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HSP #70 with Mark Hyman audio
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HSP #70 with Mark Hyman video
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Dr. Hyman explains why he constantly invests in his professional future, and how he--and those around him--succeed.
LINKS:
www.DrMarkSpeaks.com
www.digi-doc.com
www.pankey.org
www.jamesonmanagement.com
www.dentistry.unc.edu/foundation/awards.cfm
CONTACT:
W: 336-282-8850
C: 336-456-6728
DRMARK@DRMARKSPEAKS.COM
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Howard Farran: We are here in Las Vegas at the Bellagio at the Townie 2015 meeting. Townie meeting 2015 and yesterday you lectured, you questioned, everybody was posting pictures of it on Facebook and Dentaltown and more and I’m your biggest fan. I think your audiences are…they love when you here and I… So my opening question to you is…Mark first of all thank you for doing this.
Mark Hyman: Howard it’s a pleasure to be here, thank you.
Howard Farran: And thank you also, you’re going to fill in for a speaker who got sick and is in the hospital, my very good friend Mike DiTolla so thank you so much for filling in for my good buddy Mike The Man DiTolla. We hope that DiTolla feels better but so Mark I want to ask you…My first question that I’m going to ask you is this is April 17th, 18th and next month 5000 American kids our going to graduate from dental school and being close to dental students because there are two dental schools in my yard and in all honesty dude they are scared.
Mark Hyman: Yeah.
Howard Farran: They’re not sleeping well, they’re scared shitless. So I want to ask you, my first question to you is how many…what year did you graduate?
Mark Hyman: I finished dental school in December 1983.
Howard Farran: So you are ‘83 I’m ‘87 so we’ve been doing this 30 years.
Mark Hyman: See I consider myself like a Howard Farran but with hair and without profanity. See that makes a difference. I remember reading something you wrote back in maybe 1990 and thinking who is this guy and he’s not going to impact dentistry and it’s amazing what you’ve done and the impact Howard. You talk about young dentists, I have one of those young graduates coming to join me June 1st and I know that they’re scared, I know the debt is crushing and also know with proper guidance that we can point them in the right direction and they can help lead dentistry into the new generation, the new future that we have. The debt is a lot but with paying good attention to management, leadership, principles and communication skills we can help these kids get out of debt and thrive.
Howard Farran: So what would you tell that kid and I also want to ask you this Mark, when we were little and got out of school, if one of our classmates said you know what I want more experience, I want to go join the army, navy, air force, marine for a couple of years.
Mark Hyman: Right.
Howard Farran: They get a lot of CE I want to do a 100 more root canals and crowns and maybe do a GPR or whatever and we would all say right on man go navy, go army
Mark Hyman: Yeah.
Howard Farran: Good luck for you and that was usually a good decision. Now the kids says well you know I think I’m going to work in corporate dentistry like Hartland Dental or Pacific Dental
Mark Hyman: Right.
Howard Farran: A lot of people are like trying to throw them under a bus like well that isn’t right. I mean what would you do tell these specifically 5000 kids? Do they…should they get another year’s experience or…
Mark Hyman: Howard I respect how people choose to practice and how they choose to get experience. I was fortunate that I finished dental school semester early. So I finished December 1983 I went over to Israel and worked as a dentist for four months on a kibbutz, a cooperative farming community. Grew a beard, grew my hair long, my last wife, the week that I met my wife, a very profitable trip. I came back to Chapel Hill and did a two year hospital residency so I bought basically a 10 year old stall practice July 1st 1986, it’s like two and half year experience post dental school. For these young men and women coming out I would ask them to aim high. I respect again if they choose to join a corporate situation I would ask that they look at the philosophy of the corporation. Is it based on volume or on quality? And I would hope that young dentists would set an education goal. I set a goal for myself to 100 hours a year, so I got my fellowship at the academy in general dentistry, my mastership at the Academy of General Dentistry. I went to Pankey and that had a huge impact on my career. I went through six levels of Pankey.
Howard Farran: So did I up to MGA.
