Dental A Team Podcast

Dental A Team
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This podcast is here to give dentists and all dental office team members, in EVERY position, TACTICAL and PRACTICAL TIPS to: - Be more efficient - Have more fun - Improve doctor and team communications - Eliminate frustration - And make your life easier! Jump in! We are thrilled you have decided to LEVEL UP and be part of the DENTAL A TEAM! New episodes every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.

  1. 15h ago

    #1,159: What Are You Actually Marketing Your Practice As?

    Do you market your practice for its dentistry? For its atmosphere? For the team? Something else? Tiff and Dana talk about why it's so critical to market the right aspect of your practice, and then following through on that aspect. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. We are back again. I've got Miss Dana here with me. We are busting out a few podcasts today and I love this so much. ⁓ I just love podcasting with you, Dana. It's easy, it's fun. We get on tangents sometimes and soap boxes and it's wonderful. And I hope everyone out there, all the listeners, love it as much as we do. Dana, how are you over there? I know we're hot and it's like...   I know, we probably have like 3 % humidity, but we're feeling it. But anyways, how's it going?   DAT-Dana (00:32) It's going good. It's going good. Today is a busy day, I feel like, you know, busy days help the day go by fast and helps me feel super productive. So I'm excited that podcasting with you gets to be a part of this busy day.   The Dental A Team (00:44) thank you. Thank you. I love the word productive that you slid that in there. I have been very well, I think I could be more intentional about it. I say very, but I think I've been slightly intentional about it because I was talking with gosh, my sister or somebody I don't know, but they were like, how come? it was my sister talking about hairdressers, hairdressers. love you, Christie. I love you. But sometimes it's like, my gosh, I come out more exhausted than when I went in. And it's confusing. And I thought to myself, I think   This is just me thinking out loud. told my sister, I think that when you're asked, how are you, our initial, nobody thinks what's the best thing that happened to me today that I can tell this person, right? Because we're like trying to hold back and we're like, I don't want to make you like, I'm having this amazing day. We're buying a house, like, but I don't want it like, I don't know where you're at in your life. So I don't want to overshare and be extra and make you feel bad about anything in your life. So when you ask me that question, I'm going to say, well, I'm busy, like,   life is busy. How are you? Because I want to gauge how you are before I'm excited about my life, which is really sad if you think about it. But I thought to myself, everyone who sits in a hairdresser's chair gets this she's like, what's the news? What's what's new? What's what's going on? What's the drama? And you sit there and you spew all of this busy and anything that's like, exciting because drama is like exciting. It gets you pumped up, right? And they're   DAT-Dana (02:00) Yeah.   The Dental A Team (02:11) their five people they hang out with the most are drama. So then I come in and it's like, my gosh, I'm so exhausted. So my point in that is my intentionality has been to try to be like, I'm I've been super productive lately. Because I'm always going to be busy. It's just life like you've got you've got a whole farm over there of animals and humans. Dana, I don't know if I'm the first person to tell you this.   But you're going to be busy for the next 10 years. You got 10 years left that you're going to be longer, but I'm going to give you 10. That's what I'm going to say today. You're going to be busy. So I've been trying to be like, I've been super productive. So when Erin's like, how was your day? I'm like, it was, it was good and it was productive. I don't know. It just feels better. Your words, words create your world. And I feel like it's so easy to just mute yourself and not celebrate.   DAT-Dana (02:41) Yeah.   The Dental A Team (03:08) in this kind of world where we're like, I want to engage where you're at first because I don't want to be too much.   DAT-Dana (03:14) Yeah, yeah, I agree with you. And I think a part of it too is like I sit in the turn, I'm like, wow, like she talks to a lot of people, like, how can I wow her? Right? Like, or how can I be different? Right? I know she hears about a lot of people's kids and a lot of people's this and a lot of people's that. So like, where do I come in with like my uniqueness or like something that like, also will make her day a little bit like better because it was more interesting than all the like all the same conversation that she hears. Yeah.   The Dental A Team (03:20) Yeah. Yes.   Yes.   Yes.   Yeah, and I think it's every profession, you know, hairdressers are just like easy because you're stuck there. And I mean, you and I are stuck there for like three hours because I don't know why I'm a blonde highlight stick so long. And it's fine. Or like when you go get your nails done or coaching calls, you know, I'm like, Hey, how are you? And they're like, good, busy. I'm like, no, like, tell me about like, tell me about you. I want to hear about you. So like, we get the same   kind of response even, and hopefully people aren't walking away saying they're exhausted. Sometimes I think they probably are because I can be a lot, but you just let us know. You let us know what you need. But anyways, I think you made me think of that, the intentionality behind making sure that our words create the world that we live in. And I've been trying, if you guys remember the try, if you didn't see Summit or you weren't at our mastermind, you might not know, which means I haven't been very great at replacing busy.   with productive, but it's on my bucket list. That's my intentionality right now is to be productive. And I think that statement, just, you you say something and then my mind spins, but it really does relate to what we're talking about today because it's part of marketing. think I love marketing and people think it's wild. My fiance thinks I'm crazy. He's like, you're so weird that you love marketing. like, everything is marketing. How I present myself, how...   I hold myself, how tall I sit up, the words that I'm using. I'm constantly marketing to the people around me. I'm marketing to my friends. Was I a waste of your time today? Did I create value? Did I hold space for you? Was I intentional? Did I inspire you in some way? I'm constantly thinking of, gosh, how can I positively impact this person in front of me? And that is marketing. That's who I am to my core.   That's my culture. That's my, my mission. And to me, those are what create the marketing, right? We, we think Dana, marketing company and Google ads and Yelp, Brody has got his detailing business. He's like, is Yelp worth it? And I was like, well, you got to pay for it. Like we can go down to Yelp rabbit hole, but all you think of all these things and Facebook and meta ads and all these things are marketing a hundred percent. But in reality, we're constantly marketing to the people around us. Does you have   Bri, like tell me poke holes in that, Dana. I don't know. That's my mindset and people think I'm crazy for it.   DAT-Dana (05:58) No, I agree with you   100 % in that because I feel like at the end of the day, yes, you can do Google ads and you can do meta ads and you can have the best website and you can have SEO that is tractioning beyond belief, right? But then what are you marketing? And it is you, the experience, your team, yes, the dentistry, right? But they did a survey not that long ago. I wanna say like right post COVID and it was like, hey,   What are you looking for when you choose a dentist when you go back? And I still think that like this 100 % stands today. And that was like honestly and truly the quality of the dentistry that they received was well below on the list than where I anticipated it to be. And it was truly that white glove experience. And so I think that you're 100 % correct that yes, those things are great, but you won't get traction on those things if the experience   The Dental A Team (06:41) Yeah.   DAT-Dana (06:52) the personality, sometimes even too, just like the appearance of the office. When I walk in, do I feel calm and serene versus it looks like it's chaos here and it kind of gives me more anxiety? All of those things are marketing. And two, all of those things will drastically impact anything that you spend money on for marketing too.   The Dental A Team (07:16) I totally agree. Yes. And gosh, there's so many things. There's so many nuggets in there. I love it. I truly believe I tell, I tell doctors all the time and teams. I'm like, yeah, cool. You did an awesome filling. It was great by perfection. They didn't have to come back for an adjustment. Guess who doesn't know that some people have to come back for an adjustment. The patient that didn't have to come back for an adjustment. Guess who doesn't know that you picked the right shade of A2.   to match the filling so it doesn't look like they have a filling on tooth number two. The patient who has a filling on tooth number two, they can't see it, they don't know. It's like you can't even see tooth number two while you're filling it. You're like cranking your neck and your arms are all wild. Patients don't know what a good filling is. They know what a bad filling is, right? They know when it hurts, they know when their floss gets stuck, they know. But patients who aren't experiencing those things, to them it's everyday.   DAT-Dana (07:50) Now, you can rarely even see tooth number two.   The Dental A Team (08:12) normal life. They're just like, cool, thanks. Awesome. I'm good to go. They don't. He has like, we know we're like, heck yeah. Like I remember, I remember early in my dental days, this is slightly, this is really embarrassing. Actually, my doctor used to laugh so hard. And finally, he was like, Tiff, let me tell you what's supposed to be here. Because we would have our template for our notes, you know, I've never told this story. So so

