Dental Unscripted | Getting into Ownership and Practice Management Insights

I was just following your lead.

Welcome to Dental Unscripted,

where Mike Dinsio and Paula Quinn break

down the practice ownership journey,

one episode at a time.

Starting up, buying,

and running a successful dental practice.

what up what up guys welcome back to

another episode of dental unscripted it is

podcast day for paula and michael and we

are here and it's a beautiful day and

we're talking about all things leadership

and uh it's just michael and paula if

that's not good enough for you so good

morning paula how you doing i'm good how

are you

Good, good.

I had some cool other podcasts today,

and it got the juices flowing.

I think there's some really cool content

that you all should check out.

I don't know when this is going to

post or publish,

but we had some good conversations today.

We're going to just talk about something

that I think probably needs to be on

repeat, repeat, repeat,

and it's just leadership.

I think Paula and I are in the

trenches every single day on this topic

with our clients.

It's one thing just taking on the stress

and the weight of ownership in general,

the taxes and the

state requirements and the W, you know,

the W twos and the gustos and, uh,

you know, payroll and employees.

And then there's the dentistry.

You gotta, gotta be good at dentistry.

And then, but just all of that.

And, you know,

trying to find ways to sharpen your ax,

uh, or your tools on leadership is,

really is going to help you throughout

your journey of ownership.

You can't just be an owner and not

be okay at leadership.

You might not be great at leadership,

but you got to try to improve and

be better over time.

And you will.

And that's what we're going to talk about

today.

So Paula,

when it comes to just like leadership

stuff,

you know we're going to get into some

tactical things later here or some some

stuff but like what do you see out

there in leadership i mean you're you're

on the practice management side so much a

lot more than i am even like what

are you seeing out there as far as

just our younger owners doctors and owning

practices and what you know what are you

seeing

Yeah.

Great question.

I, you know, it's funny cause I actually,

this comes up on occasion when I'm talking

to dentists,

especially when they're frustrated with

managing team or being the leader.

And it's kind of funny.

And I,

and I probably said this before on the

show.

I don't know.

I say it so much,

but gone are the days of just popping

up a dental practice on the corner,

having the loyal, you know,

patients, even employees,

because you're the only dental office in

town or one of three, you know,

if you want to be in dentistry,

this is where you're going to work.

You stay a lifetime or however long,

you know,

those days have changed both from a

patient perspective and from an employee

perspective.

So dentists have had to morph into actual

business owners, not just dentists.

So,

Unfortunately,

they don't teach leadership,

marketing or management or business in

dental school.

And it's a huge miss and they should

probably consider it because you are now,

you probably always should have been,

maybe you were a little organically,

didn't even know it,

but you need to know marketing.

You need to know management.

You need to know leadership and you need

to have business skills to really run a

practice these days.

You can't rely on Betty Jo for the

next forty years to run your business.

Totally.

What we've done in the past.

And no offense to Betty Jo,

but she didn't go to school for any

of that either.

And she's got your practice in the palm

of her hand.

She's the first touch, the last touch.

She's managing your money.

She's paying your bills sometimes.

She's your HR person.

And you're just relying on this gal who

learned it off the street or the

predecessor before her.

And then you're mad when you don't get

the return on your investment when you go

to sell or even a month-to-month basis.

You don't get to check out anymore if

you really,

really want to run your business.

So what I'm seeing is...

you know, always, and still today,

I just want to do dentistry.

Why can't my front office or my hygienist

or my assistant just do this?

But I think there's more awareness now,

which is what makes it different.

I think bills are higher.

I think team wages are higher.

I think, you know,

student loan debt is higher.

I think, you know,

especially if you acquire a startup,

purchase a practice, you know, the, the,

per square footage is more, you know,

all of that is more.

You can't just.

Hang a shingle.

You can't just hang a shingle.

I want to ask you like a follow-up

though on that.

It's like,

you've been in the industry for

thirty-five years-ish.

And you talk,

you tell me about stories of like going

into work and

just what it was like back then.

And I think that, I think,

I think people need to hear that to,

to,

to play into what you're saying here is

it just used to be totally different.

So, so paint that picture first of all,

but then second of all,

You're talking about my dentist who... Oh,

yeah.

That's exactly what I'm talking about.