Mark Hyman: It was tremendous. I have been to Spear to Herpy Dawson, tremendous though leaders in dentistry. I’ve picked some really wonderful heroes. Erwin Becker from Pankey, Linda Miles, Dr. Cathy Jameson from Okalahoma’s been a huge impact on me. So I recognize that everybody needs a coach, everybody needs a continued education goal and I think you need to constantly improve and also recognize that you’re not going to get it all in one moment. That it’s a process, it’s a journey and with small improvements, with little things you can have a huge impact. My young doc coming out $200 000 in debts it sounds crushing. Most young docs work 200 days a year, it’s a thousand dollars a day. It’s a flick of the wrist for us in dentistry if you can use the technology and use continued education in a wise fashion. There’s a lot of equipment that we use in our office, we have eight operatories. We have eight ISO lights, we have eight intraoral cameras so we use a DigiDoc. We take a picture of the patient, every procedure before, during and after and if you said to me Mark what is the liberating moment? To me it’s using that technology because we in dentistry don’t have the verbal skills often to explain to patient’s changes that are going on but I can look at you and say Howard here’s this picture the MODFLTWAKLM how can I help you? Do you see this line what do you think? In your words you tell me and you say my tooth is cracked and instead of me using the word need, I think need is a punitive four letter word and there are a lot of four letter words, a better one is want. Howard what do you want? Do you want to keep this tooth? Do you want to avoid a slow painful root canal? You tell me. So I’m really big in our practice of letting go and saying I’m seeing changes, it’s your tooth how can I help you? So I think young dentists looking at the technology, if they commit to use intraoral camera on every patient, the might not have the verbal skills of men and women that have our vintage in dentistry but they can put the technology in front of them to say wow look what’s happening. What do I do? How can I help? You guide me. So 200 grand in debt at a $1000 a day its one extra crown a day. So this can be done, it can be managed. I hope our young docs that are listening to this aim high. I hope you look outside of dentistry for leadership also, for me the Dale organization had a huge impact on my career. I don’t know if you ever got to take Carnegie e-class?
Howard Farran: So far we’re identical, except you’re better looking with hair I mean for FAGD, MAGD, Pankey, Erwin, Kathy.
Mark Hyman: Tremendous.
Howard Farran: I mean so far everything you said
Mark Hyman: Loving it.
Howard Farran: I’m just saying yup, ditto, ditto, ditto.
Mark Hyman: So I would ask young dentists would you be interested in studying material titled How to Win Friends and Influence People? How to stop worrying and control you stress, it’s huge and impactful so everyone on my team, every team mate that I have has gone through Dale Carnegie. We have lunch and learn in the office at least once a month. We bring in the Jameson organization to teach in our office three times a year so we invest heavily in continued education and equipment and our own personal growth inside of dentistry and outside of dentistry and we try and have a lot of fun too and I would say that to young docs. You can focus on that debt as so oh my God what do I do? We’re real big on saving as well so we have a 401K plan that I match 50 cents on a dollar. We also have our office where the money manager comes in twice a year with out me there to meet with the team and one of the first questions he told me afterwards and one of the team mates looked at him and said what is the difference in a stock and a bond and if you’re from a family where financial literacy wasn’t a big deal, it sounds like a silly question but it’s a good question if you don’t know and so how am I going to pay for my kids college? How am I going to pay for my car, how am I going to pay for my house? So if the team is financially comfortable and they see that we care for them inside and outside of dentistry. We pay them well, we have great benefits, we celebrate whenever it’s their birthday in the office. We all take them out to lunch. We have our office Hanukkah Christmas party where I do what I’m sure what you do is that my wife has a team over at the house for a wine and cheese party then we pick them up in a limo. We got a local shopping centre, they each get a gift voucher and they have one hour to spend the money or I get the money back. So in 29 years you know how much money I got back?
Howard Farran: None.
Mark Hyman: Not a penny I couldn’t figure out how they spend so much so fast, finally it got out that they do layaway.
Howard Farran: So this is the wife that you met in Israel?
Mark Hyman: This is.
Howard Farran: Wow you’ve kept her.
Mark Hyman: February was my 30th anniversary.
Howard Farran: Congratulations.
Mark Hyman: Thank you bud, I’m fond of saying it’s 10 of the happiest years of my life. Well the teenage daughter is a wipe out you out. You have sons so you’re fortunate
Howard Farran: Four boys.