    25 min

  2. 1d ago

    #1,158: When You Want the Dentistry Part, Not the Business Part

    Owners, this one's for you. Especially those who don't want to have to care about the business side of being a practice owner. Kiera's here to prove that staying clinical while still leading the practice is simpler than you think. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent- Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team Listeners. This is Kiera and I am excited to podcast with you guys. Today is such a great day and I hope you're having an amazing day. I love hanging out with you guys. The podcast is such a happy space for me when I get to podcast and have this day. You guys let me go into creative Kiera zone where I get to speak from my heart. I get to speak from honesty. I get to speak from experiences. I get to   laugh with you cry from you meet so many of you in real life and I just feel so honored and excited that This is my real life. And so thank you for being a part of the podcast family. Thank you for Listening and sharing and leaving reviews. I read those reviews. I'm so grateful for you guys and Please share this podcast any episode that you've had you guys can always head on over to our website TheDentalATeam.com click on podcasts and I kid you not you should search any topic and it's all there so   Just wanted you guys, any issue, anything, I try hard to be a great resource for doctors and for teams. And to just remind you that life is so good. I think that the glass is half full and that doesn't mean it's always easy, but I do believe that it's worth it. So today I wanted to kind of dig into like what happens when you buy a dental practice and you are an owner.   but you really just love to do dentistry and not the business side of it. Like done, done, done, done, done. Anybody out there, anybody, please raise your hand in real life. If that's you, if you know somebody that this is the case, be sure to send this podcast to them because I think that this is so real and I think it happens. And I see people in like, Kiera, I wanted to be a dentist because I wanted to just be a dentist. I didn't want to do the business of it. And I'm like, amazing, let's chat about it. So I think that it's, you want to open your own practice because you want to decide how to treat patients and you could do it better than that.   DSO or the other dentist that you were working for but then you get into and you're like, wow, this is a lot harder than I thought. And so what do we do when you don't want to run the business? Like, what do we do then? So because the answer is you don't get to abdicate and it doesn't mean that you get to say, I'm not doing this anymore and someone else can do this. Guess what? You're still an owner. Just like if you have a kid and you're like, I don't want to be a parent anymore. Well, guess what? That's part of it. But that doesn't mean you have to do it all. And   So I just want to help you get some good clarity. We did this in our Dr. Mastermind that we call it Think Tank Tuesday. And people come together on the first Tuesday of the month and it's very fun. And I think that this is just a space for you of ⁓ how can we help you? Because I want you to be thriving and happy in your practice and not dreading. And there's ways that you can do it. Like you can have your cake and eat it too. So let's make a way for that to be real. So ⁓ I think that it's where there's great dentists who feel frustrated, they feel overwhelmed.   They feel stuck because they don't want to deal with the business side and they don't want to take that on. And this is me. I created a consulting company, but I didn't want to know about the numbers. And I was like, numbers are not my jam. And now if you've heard me for any length of time, you know, numbers love me and I love numbers, right? We're going to be really good at making sure that you get obsessed with that. Just like I love being a business owner. And, ⁓ this is something that it's a, do I have to, or do I get to, ⁓ my gym trainer?   I like a lot of her posts and she often posts about, it something where like I have to go to the gym or I get to go to the gym? And it's crazy how just sometimes even that little bit of a mindset shift can help us realize like I have to run a business or I get to run a business. ⁓ Both are real and both are available. But hey, let's break it down because I think that this is something of like, what happens if you only want to be in the operator and like, what are some solutions for that?   And then what happens of your practice if you maybe are not right person, right seat for that. And then three things that help you to be able to stay clinical and also lead the practice because it might be simpler than you think it is. And your job description might actually be a lot easier than maybe what you're piling on yourself because I think sometimes people feel running a business means they have to do it all. I know I fell into that trap. I know I've been guilty of that before. Like, hey, I'm the business owner. I have to do this when guess what? That's not necessarily true. So what happens is   We did this as an exercise for our dentist the other night and I had them write down everything on their to-do list. And then I had them go back through and I said, okay, what things really are things actually only you should do. And it was crazy because I had quite a few of them like talk. Like I tell them our think tank is like, pretend we're in the living room with me and we're just all hanging out. We're sharing our best ideas. Like there's no team members that are allowed to be there. Teams is not cause I don't want you there. I just want your doctors to be able to speak openly and honestly and to be able to get the support from other owners in the room and.   It was crazy because the doctors were like really the only thing like even dentistry, you could have somebody else do. Right. Um, but in this scenario, you're like, but I love to do the dentistry. I don't want to have to do the rest. The only thing really you have to do as an owner, you got to set the vision, know the profitability and drive the culture. Like that really is your role. Now, as I said, those three things, you might be like, yeah, right. Do you see my whole to-do list over here? Like you want me to ship you? Yeah. Send me a picture of it. I'd actually love to see it.   I'll help you out. So please, by all means, be a pen pal for me and I will happily look at your to-do list and help you see it differently. Sometimes you're just in the weeds, but other times what happens is a lot of things on there you don't have to do and maybe you're not the best person. But like I said, of the things I listed off, that's really what an owner needs to do. And if that didn't light you up, guess what? You can actually hire somebody who wants to do that. So, but if it did light you up, then great. You can be a doctor, a dentist, and then those are the three things really you need to do.   Yes, you do need to know the numbers. You are a business owner. You don't just get a pick and choose. I'm like, I don't want to care about the numbers, Kiera. I don't want to look at it. Well, guess what? Tough luck. You did sign up for a business and your job is to make sure it's profitable. We don't want to have our teams go out of jobs. Like you have a responsibility to your patients and to your team. And that is part of it, but it doesn't mean you have to be the manager. You don't have to do the one-on-ones. You don't have to like order the supplies. None of that falls on your list. But I think sometimes we think it does, but you've got to make sure that you have to have like,   very clear priorities, very clear direction, and you are leading and guiding. So what happens with that is as a leader, you've got to set the vision and the direction of where we're going. And if you don't have that, then you're going to have constant interruptions and confusion and like, what are we working on? And Dr. you're annoyed because it's just a firefighting rather than a proactive preventative. So if you can work through this and figure out where we headed, what's the direction? And then next step is accountability and org charts. Who does what?   In our team, we just did this nice little shakeup of all of our team members. And it's wild. I thought it was right here. I was going to show you. So it's not, I usually have a carry. We have our accountability chart and I have like, open it up like a legend, like, okay, I have this task. Is this really a me task or who does it belong to in their job descriptions? And we talked about it because dentists are like, but I'm so afraid of like asking team members to do these things. That's why I don't delegate. And I'm so grateful for our doctors.   having trust and vulnerability in our mastermind. ⁓ And we talked about it and it's like, but as team members, if that's part of my job, let's make sure it's realistic for me. Let's make sure I have a clear job description. And then let's make sure my KPIs report that. So when you get this clear, like, doctors, yes, this is the annoying part. And this is where I love consulting and helping offices. Like let's help you get the vision, like where we had in the next 10 years and get your whole team rowing towards that vision. Then we're gonna make sure we've got correct accountability charts. Like who does what? And sometimes having a consultant come in to say like,   No, no, no. Like this is your job. This is what you get to do. I had some team members trying to push responsibility and I was like, no, no, no. This is what we get to do. and after that, from there, then from there, it becomes easy. Like doctors, this is your job. Now, sometimes I think doctors might have a little bit of an ego and not want to let go. And someone like, can do it better, faster, easier, true, but choose