Just go to the stories.

And then I also want you, though,

to bring it back to,

did you have an employer working in all

those years that did hold you accountable

and that was a decent leader and how

much better maybe you were?

Can you think of that?

Because I can think of that in my

career, but in dentistry... My ex-husband.

Yeah.

Oh boy.

Let's talk about Jerry Burns.

Well, like, why don't you pull it in,

pull it all in together?

Like where we started and, and,

and where we're at now.

Like,

Yeah.

So I, you know, it's, it was,

you know, and I think the difference too,

is it was a,

it was a job back then, you know,

I, I learned on the job dentistry.

My first dentist I worked for, you know,

he was a smoker.

He didn't wear gloves mask.

He didn't have to, it wasn't,

it was before AIDS.

It wasn't a thing.

which was weird it's weird now to me

um but he would smoke he had a

pack of cigarettes in his front pocket

he'd go in his office smoke before when

i would go to get him he'd put

his cigarette on the side of his desk

still fuming still lit and come in and

and numb the patient or what have you

and then

I hoped he washed his hands.

I don't really remember.

I got to be honest with you.

I'm thinking he probably did at least wash

his hands.

But they go back and smoke.

So not only did the building have someone

smoking inside of it.

That's weird.

That's so weird.

That didn't wear gloves or a mask.

It's one thing not smoking in a restaurant

and thinking, oh, that's weird.

No one's smoking in a restaurant.

But it's a whole other conversation when

it comes to dentists.

But he had patience and lots of patience.

We were always busy.

If you did that today,

no one would come to you.

Oh, God.

You get judged out of the practice if

you're smoking behind doors on your lunch

break.

But it also was like...

There were no numbers.

There were no morning huddles.

Auditing the schedule.

No, you just clocked in,

saw your patients,

said goodbye for the day.

And so many doctors still operate just

like that today.

We walk in them as practice consultants,

which is actually surprising.

Not smoking and not wearing PPE these

days.

Wearing masks and gloves.

Yes.

Sorry.

I thought that was assumed.

But the way those offices were ran back

then, thirty five years ago,

and how offices are being ran today.

Yeah, that still exists.

And those people are bitching about all

the things that they can't control.

They're bitching about Delta Dental and

you know,

cancellations and Gen Z and my marketing

is not working.

And they're just constant complaining

because they're running the business the

same as that guy was for you, Paula,

thirty years ago,

just clocking and clocking out,

expecting different results.

But you as a team member,

you just said it shifted when you and

Jerry

your ex bought your first practice?

Is that where you were going with this

with leaders and expectations?

No, just he is a leader, you know,

in general, that that era, and let's see,

he graduated in nineteen ninety eight.

It may have been before then,

but but I was in hygiene school then.

So my my, you know,

I worked in a couple other offices and

I would say they kind of ran the

same

You know,

right before I went to hygiene school,

I was in a front deskless practice.

So that was a little bit cutting edge

where we didn't have a front office.

And we took as dental assistants,

took our patients beginning to end.

There were probably more.

Well,

there were definitely he did wear gloves.

He didn't smoke.

And there were more expectations.

still didn't know the numbers still didn't

do morning huddles still you know it so

it was about you know whether it was

the era or my ex as a business

owner where there was a shift and it

was continuing education it was morning

huddles now i will say the caveat is

we did pay for a consultant um you

guys paid for a lot of stuff

Yeah,

we paid for a lot of continuing education,

consultants,

things to always better ourselves.

We were a groupie on a couple of,

you know,

podcasts and Facebook groups and things.

So we were very prepared for ownership.

Yeah.

not over prepared like they are today,

but prepared.

Not prepared, you're never prepared,

but there were some things that were like,

wow, that's a great idea.

So where I saw it shift was just

being intentional in your day,

whether it's a morning huddle,

whether it's auditing your schedule,

whether it's setting goals and

expectations with team members,

But the whole thing around it is

intentionality.

You're making your day happen proactive

rather than your day happening to you

reactive.

And that's when it changed.

And I'll give Jerry some kudos, obviously.

He's a great dentist and a great business

owner.

But I don't know if it was us

together.

I don't know if it was the things

we listened to.

I don't know if it was

just that era of people, you know,

because you do evolve as, as each,

each generation involves evolves.