Mark Hyman: And so for the team longevity I know you had your Jenn for how long? Twenty?
Howard Farran: Twenty years.
Mark Hyman: Amazing. So I’ve got my Mary-Catherine with me 24 years. I had an assistant, Tina’s been with me 15 years we have several team members that have been with me 14 years and I appreciate that and people say you know are you ever worried about them going somewhere else, well why would they? You spoil them rotten, you care about them as person. You do little things on the books and off the books to honor them. Then it’s a surprise that the practice is profitable and that patients have loyalty and the communication skills are excellent. When I ask the team to stretch, when I ask them to come early, work through lunch, stay late. I don’t even have to ask. Somebody comes in at four thirty with a broken tooth what do you tell them? I’ll see you tomorrow? Or it’s a super time. You’re here let’s solve. So for young docs I think the future of dentistry is outstanding. There are storm clouds for sure but with CE, with enthusiasm and passion with following thought leaders in dentistry, folks at Pankey, at Spear at Koi’s and fine Townie people that you created something distinctive. Again Howard I remember first hearing about you going this guy is nuts and this won’t work and well 30 000, 50 000 people later, how many Townies do you have?
Howard Farran: 195 000.
Mark Hyman: 195.
Howard Farran: In every country on earth.
Mark Hyman: I mean it’s absolutely nuts. You know and you have taken bows for dentistry and I think it’s amazing that you risked what you did and sacrificed time from your family to create an avenue for dentists to get outside themselves because what we do is lonely and it can be really hard and it’s hard to know that you doing the right thing. Am I…which gurus do you follow? And I think you’ve made it safe for a lot of people to reach out to colleagues and say I don’t know what I’m doing. Who do I turn to, how do I solve it? So I look at all young dental colleagues again I think dentistry is an amazing profession and we’ve got the technology now to help young docs thrive even though there are big storm clouds going on.
Howard Farran: So okay Mark, I want to put this $250 000 of student loans in perspective. First of all if you’re smart like you and keep your wife for 30 years just saved a million dollar divorce.
Mark Hyman: That helps.
Howard Farran: So $250 000 in student loans is really only about a fourth of a divorce but when this kid gets out of school they think okay I have $250 000 of student loans but if a buy a CBCT and 3D X-ray machine that’s another $150 000. If I buy a CAD CAM from Corona that’s another $150 000, that’s a whole, another dental school and then the laser company BioLase, WaterLase that’s another $50 000, $70 000 so my first question to you is, if I graduate next month from dental school do I need to buy a another dental school’s worth of equipment to be a high quality dentist like you?
Mark Hyman: A good question I would say the single first thing you do is you buy an intraoral camera and that’s the multiplier for everything. That’s a $5000 investment that will make you $100 000. To me buying an intraoral camera in twelve months you get a free CEREC, that’s the level of profitability. So I’ve got eight ops, we have a DigiDocs we use them on everybody and so…
Howard Farran: Okay so explain to the viewers what a DigiDoc is?
Mark Hyman: The DigiDoc intraoral camera. It’s the number one rated camera by Reality magazine. I bought four different versions of that camera since the year 2000.
Howard Farran: Where are they out of?
Mark Hyman: They out of California, it’s an American company. It’s gorgeous resolution, they got a new 3.0 USB camera that the photo is the same quality as a 35mm camera. It’s absolutely stunning.
Howard Farran: I love your amazing mind and what I’m most exciting about so far is that $200 000 student loan. I mean the average dentist only works $200 a day for 200 days and how could a DigiDoc not sell one more $1000 crown a day by showing someone their big MOD that’s all cracked and shattered.
Mark Hyman: It’s an impossibility.
Howard Farran: I know.
Mark Hyman: A lot people get in my face and say well I will buy a camera when it’s more affordable. I first bought intraoral cameras in 1991, I think I paid $18 000 a camera but I’ve met people that paid $35 000 for an intraoral camera I’ll say do you think you over paid? They will say no, it took me a couple of more weeks to pay for it.
Howard Farran: The first intraoral camera I bought was $30 000 remember that? It was like…what were they called? Absence or something.