    21 min

  3. 2d ago

    #1,157: Of All the Dentists Out There … (How to Stand Out)

    Standing out as a dental practice is easier than you might think — and thank goodness for that! Kiera gives three steps to find what makes you and your practice unique even when you feel like you're as vanilla as can be. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent- Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and I hope you're having an amazing day. I am so excited to podcast with you. I get so giddy when I know it's podcasting day and I literally can't sleep at night. I get so excited for the next day and I just really want to make sure that what I'm delivering for you and all the different podcasts are exactly what you need because I do believe that my job in this world is to positively impact the world of dentistry and give you quick tactical tips that are going to change your life, change your practice and make you   Remember why you chose dentistry. Dentistry should be fun, you guys. Owning a practice should be fun. And I know that it's not always going to be fun. I've accepted as a business owner, there's highs and lows, and that's just the flavor of business ownership that we sign up for. And so today I wanted to just give some quick tactical tips because I feel like so many of us are trying to figure out how can we stand out as dental practices without it being just about cost. There's so much more because we talk about marketing and you guys know my Achilles heel is marketing. Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun.   ⁓ But it's really truly how can you be your own brand, your own fragrance, your own style, and yet still attract the patients that you want. And I think it's actually easier than you might think because we help practices all the time stand out for who you want. And what I found is the number one most important thing when you're looking at your practice is be true to who you are. I remember I was reading the book Traction.   by Gina Wickman, guys know, shout out. I'm a big proponent of that book. do a lot of Dental A Team's version of traction. We have traction within Dental A Team. And, I remember at end of the book, they were talking about how, like, know thyself and be free as a visionary. And, ⁓ if that's who you are or you're an integrator, like know thyself and be free. And I think when it comes to your own practice, know thyself and be free and make sure it's what people want. And then make sure you're talking to those people. I think about, have some friends that are.   are very into nature and them getting on the podcast, I'm probably not going to attract the same type of people that I attract. I want people that are driven, growth minded, entrepreneurs, people that are seeking that next level, people that want to have fun in life. That's who Kiera Dent is and that's my style. That's my brand. And I remember when I started Dental A Team, I had some people tell me that, Kiera, there's absolutely no way you're going to be able to impact everybody across the nation and that's not going to work for you as a consultant. And I am so grateful and thankful that I stuck true to my gut.   I struck two to who Kiera Dent is. And while at the same time I can say true to Kiera, I need to also know what the market's asking for. If I'm just here to talk kumbaya with you, I'm probably going to attract a different crowd. But the people who want to be with Kiera, who want to be a part of Dental A Team, it's crazy. At the masterminds, I look at our doctors and our office managers and they are very similar to who I am and who I am on the podcast. So if that resonates with you, come be a part of our community.   you can reach out, Hello@TheDentalATeam.com or go to our website, book a call. I'd love to chat with you. And I do still vet a lot of the people coming into our company. And, ⁓ I want to make sure that you're a good match for us. And so I think when I'm looking at what can you do to stand out within your own practice and how can you compete? It's who are you and what makes you different. And if you don't know, go read your reviews, go read the Google reviews, go read to see. And if you read dental, interviews, they always talk about that. They're fun, that they're positive, that they changed my life, that they make dentistry so simple.   That is Kiera Dent to the core. wanted to be the Dr. Seuss of systems. I wanted to make doctors and teams have easy profitability without it being hard. And so when I look at the reviews, that is true core to Kiera. So I want you to say who's true core to you. ⁓ And a good way to do this is to go back to what your core actually is. So go back to what the core values are. Why did you even start the company? When I go back and I look at Kiera Dent, like what were my three core fundamentals? You can ask Tiff this was the beginning of day one. Like it was fun, do the right thing and ease.   from the beginning of time, it's always been what I've said. I said, if we're not having fun, I don't wanna do this. Like truly, it's a hobby for me, it's a good time. And now we've created into an incredible business. Do the right thing always. Like do the right thing for the customer, do the right thing for our team, do the right thing for our clients. Like that is what I want you to do. And I'm not gonna sit here and give you a rules of do the right thing. Like as a core individual, you need to have that to your core. To me, it's a, we over deliver. We always come to the table. Like I want you just to do the right thing. And that needs to be a moral compass for you.   And then ease, I don't need people who make it clunky hard, all the different pieces, I need you to make it easy. And that's been my model since the beginning of time, I wanted everything to be easy, do the right thing and fun. That's Kiera's core, that's who I am. And so for you to go back and it's core values versus aspirational values. And so I really want you to look at what are the core of your company? And is that fulfilling?   I remember there's dental office I opened, me and the doctor, her core was very edgy. would say edgy is probably one of our core values of that company. We were listening to Drake at six in the morning. Like that was our core and we wanted it to be this edgy vibe. were in downtown Denver. That's what we did and it attracted the right type of people. Now my parents, if they walked into that dental practice, there is absolutely no way in their right mind that they would want to stay there. But a lot of people in downtown Denver, we knew our avatar, we knew who we wanted. So we were going to attract that. So I really want you just to think of like,   How can you stand out? How can you make sure that this practice feels like home to you? So step one is go back to your core of why did you even start this business? And let's make sure that that's really incorporated in everything you do. Number two, I want you to really make sure that who you are fundamentally is what you're branding and what you're speaking to. ⁓ And then make sure the third thing is you look to see what do patients really want and what are they valuing? So.   I think so many practices, the reason you get lost in the mix is because you've just got standard marketing across the board. says like, we care about our patients. We have the exact same services listed. We've got generic online presence. There's nothing that identifies or differentiates you. There's a practice in California that I really love. And she said like, we love ⁓ changing the way people feel about going to the dentist. And I have another dentist who their tagline is to be the community, the, like the dentist that the community chooses.   ⁓ And I have another office that's like to change the way people feel about going to the dentist. And another one is to just be your foodie dentist. Those people, you guys, I didn't even pull up my notes. didn't look at it before I got on the podcast. Those are ones that I can just rift, repeat, remember because they stand out to me. They're not just generic marketing. And so for you, what is it that makes you stand out? I've got a doctor and he called it, ⁓ I think it's called Empower Dentistry.   ⁓ and I love that because his whole model is like empowering patients to be confident about their health, to be confident about their decision-making and really spend a lot of time educating his patients. So for you, like, what is that one thing for Kiera? You guys, I'm the Dr. Seuss of dentistry. I have a good time. have a lot of fun. I am not your standard consulting company. We do things very different at Dental A Team. I want people, we get the same type of results, if not better.   But we do it in Kiera Dent's way. We do it in a fun way. We do it in a way that makes team members happy. Our job is to light people up. Life's my passion, dentistry is my platform. That's Kiera Dent. And if that doesn't resonate you, then you're not gonna be listening to the podcast. But if it does resonate with you and you're like, yeah, I wanna have the best life and I wanna have team that's lit up and I wanna do it in an easy way, not a hard way. You guys, I'm not cookie cutter. If you want standard scripts on how we do X, Y, we have them, but that's not gonna be where I'm going to lead from. We're gonna lead from what's your vision and your practice to what did the numbers tell us? Then we're gonna implement systems based on that information.   That's how we operate. Most people are like, Hey, you want systems? Fantastic. Here are your systems. And I'm like, no, why am I coming in and giving teams more work? Like nobody wants that. What we want is what's the vision of the practice? What are the numbers tell us? Let's put systems into place that way. Again, it's all boiling it down to that ease, that simplicity that's going to guarantee results. So what is your clear