And so I don't know exactly what it

was, but I do know that.

And we are obviously going into ownership.

So shifting from team member to owner is

like a, is also, you know,

as a caveat in there.

But what I'm saying is the shift is

now you have to be intentional, right?

And you have to plan and make anything

happen that you want to happen.

You have to have a plan around it.

You can't just trip on it.

Trip over it.

Well, I mean, with that being said,

leadership is something that you kind of

don't just trip over.

In my mind, it is all about.

intentionality and having maybe structure

or a plan or a strategy.

All of it.

Yeah, all of that.

And, you know,

when I think about like trying to get

performance out of something,

someone I start with, OK,

and it was actually somewhat of a

consultant to me and you as business

owners is like,

You wake up one day and you're like,

shit, this isn't working.

I need better out of something.

And when someone challenges you,

it's like, well,

were the expectations set?

Do they understand their role?

And then on top of that,

do they have a system?

And without any of that,

you can't expect what you're expecting

better.

You can't expect better out of someone.

If you don't have some structure,

some systems,

how do you hold someone accountable if

they don't even know what the hell they're

supposed to do or what the training should

be like?

So I guess what I'm saying is, folks,

stop.

stop like just expecting things to be

different.

Okay.

I even like what Cisco said on another

podcast and, you know,

it was about marketing and stuff,

but it's, it's the expectations.

It's, it's taking the money,

what you're paying everything and water

falling backwards to set your expectations

first.

You,

you love the quote or the thing by

Gary Vander check, Chuck, Chuck, Chuck,

Chuck, Chuck.

it's about the hourly wage per the hourly

per hour person.

So I think,

I think setting your culture and your,

and your own expectations start first

because you're thinking,

and I kind of joked even on the

last one or no,

it was earlier on this one.

Jeez, I'm losing my mind.

Betty Joe, Betty Joe is.

Eighteen to let's even say thirty an hour.

She is running.

a minimum five hundred thousand most

practices right but up to a two million

two million million dollar business a

business business and you're mad when it

doesn't perform the way you want it to

only you as the owner are going to

care more than anyone in the world so

you you have to design what you want

And if we have the eighty twenty rule,

right, if eighty percent of that happens,

you're going to be more successful than

any of your colleagues.

And I think it starts with what do

you you know, we throw vision around.

We joke about this.

We've talked before.

What do you want your culture to look

like?

What do you want your business to look

like?

What is your business plan in one year,

five year, ten year?

Now you design around that.

Does this person fit in my vision?

Am I going to get to my million

or my second practice with this person on

my team?

So again,

it's that strategy or intentionality,

whatever you want to call it.

But I would say I would start with

culture first.

What do you want that to look like?

That's part of your vision.

So we do a, an exercise and it's,

it's all about, which I think is the,

the foundation, the, the, the foundation.

It's a perfect word for it,

for our culture.

And it's, it's agreements.

It's the first thing that we do in,

in almost every single one of our, uh,

team meetings.

Uh, when we first sign a client is,

is really just identifying what you guys

are

team doctor it's not us not paul and

i but what you guys want to be

for the practice who who you want to

be so that's that that is kind of

the first step is agreements agreeing to

be something meaning i'm agreeing to the

team and i want the team to have

great attitude have uh impeccable uh um

be being open for, for training, um,

be a mindset, having good mindset,

having safety and conflict,

having open communication,

having whatever it is.

Okay.

It, that is,

that is who you guys are going to

be.

And, and without define defining.

And I,

I want to say that a couple of

times in a row here.

So that sticks without defining the,

what you're trying to fix you can't just

expect the fix to happen that should be

super obvious right so so if people have

bad attitude or showing up late or not

open-minded to training or change whatever

you have to have a discussion with the

whole team and say this is who we

have to be

Do we all agree with that?

It's an agreement.

You have to get them to agree to

it.

You can't just force agreements on people.

But you got to get people to agree.

Once they agree to it,

then they have to agree.

You can't force it.

I'll say it again.

Once they agree,

then you can hold them accountable to that

agreement.

You force it on them.

You can't hold them accountable.

But if they all,

but there's just a different type of

dictatorship.

You know, it's, it's, you work,

you work for me and you'll do this

versus, Hey, this is your,

this is your second family.