Mark Hyman: I bought an AcuCam from the card in 1991.
Howard Farran: That was the $12 000 one?
Mark Hyman: Mine was $17 000 or $19 000.
Howard Farran: But what was the first one that Patterson sold for like $38 000?
Mark Hyman: Well, and it was a crazy investment except that it made economic sense.
Howard Farran: And nobody regretted buying it.
Mark Hyman: Right so if you’ve done anything amongst your amazing gifts Howard is that you brought the business of dentistry to mainstream, to main dentists and to explain a $35 000 investment, it sounds nuts but it makes economic sense. Would you buy stock for $5000 if in twelve months it’s going to be worth a $100 000? You would be all over it.
Howard Farran: Absolutely.
Mark Hyman: So how many of those $5000 shares do you want if it’s going to be a $100 000 a share? So I would say that to our young dental colleagues that is the liberating point and where do you go from there? You talk about lasers, DenMat has got a laser for three grand so you can start small and then buy the fancy laser down the road as you choose.
Howard Farran: DenMat, you mean the AMD laser?
Mark Hyman: DenMat has the SOL.
Howard Farran: The SOL?
Mark Hyman: The SOL laser, it’s a portable, it’s about a three grand laser, it’s amazing.
Howard Farran: Okay.
Mark Hyman: Simple, you can bounce it from operatory to operatory, very easy to use.
Howard Farran: Okay. So we both, we both got our fellowship at the AGD?
Mark Hyman: That’s right.
Howard Farran: We both got our masters at the AGD. Tell the 5000 graduates: why do you think you did that? Why do you think…? Tell them… should they sign up for the AGD? Should they sign up to get their FAGD?
Mark Hyman: I think you’re crazy not to do it. I think it’s wonderful to have a goal like that. Being a fellow and master at the AGD made me take courses that I didn’t want to take.
Howard Farran: Exactly.
Mark Hyman: Which made me a better dentist. We just, an office we did six months Smile training, the whole office and Invisalign and I hadn’t done any ortho because in school we where told you’re not smart enough. I went to UNC, I’m a tar heel. Head of orthodontics was Bill Prophet, the orthognathic surgery book Prophet Bell White, White was the dean in oral surgeon and Prophet was head of orthodontics so you knew you weren’t smart enough to do it, but I think everybody ought to take a six month Smile training course. Everybody ought to take Invisalign, whether you do orthodontics or not you see things that you never saw. You look at a case that you said well I can only solve this with veneers because that’s the only tool that I have.
Howard Farran: There are two of those, one was Ryan Swain and one was…
Mark Hyman: Ryan was a six month smile.
Howard Farran: Six months smile, that’s the one that you are taking about?
Mark Hyman: Yes.
Howard Farran: And the other one was?
Mark Hyman: Invisalign training. You know that’s been over a decade.
Howard Farran: What’s his called, Victor Paul?
Mark Hyman: I don’t recall him. Six months smile and Invisalign way back when I think the results weren’t as amazing as they are now with the improvement in the CAD CAM aligners and the little attachments that they use. So it’s wonderful again for me as a doc to have it on the shelf. It’s imperative for me to have the team trained too. This is an example of how I lead Howard with six months Smiles I sent the team first. I said you go to training and see does this apply to our practice? They’ve got ownership then, they say we get to make this call, it’s not me, it’s the doctor ruling from on high. I said if I invest in this, will you do it? Will you use it? With our CEREC machine…I was the second CEREC user in North Carolina, 1998 I bought a CEREC 2 and then I bought a 3D then the AC then the OmniCam and I had the team trained on it so I come in prep and roll because as someone probably you taught me is you ought to just do CEO work, you ought to do your doctor only procedures as a goal for a team when you talk about setting goals. My team knows very clearly what we expect to produce per hour, what are our overheads per hour, per minute?
Howard Farran: Can you share those numbers?
Mark Hyman: Sure, we try to produce a $1000 an hour. So that means why should I spend time doing procedures that…
Howard Farran: Does that include your hygiene or you talking about the whole office?
Mark Hyman: That’s doctor only.
Howard Farran: That’s just you?