    23 min

  4. May 28

    #1,156: Stop Managing People, Start Managing Leaders

    Do you find yourself with a to-do list rather than a fully functioning leadership team? This episode is all about the Dental A-Team's bread and butter: scaling leaders. Kiera shares how to transition out of micromanaging in a way that you and your team can get behind, whether you're working with people who've worked in your practice for years, or starting fresh. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent- Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and I hope you're having a great day today. I hope that you just love what you get to do. I hope that you realize, gosh, you're so lucky to be working in a day and age like today. I know we can sit here and we can talk about all the problems. We can talk about how this patient did this and this team member did this and my gosh, this happened and Kiera, the cashflow this and you wouldn't even understand. I haven't taken a vacation for four years. I hear you.   And I just want to remind you that good and bad coexist. We can see the good just as much as we can see the bad. And the greatest way to combat anger and fear is to look at gratitude. We can also talk about what were all the great things that happened. You have all these amazing patients today. You had a team who freaking loves you and fills your schedule for you. You showed up today and patients were just magically there. You were able to walk in and you're cash flowing positive. I hope that that's your day. And if it's not, let's talk because cash flow.   ⁓ it's my biggest pet peeve and I Dennis to always be freaking wealthy because when you are successful financially, your team is happier, your patients are happier because we're not stressed out all the time. So that's my big rant. Let's chat. Welcome to the Dental A Team podcast. I'm obsessed with making your life easier. We're obsessed with positively impacting you in the greatest way possible. And I love helping dentists get the happiness, fulfillment, success that they're seeking and doing it for you and teams. So   That's what I'm here for. Welcome, welcome, welcome. If you love our podcast, please like, subscribe, share this, leave us a review. That's how we're able to help more practices just like you get to the success. We're all here. Like the world of success. Imagine it's like this boardroom. It's, it's infinity. Everybody's welcome and everybody should have that. And that's what I'm here for. There is more money in this world than we can ever count on. And all of us are entitled to it. All of us have access to it. And I want everybody to rise to the top and help each other get there. And that's what we're about. So   With that, I wanna just help you. I think this is a great one. I think leadership is such this like, tricky topic. Like, my gosh, I don't even know what leadership is. And so today I wanted to kind of break down like, stop managing people and start managing leaders. And this is like leadership 101 for you. So just gonna kind of walk you through. If you're still managing every single detail.   of your practice, you don't have a leadership team, you have a to-do list. And that's a bold statement. And that's even a statement for myself. And sometimes you might have a leadership team and you just need to let go. Also speaking to myself, but hey, if that applies to you, please email me. I love a good pen Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. Please tell me I'm not alone out there, but truly, are you managing every detail? Are you managing your leadership team? So I just want to walk you through some three simple little steps of how to stop managing tasks.   and leading through an empowered team. was talking to our COO and she said, know, Kiera, you've got to be able to work through your team. Meaning you don't do it all yourself as a leader. You work through that team. And I think as CEOs, as owners of practices, we often don't work through our team. actually just do it all. And that creates a burnout that creates stress. It does not create a self-sufficient leadership run team. And that's what Dental A Team's obsessed about doing is let's build these self-sufficient leadership teams. And this is a blueprint to stop micromanaging   and start scaling leaders. Are you on board? I hope you are. This is something I freaking love because for me it's hard. Like it's a real life thing. Like I feel like I micromanage a lot. I feel like I don't scale leaders. I feel like I get in their way. I feel like I've grown a lot. I feel like I've also had to be the person. So it's kind of built in his habits. And so I think it's a space where like we oftentimes think do I need to hire a new leader? And I think sometimes, yes. Like when I look at office managers,   We can grow them. Dental A Team is really, really great at actually developing office managers and helping you know what it is. So before you go and hire someone brand new, I would definitely recommend growing them, seeing if they've got the skillset. And if not, then let's go hire this person. But I think when you're, when you go from this micromanaging to do list to bringing on leaders, it's going to be a let's identify and develop internal leaders for you because a lot of times they're just sitting right in front of you.   I was just at an event the other day and one of our team members was there and like not even on my radar of leadership. And I was like, wow, that person has been sitting right in front of me. So I think sometimes we think the grass is greener rather than just really like we got a freaking green pasture right in front of us. Let's just develop them. So you can test people out. And the way you start to look for leaders on your team is who naturally takes the initiative, who does this just on their own? And can I help grow them?   and help them like earn trust with me. And then can I do one-on-one coaching? So for me, I like plant little projects like, hey, you take this on and I'm watching to see does this person take the initiative? Do they follow through? Do they have the traits that I'm looking for in a leader? Do they have my trust? And if they don't, that's great. They're a great team member. But if not, like I can do one-on-one with them. Also the way you develop, like if you identify about this person, they're not quite to leadership. You can do one-on-one coaching with them. You can literally hire a Dental A Team to help coach and train your leaders.   We do this all the time. Give leadership books, have a book club with them, have clear responsibilities, what's their job description. And then we promote based on ownership mindset, not tenure. And that to me is something so hard. And I just wanna talk about it like, how do we do this? Because a lot of people feel like I've been here for a long time. And I will tell you the best and easiest way to do this is to actually put out the job description for who you're hiring and send it to your team and see who wants to apply for it. Because then the tenure people might look at that and like,   And someone told me that, like, yep, open that job description and close it right back up because surely don't want to do all that. They're a seasoned team member, but they don't want to take it on. So that's your easiest way to be able to promote for that ownership mindset and leadership of who actually wants it rather than just who's been there for a long time that quote unquote feels like they deserve it. Just because people have been there for a long time does not mean that they're a great leader. And I hope you hear that. And this is how you micromanage because a lot of times people put leaders into place with massive air quotes that aren't leaders.   They're just bodies with a title and you're still having to do everything. Right? People write, see, it should not cost you more time or more money. They should actually give that back to you. So if that's not the case for you, you don't have leaders, you have doers and you need leaders. So I think when you, um, there's been plenty of practices that I've worked with where we've taken team members on the team, given them some leadership guidance. So we teach them how to have one-on-ones. We teach them how to have hard conversations. We teach them how to look at the books. We helped them learn.   how to actually like be a leader of your practice. And people are like, you turned my office manager around. Like they're now an office manager. And a lot of times it's not that they weren't great. They just didn't even know. If I would have had a coach and a mentor as an office manager, I would have been 10 X the manager that I was. And that's coming from Kiera Dan. I think I'm pretty dang good. And I take a lot of initiative, but I just didn't know what I didn't know. I didn't know how to run a business. I hadn't looked at this before. I didn't have the experience with it. I just got thrown in because, hey, I'm Kiera. I know I can figure this out.   but a lot of times it's very costly. So give them the coach, give them leadership books, give them a mentor, give them a job description and KPIs and see them rock. So I would definitely look at that. And so if you're managing everything or you feel like you're doing a lot, is there a team member on your team today that shows leadership potential? And could you start mentoring, testing them out, seeing how they do to see if they're your person before we go higher? Number two, step two is going to be we wanna make sure leadership roles are   very clearly defined with authority and accountability. So something I see that happens often when people put leaders into places, they don't give them authority and the doctor actually undercuts them. And I know I've done this to my team. So team, if you're listening, I'm very sorry because I know I've done this to you and you've got to have clarity