You spend more time here than you do

here.

at home sometimes.

Yeah.

And we want you to be happy and

we want to be a big, happy family.

You can decide either way, but you,

you probably are going to go burn through

a lot of employees.

If it's,

this is my way or the highway,

we're all going to do this.

And I don't really care about your

opinion.

That's right.

Now opinions can be vetoed,

but I think when, like you said, Michael,

you know, when,

when you all agree together, um,

then there is an integrity inside most

people that are like,

I said I would do it.

I'm going to do it.

Right.

Versus you're going to do it.

Okay, I'll do it.

Well, that's where culture sucks.

You're sitting around thinking that, wow,

my culture sucks.

My team treats this like a J-O-B.

Well, that's

Doing it that way is why.

If you include people and get them to

agree to it and then hold them to

that,

then that's a much better way of

communicating and coexisting with people.

So just who we're going to be and

how we're going to show up,

that's like the foundation.

So that's step one.

Paula,

once you get people to just agree on

attitude and behaviors and open-mindedness

and safety and communication and all that,

just be good human beings,

then the next layer of that is what

do you do every day?

What's your freaking job description?

What do you contribute to the business?

And you go through this exercise all the

time.

I'm shocked.

I'm actually shocked still to this day.

on how bad it is in dental offices

can you explain why i'm saying that

because it's so bad and it's shocking to

me how how people just don't really know

and what explain that because obviously

they pick up the phones but like walk

walk our audience through what i mean by

that

You know,

it's funny when we do the exercise,

how much resistance we get to,

and I'll tell you a little bit about

it.

So for instance,

we usually start with the front because

it's the first and last touch for all

patients.

It's where the money goes in and out,

the phone calls.

So it really is,

if the front of the house is out

of order,

it trickles back and then back up to

the front.

Inpatient experience and finances and all

kinds of ways, it rears its ugly head.

So we start there because if it's not

clean and we're not doing it correctly,

it's,

it's just going to make a muck of

the rest of the practice.

So job descriptions,

the reason we like to go through this

is because we find two things.

Everybody says they're all doing it.

So number one,

we're doubling down on something that one

person could, could handle.

Number two,

what we really find out is there are

things nobody's doing.

Um,

And it's always funny when we say, okay,

who handles, you know,

who handles sending out new patient forms?

Oh, we all do it.

Okay, well, how do you know if it,

how are we checking to see if it

got sent out?

Well, we just all know to check,

you know,

so you never miss sending out new patient

forms.

Well, sometimes that happens.

Okay, well,

why does it happen if you have a

system?

well because someone forgot okay then you

don't you don't have a system or your

system is failing you which which we're

going to get to systems but just that's

what that's what's great about a job

description it's like here are all the

jobs okay here are all the jobs in

the or tasks tasks jobs yep yep who

is doing them

Who's accountable if it doesn't get done?

So that's my that's my favorite.

Yes, accountable.

That's where we want to start.

And when are you making the time to

do it?

Well, we don't have a time.

Well, of course, you don't have the time.

You're not making the time.

So if it's an important job.

Sure, answering the phone,

that's reactive.

You got to answer the phone.

Someone checking out, somewhat reactive,

but we'll teach you how to be proactive.

So there are things around that.

Majority of it,

you can plan and be intentional,

proactive, have time management.

And then things don't get missed.

Nobody would want to get on a plane

where it's like, okay, well, who, well,

we both kind of do it, you know?

Well, what happens if it gets missed?

Well, you know, the plane crashes,

you know, it's like, no, right.

This is a business.

You got the co-pilot and the pilot saying,

yeah, we kind of both fly the plane.

Yeah,

we both kind of go through the checklist

and, you know,

every once in a while we miss something.

No, it's, you know,

what is it being done?

How is it being done?

Who's doing it?

You know,

and is it done every day succinctly?

So, you know,

job descriptions are not just what,

but it's who and when.

Yes.

Okay.

Out of that,

Out of that comes, like you just said,

the systems, right?

Because once we find out, okay,

everybody's doing it, you know,

we narrow that down.

We get the win around it.

So the time management around it.

and who is accountable we find out but

are they equipped to do it okay let's

pause on that because because okay so just

walking you guys through this is this is

just leadership one-on-one stuff this is

probably all we're getting to today is

just the well maybe but it's hard to

do this but like you've got agreements of

who you're going to be again culture be

good human beings

agreement.