Mark Hyman: Yeah.
Howard Farran: So you’re in eight operatories so how many hygienists do you have?
Mark Hyman: We have two hygienists. In the great state of North Carolina you can only have two hygienists per doctor so each hygienist has an overflow room and then I’ve got my four restorative rooms and so we have three dental assistants, we have three hygienists, two work in hygiene and one is our treatment coordinator and you say man why would you have a hygienist as a treatment coordinator? It’s expensive right? Someone with a hygiene education with exquisite verbal skills and can do the perio probing and has seen my work and trust me. It’s a magnificent treatment coordinator. Then we have three business team members.
Howard Farran: And what do you call the hygienist?
Mark Hyman: Our hygienist is our treatment coordinator as well.
Howard Farran: Does she present the treatment?
Mark Hyman: She does so she sits with me with every new patient, every emergency patient that comes in. The first thing that we do is we sit in a consultation room and I say Howard, did you have trouble finding your way here? So yeah I’m new to town or I grew up here and who can we thank for referring you? Oh Howard, Howard has sent us the nicest people and then I’ll say Howard can I ask you a question? Why did you leave your last dentist? I’m stunned in my seminars how many docs don’t ask their new patients that. And I’m like a colleague of ours in dentistry just got fired, don’t you want to know why? And if he says well he was always pushing crowns that’s a great thing to hear to me because he, I will say Howard do you think you need one? And as soon as you say I don’t know, I say bud you ever seen your teeth on TV? Nope. Well if I see changes going on do I have your permission to tell you and as soon you say yes man it’s supper time. It’s just a great time to be a dentist. You’ve just told me if you can prove to me that there’s something going on I may say yes. So that again is the liberating thing. My treatment coordinator is listening to me doing that interview. Generally women listen a whole lot better than men and they read body language and nuances then my treatment coordinator will do a full mouth, series, a panorex, study models, and do the full perio probing. She will do the charting and then I come in, take the intraoral camera, we go tooth to tooth and co-discover and that’s where I try real hard not be doctor. I just try to listen, I always try and show a healthy tooth and say look this is perfect. Howard do you see this line? And that’s where I’m trying to get you to say my tooth is cracked you need to fix it. And that’s where it turns instead of from a bottle of me saying let’s earn together, let me advocate for you. I see changes how can I help you? If someone is going well how is my insurance going to pay out I’ll say that’s a good question. What if it doesn’t pay anything? You just told me your tooth is cracked, you told me you don’t want to loose teeth, you want to keep your teeth the rest of your life. Your mother ended up with dentures, you’ve see 26 teeth that look good and two that are split, how can I help? So most people at the end of that process, what’s cool about the new patient experience in the consult room, I’ll say well Howard have you ever had a dentist start a visit like this? And one percent of the time I would hear them say I never had doctor sit down and talk down to me. I never had anybody sit down and do this so it’s just kind of cool. When I ask them about intraoral cameras I say Howard have you seen your teeth on TV before and they almost always say no and like this technology has been around in dentistry…
Howard Farran: Fuji Cam.
Mark Hyman: Fuji yeah I remember that. I mean this technology was around when you had a full head of hair.
Howard Farran: The difference between me and you, our resumes are the same, just you’re so nice and charming and proper. When they say does the insurance pay for it, I say well what if you didn’t want to have any more kids and they didn’t pay for the vasectomy but they’d 100% on castration?
Mark Hyman: I love they way you sell. So that’s a huge thing for us and a handful of patients I’ll say did you ever have a dental visit start like this? I will tell them sometimes there are colleagues of mine in town that tried me saying you’re wasting time sitting down and talking to folks and I’m like well this is one….they’re deciding, are we going to do business or not?
Howard Farran: I want to ask you.
Mark Hyman: It’s amazing the patients have said yes to me and I haven’t even examined them.
Howard Farran: I want to ask you the most controversial question on any patient that was day one when we where in school in the 80’s and still this day, a patient calls on the phone. They never call up n new patient and say oh I would like a new patient exam. They always call and say I want to get my teeth cleaned. How do you handle the patient who wants to come and get her teeth cleaned?
Mark Hyman: Yup.
