmed by where to start. 

Read the full show notes, memorable quotes, and key takeaways.  

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What if the thing quietly holding your practice back isn't a systems problem or a staffing problem — but a grip problem? In this SNACK episode, Miranda Dorta turns the mic around and puts Tracy Cherpeski in the interview seat for an unscripted conversation about one of the most persistent patterns in healthcare practice ownership: holding on too tightly.

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Tracy draws on over 15 years of coaching experience to explore what white-knuckling actually looks like day-to-day, why it's especially hard for high-achieving clinicians to recognize, and what it really means to surrender — not as giving up, but as a powerful, active choice. She also shares a personal shift that changed the way she works with practice owners and created a surprising ripple effect in her clients' confidence and growth. 

If you've ever felt like everything depends on you, this one is worth your next commute. 

Read the full show notes, memorable quotes, and key takeaways. 

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