    19 min

  5. May 27

    #1,155: Why Even Great Practices Struggle to Find New Patients

    Today's topic is something the Dental A-Team hears about a lot: Our practice is awesome, but we struggle to find new patients. Kiera talks about why this is such a common issue, and gives tips on what you can do to address it. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent- Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and I am so freaking pumped about today's podcast and I hope you are too. Today's gonna be a fun day. It's about something that I absolutely love and hate. For those of you that have been listening to the podcast for a while, welcome. I'm Kiera Dent. I'm so happy you're here. My job and our company's motto is to possibly impact the world of dentistry in the greatest way possible. And we do that through this podcast. We put it on for free for you. Tactical practical advice for you every single week for doctors and teams because honestly trying to get   both on the same page is really tricky. being a team member myself, being a business owner myself, working with hundreds of offices across the nation, our team works with hundreds of offices, our consulting team is like truly second to none. I do believe that we have the most experienced expert team that you could ever ask for. And they truly guide doctors and teams to fulfillment, to success, and they do it with ease. And of course we pop the confetti and have a ton of fun. So today I wanted to just dive in.   And talk about like, why are great practices still struggling to attract patients? I think that this comes up on many coaching calls in lots of different areas. And it's something of like, but the practice is amazing. Why are they not getting the patients? And I think something that I pulled from some business courses I've taken is it does not matter how great your business is. It matters how well your business is marketed. And so I think for us to just look at this and say, all right, how do we market better? And what are the things? So I have found that it is   not because like you are clinically sound or you're not clinically sound. It's really about like being easy to choose and how are we able to be easy to choose as a practice versus being hard. And there's some simple things today that I wanted to go through because like you can have great dentistry, a solid team, great intentions, but if growth is feeling harder than it should, or we're not attracting these patients, let's talk about some ways to do this. And yes, there are PPO, there's fee for service, there are different things that happen for both of those. But literally what I found is   we've got to like look through what a patient's experiencing before they even come into your practice. So I feel like the growth and systems conversation is like not just about marketing conversations. A lot of times we're like, here, I want the magic bullet. I want you to like give me these items and we can just get all these new patients. And I want to too. And I'm here to say that marketing has a place. ⁓ But I also want you to realize like what are your patients choosing you for? And so looking through your reviews, you can actually throw it into AI and say like,   What are the top like five things that come from these reviews that we're receiving as to why patients are choosing us? And there was a great quote from Top Tips for Effective Clinical Communication in the British Dental Journal, yes, PMC 2023. And they said, effective communication is central to every element of clinical practice from first contact with reception to the point the patient leaves the building. And when I read that quote, I loved that quote because I feel like so often we don't think about   all these mini touch points. And I know we've talked about it before, but it's like, let's work through, like maybe we don't need more new patients. Maybe we just need a better path from attention to appointment. Yes, I love that. From attention, like grabbing their attention to them setting the appointments. And so where can we look for like common misdiagnosis within the practice? What does this look like? And so usually people are like, we need more marketing, we need more patients. And that's not wrong. I was on a coaching call with a practice and we were talking about like,   A great ratio for everybody to have is we need the patient base to be 200 patients per hygienist per day in one week. So for example, if I've got 10 columns of available hygiene in a week, I need 200 patients. Yes, I did easy math for you. What is that answer? 200 patients times 10, bingo, 2000 patients would be an active patient base. Usually seen within the last 12 to 18 months is how many we need to see. So we were looking and this practice was running 14 columns of hygiene in a week. Well, that's 2,800 patients.   They only have 1900 active patients. So what would most practices say? We need more new patients. Let's run into marketing. But like, are there other things that we can do instead of just needing marketing? Like could we maybe, are there patients already sitting within our practice that we need to have? Maybe we do need to have more new patients. Yes, the ideal is 30 new patients per month per doctor. But is that always the case? Are they maybe hiding in the crevices of your practice that we could pull forward?   So me and this office manager had a call, talked about it. looked, we went back to their recall. She was like, here, I got six patients on there. And I was like, well, that's inconvenient. So what things could we do? And so what can we really look for of what about our, are we looking at our re care and our reactivation? Are we reappointing all of these patients? Like before we even go and jump into marketing, which I'm not here to say don't market, but what about all the patients sitting in our database right now? One, can we reactivate them? The answer is yes.   Two, with all the patients coming through, are we asking every single patient, who else can we schedule for you? We absolutely love you. How else can we like, who else can we schedule? Who else do you know that we could schedule for you? So when I look at this, like where is the true diagnosis and do we actually need more? Or is it that like, no, we just need to be better with this. The practice is also asking me like, Kiera, is it the economy? Like we're not getting all these new patients we used to. And I want to say that like generally speaking dentistry is pretty economy bulletproof. Like most patients come in,   Things have it. Now, fee for service, you're gonna struggle more because patients might only like to do one cleaning versus two cleanings, but your insurance driven practices, great news for you. You've already got your patients there. And I'm not here to say that insurance is bad. I actually think insurance is one of the best marketing pieces to drive patients to your practice. And then it's a thousand dollar coupon, like a thousand dollars to get a patient. I know you're like, but Carrie, we take all the cuts and the fees. I don't disagree with you, but how much does it cost to bring on a new patient? Look at that cost.   to benefit and if I can like go beyond their max and my team is really good with that, $1,000 for an insurance max. I understand that not always that's the case, but is that worth it? I say typically yes. So when we look at this, why like, do we really need more marketing? Do we really need more patients? I want you to look for like, let's make sure our systems are tight and taut before we go after and hit the marketing because that just means we got to make sure our bucket, like the walls aren't empty.   We don't have a hole in our bucket, but we actually are filling that bucket with these patients. So that step one is I want you to look there. Me and this office manager, did we find? We found over 800 patients in their database right now. That's how many patients they need. We don't need to go after new patients. We just need to use the patients we already have in our practice because then our practice is full. Now, if we want to grow, then maybe yes, but even that look to see who is in our database version. People don't want this. It's not sexy. It's not fun. It's like, no, but I just want marketing. I want them to be dropped into my lap. I hear you.   but let's make sure that we have that. Now, if we've elected that we do need to go for marketing and we've already tightened up and we have all these pieces, we've got our re-care, we've got our reactivation, we're calling patients, we're making sure that they're reappointed, we're looking and we're running this report consistently, we're asking every single time we schedule patients, who else can I schedule for you? We are actively asking for referrals and reviews. If that's already done, and that's a big if, then we go and look into marketing. So what I want you to look at for you is like,   Do we need to have different messaging on there? How is our, like when we do market, I want you to look at like, what's my website, what's Google, what's our phone experience and is that matching the first impression of us? What about our clarity? Like, are we really crystal clear on who we're trying to market to? Do we have that dialed in? Our dentistry should speak for itself and so tightening up our first impression, tightening up like what our practice is saying to patients and making sure that patients really truly feel like   this office is so different than any other practice, that's going to make sure like that impression online needs to match our patient experience and vice versa. Our patient experience needs to match our online presence. Sometimes offices are so good, but their online presence looks like they are like dated 50 years ago. So making sure that your practice matches, because if a patient's confused, they might