Howard Farran: Do you do a new patient cleaning or do you do a new patient examination?
Mark Hyman: Everybody comes into the consultation room first. So it’s we would love to clean your teeth, sure what time? You know if I get my teeth cleaned every six month. That’s fantastic we will try and get your teeth cleaned at the same visit and the first thing that we do it you get the privilege of sitting out and meeting the doctor where you can…
Howard Farran: So you do try to schedule time for a cleaning after the new patient exam?
Mark Hyman: If they insist on it, we try to listen real carefully. You know I want my teeth cleaned.
Howard Farran: It’s a delicate issue isn’t it?
Mark Hyman: Which I love instead of answering is asking one extra question. I need my teeth cleaned...is something going on, do you have a wedding coming up, you taking family photos? What’s the urgency? Oh it’s just time for my six month cleaning. Great we would love to schedule it the way that we do it here is you get to meet the doctor first and he determines what kind of cleaning. Do you need to be numbed up, do you have mouth cancer? You know do you need pre-medication? What’s going on in your life? And most of them agree because you know historically we were a 99% word of mouth referral practice. What has appalled me is the way the world changed now and our number one referral is Google and you and I are a little more old school. When we were in school you didn’t want a marketing patient right?
Howard Farran: Right
Mark Hyman: You wanted a word of mouth referral patient and I am finding the new generation, their word of mouth referral is Dr. Google, they don’t ask a friend, the go online. So we’ve worked with the Jameson management very carefully with our SEO, our search engine optimization and we’re number one and two in our community in most of the categories.
Howard Farran: And what is the…explain Cathy Jameson?
Mark Hyman: Cathy Jameson. Jameson Management.
Howard Farran: Because a lot of people have heard of you, seen you lecture and they might not have ever heard of Cathy.
Mark Hyman: Jameson Management of Oklahoma. John Jameson was a dentist. Cathy has two PhD’s and it’s just, they’re most amazing thought leaders, son of Jess Webber is now CEO of the company with Cathy’s daughter Carrie Webber-Jameson, Jameson Webber. They’re young and they’re hip and they are really transforming the company. They have Misty Absher Clark as their head of, does the whole marketing SEO, did my website did all our new patient brochures. They redid every written word in the practice and it has been amazing what they’ve done.
Howard Farran: Well now our viewers are going to want to hear from them so would you do our viewers a favor and send those three names on email, Cathy, John and the third person you said?
Mark Hyman: Yes, Misty Absher Clark.
Howard Farran: And I’d love to do podcasts with them.
Mark Hyman: I bet they would love to talk to you.
Howard Farran: I would love that.
Mark Hyman: You know they are great and I think they would offer anyone that’s heard me speak is you get a complimentary one hour phone conversation with an executive from Jameson Management. Anybody who goes to one of my seminars gets a complimentary phone call for an hour just to talk about your practice and consider an office evaluation and I think that’s brilliant to me. Michael Jordan needed coach Dean Smith and Phil Jackson to get his championships. Tiger Woods could have used a different coach but you’ve have coaches in your career, I’ve had coaches in my career. What I would say to my audience is, if you already knew how to do it you would be doing it. If you knew how to transform your practice, if you knew how to manage all these systems, why aren’t you doing it?
Howard Farran: And I’ll take Cathy Jameson to the darkest extreme. Dentists won’t pay $30 000, $50 000, $60 000 for a consultant but then 18% of them will end up paying $100 000 for rehab. It’s like how come you won’t pay $50 000 and lower your stress, increase systems, train your team, reduce your stress make more money and relax but oh no you’re going to sit there and just drink alcohol and eat Vicodin until you crash then it’s 90 to 120 days at a $1000 a day while your practice is shut down.
Mark Hyman: Crazy.