Then you've got a document or something

written that says,

you are responsible for these things.

She's responsible for these things.

You guys all do it.

But if insurance verification isn't done,

she's accountable for it.

If there's a hole in the schedule,

you're accountable for it.

It's very crystal.

But everybody tries to help everybody

else,

but your ass is on the hot seat.

So who we're going to be,

what you got to do,

and now Paula's pivoting to...

Okay,

maybe you're not capable of some of these

things,

or maybe there's a system broke to do

the things you do.

So you need all of this, guys.

I just want to rewind.

She's going to go to systems.

But you need all of this that we're

talking about.

I'll say it again.

You need all of it.

before you can start expecting different

results, accountability.

Without any of this, you can't say, dude,

do your job better.

Like, do your job better.

Just, I need better from you.

Well, they're just sitting here saying,

what the fuck are you talking about?

So Paula, tell us about systems.

Sorry to interrupt you.

I just want to,

I need everybody to understand that it's a

three-part process before you can hold

accountability,

which was what we're getting to.

So now you've created these job

descriptions and tasks and everybody knows

who they're accountable for.

And then it sounds like you find that

in that process,

they don't even know how to do that

job.

Or maybe that job is not a hundred

percent.

It's like eighty five percent because the

system's broke.

Is that what I'm hearing you say?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Or they don't have the time,

which means the system's broke.

If you don't have a time,

you you don't have a system.

Yeah.

It's basically it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The next thing is, you know,

who's right for what job.

And organically,

based on kind of what they tell us

they're doing,

we're going to probably take some stuff

off this person's plate,

put it on this person's plate.

It streamlines, you know,

there's some logical sense around it,

which I'm not saying they're not logical.

I'm just saying they're not even thinking

about it.

They just inherit it when they walk

through the door.

Like a rebalance of workload or something.

Yeah.

Yeah.

yeah um you know if you're if you're

if you're checking somebody in and you're

you're you know required to audit the

schedule it probably makes sense that you

you know are the ones that check on

the confirmations too because

you know, you,

you just went through the schedule,

see what, who needs what,

if the patient has a balance,

you're going to reach out, say, Hey,

before you come in, you have a balance,

you know, there are just some logical,

logical things.

If you have enough people,

it's nice if someone kind of handles

hygiene and somebody kind of handles

restorative as well,

because they're

kind of two different beasts.

So that's, that's,

I'm not going to get into systems as

much as I am.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Why you need one.

Totally.

So part of that time management I talked

about is part of the system.

Like the first question is, you know,

have you ever done this and do you

know how to do it?

Show us how you do it.

And usually through that we get,

they're eighty percent, you know, some,

of course, fifty, some ninety,

but they're usually eighty percent

But unfortunately,

that twenty percent is what causes the

biggest disruption.

Of course.

You know, and and they and of course,

sometimes we get fought on it because they

feel because eighty percent of the time it

works out OK.

Why do we need to do this?

Well,

the time costs the practice big money,

big money come out of their check.

So they don't even know it half the

time.

You know,

when an insurance claim doesn't get paid,

we've got to refund a patient or a

patient refuses to pay a bill.

It's usually because up front,

we didn't provide the full picture of what

was owed,

when was owed and what can happen if

it's not covered by the insurance.

So

now as a patient i'm fighting that well

who has to eat it the practice the

dentist and and by the way guys we

started this conversation talking about

the guy with no gloves no mask smoking

cigs and just kind of meandering through

this life that he's in

And the employee that she just described

said, well, eighty percent is fine.

He didn't even know.

Well, of course he didn't know.

But I'm saying the employee,

the employees are treating it like he did.

It's just kind of like Paula,

you're the consultant.

You're telling me that this is a problem

because I'm not getting that other twenty

percent done.

But the office functions,

we do what we do all the time.

It's fine.

We do a million dollars.

We're fine.

We do a million dollars, Paula.

But that's the funny thing is the doctors

that are paying attention now,

not like the other guy, Dr.