    23 min

  6. May 26

    #1,154: Getting Your Team to Live and Breathe Your Vision

    Tiff and Nikki continue the topic of your practice's vision by discussing how to turn it into something your entire team believes in. They discuss believing in your own vision first, communicating it to your team, establishing consistency and repetition so everyone remembers it, and more. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:00) Hello Dental A Team listeners. I'm so excited to be here with you guys today. You know I say that every single time because I truly love what we do. I love what Dental A Team stands for and I love the podcast. and set out a long time ago to really, really, really just provide so much amazing, incredible information for the dental world and beyond. We have listeners on here who are not a part of the dental world. We serve all kinds of business owners and ⁓ healthcare providers and all kinds of people. So it's just really cool. And I want you guys to know how special you are.   And today I have with me a super special guest, someone you guys have not heard from before. I get the amazing privilege of bringing Ms. Nikki Mack onto the stage with us here today in our little podcast universe. Nikki, welcome. How are you today?   Nikki Mack (00:31) Okay.   I'm so good, I'm so excited to finally get to be a part of it. I'm on the other side now, long time listener, first time participator. ⁓   The Dental A Team (00:53) Yeah.   I love that you have been a long time listener. So thank you for that. And for those of you who have not yet met Nikki, you probably were not at our in-person event in February, which means you should get your tail over there next time so that you can meet all of us in person. And very specifically, Miss Nikki Mack here. She has joined our team. She is new to Dental A Team is what we like to say, but she has been in consulting in the DSO world in the   you know, general practitioner role, the family practice role, like all over the place. She's been, she has so much experience. She's been all over the block. We'll call her Nikki from the block from now on. I've got your nickname, Nikki. Yeah, there you go. Carol come up with a new one. But Nikki's, Nikki has been with our team for a few months now. We are just so, so happy to have you, Nikki, a wealth of knowledge. Your clients are already seeing massive results. They are.   Nikki Mack (01:36) love it.   The Dental A Team (01:49) loving you and you connect so easily. So everyone just give Nikki a huge shout out and come meet her at our next in-person event in September here in Phoenix. So Nikki, welcome and gosh tell me I'll do an icebreaker for you for the world here. I know, I didn't prep you for this. Yep, unscripted, that happens. That's how my brain works. So let's talk   Nikki Mack (02:03) Yeah.   Ooh, okay, unscripted. Love it.   The Dental A Team (02:16) Let's talk dental, we won't get too crazy. Tell us your favorite position within the dental world. It doesn't have to be within the practice, it can be outside. What's your favorite position you've ever held?   Nikki Mack (02:28) that I've ever held. ⁓ This is probably gonna come as a surprise or not. ⁓ Marketing, like doing the like B2B marketing and stuff. ⁓ I just, I love being able to get out and connect with lots of practices and being able to represent my team. You know, when I go out like on behalf of a doctor, it's super exciting. Cause like I love the office I'm in. I love the team I work with and the doctor I work for and getting to be the person that   The Dental A Team (02:35) I'll ask them.   Nikki Mack (02:56) like shares our office with the world. ⁓ It's just, it's so fun. So, and you get to meet new people, yeah.   The Dental A Team (03:01) That's really cool.   Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like you thrive meeting new people so I could see that for sure. That's awesome. What kind of practice did you do B2B marketing for?   Nikki Mack (03:06) Hahaha.   So that was my time with ⁓ pediatrics and orthodontics. Yep, the most. So yeah, fun events and things like that.   The Dental A Team (03:16) Awesome. I figured. Yeah, that's so cool. Yeah,   yeah, we have a lot of pediatric practices and a few ortho actually. So I know the team will be picking your brain because marketing for pediatrics is a massive space to ⁓ unfold, we shall say. Awesome. Very cool.   Nikki Mack (03:33) Yeah.   The Dental A Team (03:36) Well, today, you guys, we really wanted to chat with you some about your vision and communicating your vision. So we walked you through quite a few times. And if you haven't heard them go back through and listen. If you haven't worked with your consultant yet to get your vision out, go call your consultant. We've worked through kind of how to get your vision, how to get there. And I think you guys might remember, I think it was Dana and I, or Christie and I, really chatting about how like your vision, your mission, your reason for being here isn't necessarily.   what is scripted on your wall that says bringing great smiles to our community. Like, yeah, we're bringing great smiles to our community, but what does that great smile mean? How are we actually impacting the people? And today we wanted to chat. I wanted to pick Nikki's brain here on how to communicate that across to your team. So your team actually believes it. And I think more than anything, Nikki, it's really how do dentists and how do you coach your doctors on   expressing their vision in a way that the team not only believes it, because I think there's a difference in like believing it, I can believe that that's your vision, like cool, yep, that's your vision. And me as a team member living it and breathing it, it's a massive difference. So believing it and standing behind it. And with your experience, the things that you've done and the coaching you do now,   How do you help doctors to really, practice owners to really take that vision and create it to be something that a team can move forward with?   Nikki Mack (05:07) Well, and I think a big part of it really stems from that leadership piece and having a team that values you and believes in you as a leader. And then the vision just supports that. But you kind of hit on it. You have to believe it too. If I'm the doctor or the practice owner and I'm unclear on my vision, how can I expect my team to understand it or follow it? Now you'll always have those employees that just value you and will lead wherever you go. Right. doc, we're going to be, I want it. But   The Dental A Team (05:35) Yeah.   Nikki Mack (05:36) Some need to know why we're going there. They'll do what you need, but why are we doing it? So my first step with a team or a doctor is usually what really is your vision? Not what you think your vision is. Let's talk about what is your vision and how do we use that to get ourselves where we want to be? How do we use that to support our goals?   The Dental A Team (05:56) I love that I actually are making me think of something that I heard the other day on is on a Mel Robbins was actually her book, the left them theory. So some of you guys may have heard this or read it. And she talks about, I'm going to botch the first name, but one of the Toyota brothers has the theory of five wise and ask it was forced like she is in context. I'm sure he is in context of when you're bothered by something or you have like a miscommunication or an upset in life, asking yourself like, why does this bother me but   As you're speaking, Nikki, I'm actually thinking it's so hard to dig to your root. why I think is for me, my quote unquote, why are my vision is it feels like it's my purpose. And I think we spend our entire lives seeking our purpose. And we're like, why am I, we've read the purpose driven, you know, books and all these things. And we're constantly looking for it, but realistically it's getting under the surface layers of your thoughts.   because there's so much wrapped around what you think it should be, how you think it should be perceived, how you think it should be ⁓ communicated to anyone. And so I wonder even like that five why theory is, you know, why do I want to change smiles in my community? Well, because, okay, why is that important to me? Well, because and really taking it so deep. I feel like when you feel that emotional tug, and then you speak from that emotion,   that's your why. And the people around you, I mean, I guess if they're the right people, right, if they're the wrong people on the right bus, they're probably not going to feel the emotional tug to it as well, you know, right alongside with you. But when you do finally get to that emotional tug why, I feel like people can't help but be like, yeah, let's do that. Like that sounds freaking amazing. And it might not be specifically my why, but I want to support you in it because I'm so excited.   by your excitement for what you're about to step into the world to do.   Nikki Mack (07:57) Yep, I think excitement is the key word there. You have to be excited about your why and your team has to as well. It's some of the doctors I still think about, you all these years later that I worked for, it's their why and how excited they were to fulfill that purpose, right? And we get to, you know, change the face of dentistry, right? All these people that hate going to the dentist and then they get to come to our office and now they have a different outlook. Like those whys that drive you.   they inspire your team. And that's that kind of key to leadership. You have to understand that piece and be super clear because that's what drives your team, I think, at their core too. Especially to your point, when it's the right people, you're aligned and you guys are just rowing that boat forward, right?   The Dental A Team (08:39)