Howard Farran: And then when you come back from that, now you’ve even got more stress because you’ve been closed for 120 days, you’ve had your house paid off and now you had to get mortgage on you house to pay your bill. So why do you…so tell them why do they not pay $50 000, I don’t know how much Cathy Jameson costs but…
Mark Hyman: I will say it’s sort of to me it’s the intraoral camera question. How much is a camera, why do you care? Would you spend five grand to make a 100? When I first started to work with Jameson they had to do an office evaluation for them to come in and assess the practice. I think it was a thousand bucks. Just from doing the assessment you make an extra $25 000 just from going over 25 systems that they make you document. If you spend $25 000 on coaching you would go up $250 000. We brought them in and started working with them in the year 2000 with a partnership, 2005. Howard I got fired, I got fired after 19 years of private practice. Left my partner, left the old office, half my patients and I just took my CEREC machine and moved to a new facility. We brought in Jameson Management.
Howard Farran: So you had a partner for…
Mark Hyman: For eight and a half years.
Howard Farran: For eight and a half years
Mark Hyman: Yeah, a delightful young woman and we just chose to practice differently. All was cool. We brought in Jameson Management, we invested in the coaching and I never once said that I wanted to make an extra dollar. I just wanted to stop the chaos. In 24 months my million dollar practice went up over $500 000 just because we’ve put in systems. Our hygiene department over 24 months almost went up almost 75 % and we worked less days per month.
Howard Farran: Let’s talk about partnerships because I’ve been…I’ve spoken on this. A lot of… everything in the world is influenced by the people you making money off of it you know what I mean like?
Mark Hyman: Right.
Howard Farran: Like when your politician’s on soap box and he really wants to get this project done, probably whoever’s doing that project has put a lot of money in that politician’s pocket to get it down. I’ve noticed in dentistry everybody that really promotes partnerships, they sell all the partnerships.
Mark Hyman: Right
Howard Farran: And all the financials but I see when you get married half of this marriages fail. Mine failed after 20 years.
Mark Hyman: I’m sorry
Howard Farran: And they fail on three things, A third sex, a third money, a third substance abuse but when you marry a woman you make love, you have children you have home, you have all these glues that hold it together but when you marry another dentist you don’t have any social glues. I mean you don’t have kids together, you don’t celebrate innings, holidays or whatever. You’ve been in this field, how many years have you been out? 30 years?
Mark Hyman: I graduated out of dental school in 1983.
Howard Farran: ‘83 and this is 2015 so I had calculus and geometry but I don’t know how many years that is.
Mark Hyman: I’ve almost been in practice for 30 years.
Howard Farran: So okay 30 years. What do you think of partnerships because all these young kids are going to graduate next month and they are thinking maybe I should go and work for Dr. Smith for a year and then buy into half of his practice? I’m like no you should work for Dr. Smith and just keep it clean and I pay my associates you know a percentage of what they do, keep it clean. Why would you want to marry that guy? I mean do you think a partnership is a good idea?
Mark Hyman: I think it could be fantastic and I think. But really you need to do your work on the front side and you need to realize is there the capacity, you know are you philosophically compatible? Is there a game plan, is there an exit strategy? If you bring in a partner, an associate, an employee whatever you call them, without a goal then I think that’s a formula for failure. To me part of the reason that I was attracted to bringing in a partner was demographics. I brought in a women dentist recognizing half the dentists were women. There are a large number of women who want women practitioners. The women partner I had was a delight and whenever I see her now we hug and kiss and life is cool, but philosophically we just wanted different things so it was okay. You know what’s the statistic 80-something percent of dentists are in solo practice and probably dropping because of the costing and because of the circumstances and because of demographics as well? So I think it can be a fantastic thing. For me I don’t do root canals, do you still do endo? I just never enjoyed it, it was not my gift, across the street from me there nine board certified endodontists.
Howard Farran: If you just approached a root canal as Stevie Wonder picking a lock I think you’d enjoy it.
Mark Hyman: I understand that, I’ve got enough restorative. If I could do root canals at $1000 an hour then I would do them. So if it doesn’t fit into that paradigm for me, why am I doing this when there’s guy across the street that can do it in 20 minutes?
Howard Farran: But more importantly you shouldn’t do anything that you don’t like for money.
Mark Hyman: Right.
Howard Farran: Whenever you’re doing something you don’t like to do for money it’s going to end up bad, it’s going to end up in depression, disease, addiction. Don’t do things you hate for money.