McSmoke a lot.

um you know the difference between him and

maybe your ex-husband paula jerry is he

watched everything or you guys together

watched everything and now there's

accountability now there's systems and

that twenty percent

made you go from a million to one

two to one four to one six and

on it's that little twenty percent because

if you just meander you're just gonna sit

at that like million dollar mark or

wherever you're at you're not gonna see

those gains that that growth just kind of

honestly it'll get worse because it'll

compound you know it'll compound

And more and more money ends up sitting

on the table.

I think people,

when systems aren't in place and things

aren't expected of them,

they get worse over time.

I agree.

I totally agree with that.

Yeah.

So, okay.

Now we're agreements.

Yeah.

job descriptions, systems,

the last part of leadership,

which is the tail end of this.

And, you know,

we're doing a podcast in thirty,

forty minutes like you're not going to be

able to do all this stuff masterfully.

But we want to put this big concept

in your head so you can start chewing

on the pieces because it takes years to

master each one of these pieces, probably.

But the last part is accountability and

and you know guys this is probably the

most important part of all of it so

if all of that sounded exhausting that was

the easy part that was the easy part

the the exhausting part the frustrating

part is when you spend the time and

paul and i are owners we can speak

from experience when you when you spend

the time to break down each one of

these

All the way through systems.

And then in the end,

you find out that it really is a

person problem.

Hey, we talked about it.

We agreed to it.

You're capable of doing it.

There are systems in place.

You're still not doing it.

You're not doing it.

You're not doing it.

You're not doing it.

And it turns out they don't give a

shit.

And you got to move on from that

person.

But you can't move on from that person

without all the other stuff.

We get all the time people calling us.

This employee stinks.

This employee won't do what I want.

But did you set the agreements?

Did you provide?

That's what I'm saying.

That's what I'm saying.

Did you?

And then did you?

And the last piece is what you're about

to get to is the HR part of

it.

Yeah,

the documentation and all of the things.

But but there's a book that we presented

a couple of years ago,

more than a couple of years ago.

It's the one thing,

and the one thing teaches you to just

focus on the one thing to get big

gains.

But in that book,

there's some pearls about patterns and

creating change by pattern.

And it takes, I think they said,

to do something every day, sixty-six days.

There's other stuff out there that says

thirty days.

Tony Robbins might say thirty-three days.

Whatever.

But you guys that are probably listening

aren't doing something every day like I'm

talking about.

Are you asking your front office,

did you collect all the money?

Did you collect all the money?

Did you collect every single day?

Here's the adjustment.

What is this adjustment for?

Well,

you shouldn't even let them provide

refunds, but what is this refund for?

It's...

Yes.

A hundred percent.

They just, you just, even the write-ups,

Michael, like it's, you know,

we talk about all the time and please,

sorry if any employees are listening

because I'm, I'm comparing you to kids,

but I'm not, but it's because it's,

it's not your business, right?

So you're treating it differently.

Even the most loyal employees, it's, it's,

it's a job,

but

you know, even like with the HR,

you wake up one day and you realize

your employee has been late like five

times.

Did you write them up?

No.

So even when it's as small as like

they came in late, it's documenting,

it's letting them know you're watching and

you have expectations around it and it's

not okay.

You understand, you care, you're invested.

It's so, when you do this,

it sets a tone for so many things

of like, you know,

Now you now Michael talked about

accountability.

Now you have something to hold him

accountable to because you have a true

story, not a feeling.

It's not a feeling.

Everybody says I feel I feel I'm so

frustrated.

I want to fire her.

But but I'm not.

someone that's coaching you is looking at

you guys and saying but you you're not

there's nothing there it's all feeling i i

get all the time i'm broke i'm broke

i'm broke i i'm the cfo uh apparently

of of not apparently of our clients and

I feel like I'm broke.

I'm feeling my, and I get into it.

I'm like, you're not broke.

It's all right here.

What are you doing with it?

Well, here's the numbers.

Here was what we could do better.

And usually by the end of those calls,

it feels, you feel empowered and you know,

not feel, you know, you're not broke.

It's the same.

And what you need to do if you

are a little lower than you would like,

where, where am I at?

So I know what to do.

Yes, it creates this system of leadership,

creates a clarity, a crystal clear plan.

If you think Nancy Jo is not getting

the job done and you've gone through all

three things, agreements,

job descriptions, systems,

and at the end Nancy Jo still sucks,

it's an easy decision.