    30 min

  7. May 21

    #1,153: Don't Forget This Before You Go Out of Network

    Is your practice going out of network to make more money? Fantastic, but make sure you listen to this episode first. Kiera talks about all the numbers you absolutely need to know before you make the decision, and other, smaller considerations you could make instead. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Kiera Dent- Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners this is Kiera and today I am excited to chat with you about a pretty popular topic that people are always wanting to ask questions about they want to get to know like Kiera, I just want to go out of network. And I say, great, let's talk about it. Let's have a really good conversation about what going out of network actually means what it looks like for you and your practice and how we're able to support you on that.   So if you're new to the Dental A Team, welcome, I'm Kiera Dent. I love all things dentistry. My last name really is Dent and I believe that our job is to positively impact the world of dentistry in the greatest way possible. I think that we are so lucky and so blessed to be able to work in dentistry, to be able to serve and help so many patients. And so I hope that you just know that you're doing a great work out there, that you are changing lives, that you are benefiting so many people. And I am so glad that you've chosen to spend your time with Dental A Team.   If you love our podcast, please, like, please go leave us a review. Like, subscribe, share. It helps us out so much. You have no idea. Just like you want patients to leave you great reviews after you see them. Leaving us a great review for the podcast actually helps us reach more practices and that's our ultimate goal. And I do read them and I'm so grateful for your amazing reviews. So let's talk about going out of network. Going out of network, everybody wants to do it because they want to make money, right? Like I am getting these terrible reimbursement rates and so that's why I'm going to do it.   But what I want you to realize is when you go out of network, you actually become a marketing company. Okay, I hope you heard that. When you go out of network, you become a marketing company. And what that looks like is you now have to work to retain these patients. So when I help practices go out of network, like that's totally fine. You're allowed to do it, but let's make sure we look at the numbers. Let's make sure we do the math. How much is it going to cost for us to market to these new patients? How is it going to be for us to retain these new patients? How are we going to be able to actually get these patients to stay with us long-term?   Now we don't have the insurance clause that's keeping patients here. Also, if you don't know, insurance companies do often send letters to your patients telling them, hey, if you just go down to this other dentist, they're actually an in-network provider. I kid you not, you think that it's dirty, they're allowed to play dirty. So just so you know, when you do this, you start facing this huge uphill battle and I've had practices almost go belly up after going out of network. That's not to say that going out of network's wrong.   but I even have practices that are fee for service right now and they're like we just cannot drive new patients because trying to compete with people in network is so hard and I think about it like Let's just run the fees and I know you sit here and you dream about this grand day of like but Kiera if I was out of network I could get paid so much for a crown and I'm like, yes But then you're only doing like two crowns instead of 20 crowns So there is a volume game, which is not a wrong game to play But I just want you to like realize that you really have to drive your marketing. You have to be   top notch, you have to look to see how you're gonna drive patients to your practice. You have to beg, you will have an uptick in your spend on marketing when you go out of network as well. So it's not all flour, sunshine and gravy. And so sometimes I just look at like, what's the biggest pain point and could we maybe drop one or two insurance companies instead of dropping all of them. If you have more patients than you know what to do with and I'm talking you are booked out seven, eight, nine months to get your patients back in. It might be worth considering, could we drop one or two plans?   Or could we expand and add in more providers before we drop insurances? So look at our lowest paying reimbursables and see what if we just drop those and offer them our membership plan so they become these fee for service patients. But with the membership plan, they are more tethered to the practice, right? Because they're paying for this, they're going to be coming in two times a year. You have two opportunities to see them. I will tell you as a fee for service patient myself, I do not usually go in two times a year. And it's because I'm like, I gotta pay like 300 bucks. But when they have a membership plan,   They don't think like that. They're like, put my cleaning is free. Just like they think of with insurance. So when you're going out of network, really starting to think about all these possibilities of like, all right, what are we going to need to change to be able to drop? So when I have people looking at this, I think about number one, what is the cost to benefit ratio? And if we lost all these patients, let's pretend none of them come, let's go for our worst case scenario, would we be able to sustain? Do I have enough patients to be able to sustain that? And am I willing to do that? Some practices,   Totally, they're good to go. They're like, yes, Kiera, I'm just fine. I can absolutely 1000 % handle this. Other people are like, no, I can't. If I lost all those patients, we would not be able to sustain. So that's the first step before we go out of network. The second step is let's make sure we're prepared to go out of network and handle all those phone calls. And how are we going to save and maintain and retain these patients? Can we get them on membership plans? Third, what are you gonna do about the insurance companies that are calling your patients constantly?   When you out of network, you move into a marketing company. You are constantly striving to keep these patients with you, retain these patients, make sure that they're always there. They're no longer just coming to quote unquote automatically. And so I think about it like, let's run the opportunity cost for when we're going out of network to see, is this something I really want to do? do you want to do this? And I think so many people are like, okay, I'm going to just do this.   we're going to run, we're going to do, and then like, let's maybe do a little bit of prep work. And so there is out of network, like collection verbiage, there is an out of network plan. ⁓ There is all of this. And I just think like, when we go through it, you want to make sure that you are fully prepared financially, mentally, emotionally, as a team, we are locked and loaded and we are good to go. And so if you've looked at those numbers and you're set,   I really want you to think about how you're going to be a marketing company. And so when we look at this, thinking about how can I retain all these people? How can I make sure before I go and drop, like truly before you go and drop insurance, how can I make sure all these patients are going to continue to come back to us? Is it something that we can do of like, can I put into place and start reaching out membership plans? Can we work on our patient experience? Can we make sure like, what's gonna set us apart from the insurance company down the street?   I have a doctor and they are amazing and they are fee for service and they've been fee for service for years. I'm talking like they are so lucky. They've got the Taj Mahal of a practice. It's gorgeous. They've got state of the art technology. Their fees are really not that much higher, but they have like, could you not multiple practices? There's probably 10 around them that are all insurance driven and they're like, but our dentistry should speak for itself. And I'm like, I don't disagree with you, but when times get tighter, things get harder.   People are gonna look at this. guys, I have even, Kiera Dent, who knows dentistry, I have switched. I have a doctor who's fee for service. This is embarrassing. Me as a patient, I'm going to tell you. I have a dentist fee for service. I know they do great dentistry, but they're fee for service. My husband, he's got a great dentist who's got a great hygienist. They're in network with my husband's insurance. I was like, well, I'll just go to them for my cleanings. And if I ever have work that needs to get done, I'll go to the fee for service practice.   Even myself, because I'm just like, well, is it really worth the cost? Like, it's just a cleaning. Like I could just go to the other dentist and you might be like, no cure. But you got to think about the patient. I know you think your dentistry is amazing, but to that patient, a cleaning is a cleaning is a cleaning. Unless they love your hygienist or they love you, they love your front office. They love something about your practice so much that they're willing to pay almost like I pay $300 out of pocket versus insurance. pay $30 a month.   and I get to go have a great cleaning by this amazing hygienist. I also can look at my x-rays, but I think about it, this is where I say you've got to be a marketing company. What's going to make this person continually come to you and choose you every single year when the insurance companies are hitting them, the economy's hitting them, the price is hitting them, and they don't know if your filling is better than the dentist down the street that is closer to them, is in network with them, and they don't need to drive to you. How do yo