That is super clear.

But if it's a feeling and you don't

have any of those other things in there,

it's just a feeling, guys.

It's just a feeling.

So remember, we're working with,

and this sounds terrible,

and it actually is terrible.

Like we talk about teachers deserving so

much more money.

Well, the dentistry,

dental industry needs more money too,

but the poor dental assistants make about

the same as a Wendy's worker.

But the poor dentist,

the reimbursement is so bad and it's a

small.

I know.

I'm not saying you guys should be paying

more.

I'm saying the industry deserves better in

that way, in that way.

But just remember they could probably make

the same at Wendy's.

Just think about that, guys.

One of our clients actually said that.

And I'm like, oh, my gosh,

you're being dramatic.

And I looked up Wendy's and I was

like, shit, it is Wendy's.

And you work way harder as a dental

assistant than you probably do flipping

fries.

And so just remember,

they got to love where they work.

They got to have systems.

They got to have clarity.

They want to be part of something.

They want to have growth, all of that.

And they may not have gotten the training.

Just remember all of that.

And if you can check all the boxes

and pull it all the way through to

accountability,

and then you micromanage for thirty three

days or sixty six days,

you'll create patterns.

And guess what?

That's when the growth begins.

Sometimes that takes two years, guys,

to be honest with you,

to one to two years of that and

new owners.

Our clients that are new owners that hire

us as consultants and they want results in

three months and we're sitting here

talking about all this,

you can't accomplish this in three months.

So the younger owners just appreciate the

fact that this is a body of work.

You have to give some intentionality to it

and you have to actually care about fixing

this part of it, of your business.

You want to be able to call Henry

Schein and say, you're screwing me.

Sell me stuff cheaper.

Result.

Well, with people and employees,

it doesn't work that way.

It's a process and it's a body of

work.

And if you go through that,

you'll get the gains.

You'll have the culture.

You'll have an amazing team,

all the things.

So, boy,

I just went on a rampage there.

But that kind of sums up what we

were going for today.

Paula, any thoughts?

Well, yeah.

I mean, anything that you wanted to add,

I know there's a book that you love

and that kind of encapsulates this.

So at the end of it,

once you find out that there is an

employee that has bad energy,

that you might need to get rid of

them.

You want to share that book?

You don't know the energy bus.

Oh my gosh.

It's like your favorite.

Bad energy.

I got it.

I got what you're saying since it's,

you know, yeah.

I mean, you already gave it all away.

You even said the name.

So just say it.

Oh my God.

You literally just said the name.

I know.

I thought you were spacing on it.

So I was waiting on you to breathe

so I could actually say it.

Your pause was just too long.

It looked like you were looking at me.

It's the energy bus.

Anyone who's listening,

it's the energy bus.

It helps see if you got the right

people on the team.

John Gordon's the author.

It walks you through just this process of,

look,

you might just not have the right people

on the bus.

And I think it's a good read.

But I do think before you get there,

I think our team members would even say,

whenever...

Whenever something's going wrong, bad,

whatever you want to call it,

I do always look within first.

What can I provide?

What support can I provide?

What training can I provide?

How can I help before I just automatically

say I want to fire someone or they're

not the right person?

Because it is usually a lack of systems,

a lack of understanding,

a lack of expectations.

And I think that the tighter those are

with all the steps we just went through,

You know, like Michael said,

if you give all that and at the

end, it's still not working,

then it's probably just not the right

person.

But if you haven't given that,

I think you owe it to yourself and

to all of your team members to provide

that.

love it okay well guys as if it

could just be done that easily um it

can't be but um keep it real guys

out there uh i i i don't um

typically uh sell or promote but if you

guys are looking for a good coach to

walk you through some of this stuff

next level would love to have you um

reach out schedule call um the michael and

paula you see in this show is exactly

who you'd get on that call and so

just bring your problems i sometimes feel

like i'm a therapist more than a business

coach but that's part of it and uh

we'd be happy to help hold you accountable

give you some stability some clarity so

that you can take

those tools and and hopefully become a

better leader grow your business have a

better life in general so uh reach out

reach out we'd love to have you so

without further ado yeah exactly reach out

we'll be here talk to you guys soon

thanks again for being part of the program

bye

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