    17 min

  8. May 20

    #1,152: When Ownership Feels Heavy

    So many practice leaders and owners feel it, but so few say it — the weight of ownership can sometimes be too much. Kiera talks about how common stress among dentists is, what those stressors can look like, and how to start lessening that weight today. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent- Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners, this is Kiera and I hope you're having a great day. I hope that you are excited about life. I hope that you just remember like, we are so lucky. We get to be in dentistry. We get to hang out on the podcast together. I get to go with you on whatever road you're going on today, whatever life you're doing, whatever you're doing. I am so grateful that you're choosing to take me along with you. And today I just wanted to talk about something that I feel is really near and dear to me. It's near and dear to a lot of our dentists.   We ran a really fun webinar last year and I'm excited to do it again. And it was probably our best webinar we've ever run. I had probably the best turnout we've ever had. But I think it was because we hit the strongest topic and we're actually gonna be discussing this at summit this year, at our webinars this year. So if this hits home, I would invite you to join us ⁓ at any of them because you don't have to do this alone. And what it is is the hidden weight of ownership.   And I think it's like what every practice leader and owner feels, but they rarely say. And I just feel that people, I don't know, we have a mastermind and there's a girl in our mastermind, we're in person. And I remember I was asking for people like, hey, how was the mastermind for you? What were your takeaways? And every single time I asked that question, the mastermind, someone always raises their hand and they always say, it feels so good to be amongst peers and colleagues.   and to realize that I'm not alone. And I'm like, if we all know each other is going through this, but we don't say it, I think we live in our head a lot. And when you're in your head, you're dead. And so I think a lot of times like ownership is heavy. And for myself, it's heavy. And for all of you listening, it's heavy. And I think what we don't see is it's like, we carry payroll. We worry about cashflow. We feel like we're responsible for team culture and morale. We read the book. I mean, I've been on it. I've told you guys, read Extreme Ownership by Jacka Willings.   Everything in your practice is a direct reflection of you and you are responsible for it. So then you're like, great, patient complaints, like this is my fault. Can't tell you how many doctors I've had get bad reviews while I've been in office or we've been working with them or with our consultants and the doctor literally cannot let it go for weeks, months. Like it just eats at them. And I don't blame you. You feel like everyone else clocks out and you still have to carry this home. They all get to go home. They get to have their paycheck. I don't, I get to sit in this amazing space that I built for myself that I absolutely just want to like.   let go. And I think it's one of those things of like, you're a great dentist. It's just the weight of feeling like you're responsible for all of it. And I know I feel this too. And so today I just wanted to invite you of like, Hey, let's talk about some tactical places of how to make ownership feel a little bit lighter that could make it to where you're not alone. You don't have to be alone. And there's actually some tactical pieces for you and welcome to the Dental A Team, the space where you don't need to be alone, running a practice that's successful should be easy. And that's what we're on a mission to do and to positively influence you.   to help you realize that things are better than you think they are, but to give you a tangible path, not just theories and ideas, but a tangible path to go from where you are today to where you want to go. And I'm Kiera Dent and I'm obsessed with dentistry. I'm obsessed with helping people have their dream freaking lives. I realized after a long time, and this might sound so cheesy to you, but the purpose of my life is to truly like be a creator. And what it is, is it's to create and like help people's dreams come true. And I know that sounds so silly, but I look at all of my goals. They're always for other people like.   sending my mom on her dream trip, buying my dad his dream car, getting Jason his dream car, helping my team members get their dream lives, like helping this team member buy a house, helping this dentist get their like dream house in Florida. Like that freaking lights me up. And so the bigger the dream, the bigger the opportunity. And I think for you, if you're listening today, I hope you just feel like I'm giving you a giant hug of understanding, of knowing, of letting you know that you're not doing this alone. And so I just want you to know that this today is not a pep talk. This is like,   A lot of leaders like it's only them that feels this way. But guess what? It's super common. And I want you to know that you were trained to be a dentist, you aren't trained to be an owner. And so today, I wasn't trained to be an owner either. And guess what? We've all had to freaking learn it. And so I'm here to tell you, here to help you out of the way. ⁓ And I think that this is a great quote. Leaders increasingly need to serve a wide array of follower and organizational needs without depleting their own energy or risking burnout. And that came from a qualitative investigation of leader vitality in 2023 of PMC.   And I just think about this and like the ADA also said in their health policy in 2024, they said 82 % of dentists feel major stress in their career. And I just thought like, shoot, this is something we need to talk about. Like you're carrying like this array. Like I think about my shoulders and like almost like football player with shoulder pads and I'm like, my shoulders aren't big enough to carry all this. And yeah, I'm expected to carry payroll, expected to carry this, expected to carry that, that I think it almost like literally by default weighs this down. so,   Let's talk about what makes it feel heavier and how to actually lighten that load. So I think it's one of those spaces of like, we talked about you're responsible for everyone's paycheck. You feel like every team problem, it was a reflection of you. Like turnover when somebody turns over, I don't know about you guys. like used to stew on this for days on end. Like I felt like I was a problem. Like, hi, Taylor Swift. Like, hi, I'm the problem. It's me. My team hates me. ⁓ We feel like success feels like it's impossible. I feel like everybody else has it.   I feel like cashflow, feel like team stress, feel like decision fatigue. Like Jason sometimes at the end of a day, he's like, Kiera, what do want for dinner? And I'm like, one more decision. Like, I don't freaking care. I don't care. I don't care what I eat. Maybe some of you do, but it's just like, I am so sick of this. And when they stack, that's where it can just feel very, very heavy. And so I think what I've learned and what I've seen other people do is like, let's actually like name the weight rather than letting it sit there and separating the emotional stress from operational problems. So   A lot of times what I'll do is I grab my journal and I'm like, what feels heavy right now? Like, what is it? And just list it. And like, I'm allowed to do a huge laundry list. And I look to see like, is this current? mean, shoot, if you guys could see behind this camera, I've got six giant papers and it's like, here's all my stressors. This, this, this, this, like it's there. But when we're in our head, we're dead, remember that? So getting it out of our head, putting it on paper and actually naming it and saying like, okay, I just have a lot of categories. And sometimes I look like,   My name's in a lot of boxes on our org chart, even today, 10 years later. Why? That's a care thing. That's not a team thing. That's me. And so then I also look to say, what are the top one or two stressors today? And is it a current thing or is it a future thing? Like I look at my list here and it's like this, this, this, this. Some of those are problems that I'm like not focusing on that I'm waiting on right now. Like they're the weight on me, but they're four or five months down the line. Some of them are urgent and pressing. And so what is it?   And I think helping you rise like you're not weak, you might just be carrying too many categories of weight at the same time. So then what we do is getting it out of your head. Let's make sure that we, we actually name it. We figure out what it is. Is it current today or is it future? And then what on there? Like, I just have a whole list. Then after that, I want you to make sure that you're not accidentally making your weight heavier than is intentional because when it stays like very personal,   or vague or just in my head, this is where it can actually get heavier. So like trying to be everything to everybody. No one else is owning outcomes, unclear roles, lack of KPI visibility, like avoiding hard conversations that would honestly make your life a lot better. Assuming people will just figure it out, like if they just cared, they would figure it out. Like this isn't how it is. That's not what it is. And so when we have it in there and it's just there and it's vague and it's personal, looking at your list and saying, is this something that I'm taking personally? Is this really about me?   Is it vague and could I define it better? And if not, like, let me clear those up because then what we can do is we can look to see, is this a you? Is this a you problem in leadership? Is this something where we need to rise our team up? Or is this something that li

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This podcast is here to give dentists and all dental office team members, in EVERY position, TACTICAL and PRACTICAL TIPS to: - Be more efficient - Have more fun - Improve doctor and team communications - Eliminate frustration - And make your life easier! Jump in! We are thrilled you have decided to LEVEL UP and be part of the DENTAL A TEAM! New episodes every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.

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    Dental A Team
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