Mark Hyman: Right that’s schools hard knocks realizing that and I would say that to the young dentists that it sounds lucrative to do molar endo, well if you can knock it out the park, God bless. If it’s not your gift do things that you enjoy, take more continued education. You get back to the investment of why would you pay for coaching, I mean how could you not? One of the great analogies I give to folks…I know you invest in the stock market, I’m presuming. Google went public at 70 did you buy it at the opening?
Howard Farran: No.
Mark Hyman: I tried and I thought about it and so it was too expensive, 70 I’ll wait until it goes down, what’s it now 500 something a share? So I look at coaching, I look at intraoral cameras, I look at going Pankey at going to Spear, going to Dale Carnegie, these are small dollar investments that will yield massive results. So I think the coaching to me again, why if you could work less days and make an extra couple $100 000 a year why do you care what it costs? Don’t look at the fifty grand or look at the thirty grand it costs. What does it cost you per day and what do you get back as a benefit? So Howard I love being a dentist. It’s been a great profession, I’ve met amazing people. People have said to me why do you want to hang out with a bunch of dental people? Why do you go to all these meetings and I hope in the speaking world there’s a neat camaraderie if we weren’t dentists would we still be buds? You know I think I’ve met a lot of people and you have too that loses their turkey in dentistry, don’t do this so you meet people who are like minded. It’s just kind of funny as I’m telling my story and you’re going I did this, I did that, I did that. The Dale Carnegie organization says three magic words, success leaves clues. So that to me, you and I are just not that smart, what did the highly successful people in our profession do? And you and I kind of copied them.
Howard Farran: Yeah and I would like to add one more thing. Don’t do things you don’t like for money. I mean if you hate doing molar endo don’t do it, you want to go to work and play but the bigger role is don’t give employees money who you don’t enjoy seeing. If you’re working, if you’re paying employees on the 1st and 15th and there’s people in there that you don’t…you can’t stand, you don’t like, you don’t respect them but you know they do their job well and that doesn’t work. You want to drive to work and walk in the door and see all these friends and like hey Joanie, hey Jenn, how are you doing? I want to be, I want to get in trouble every Monday morning because Jenn is like quit talking to Joanie and get in there, come one, come on you are like five minutes late. Why am I not allowed to talk to Joanie because I love to talk to Joanie? I love Zack, I love all those people in there. So keep it absolutely fun. I want to ask you another question. I want to go back to AGD because we are literally identical twins and by the way he’s wearing a wig that’s not his natural hair. He’s balder than I am.
Mark Hyman: I picked my grandparents well, this is me baby.
Howard Farran: You know we have so many identical experiences, success does leave clues. I remember when I started the FAGD writing this very long mean letter to the AGD saying why the hell I should have to take on implants and ortho, I’m not doing any of that and I want to spend all my time on restorative and crown and bridge and I don’t want to do this requirement. And then this older dentist got on the phone, he’s calling me up and he’s been all nice. I am being a little brat you know and so basically he said I have to do it. So that forced me… I wanted to like… I was going to knock out this whole stupid idea… So I looked for a course that could knock out my whole implant deal and guess what I randomly signed up for?
Mark Hymen: Carl Misch.
Howard Farran: Misch’s seven.
Mark Hymen: Score.
Howard Farran: Yeah and I mean it was like discovering the eastern hemisphere, you know it was like I saw a whole new deal. I mean it totally changed my life. Same thing with the ortho deal, I thought well 7how am I going to do that so I signed up for Richard Leddy, he was the only board certified in orthodontics and he taught and the University of San Francisco, University of Detroit, Michigan and I never looked at ortho the same way again and it increased my referrals to orthodontists because now I’m seeing it.
Mark Hymen: Right.
Howard Farran: So even though I started doing some ortho, my orthodontists got a lot more but I want to say this, this was the law of unintended consequence. I think looking back though, how the FAGD and the MAGD was most to me is that when you’re in Phoenix and you start going to these courses to get your FAGD you start seeing…you go to classes, there might be 3000 dentists in Phoenix but it’s the same 100 guys at all the courses and now those are your lifelong buddies that you bike with a run with and watch football at the bar with and I think if was those relationships, those friends you know and then that’s what I hope Dentaltown does for people via the internet. If you’re in a small town and you don’t have a like minded buddy in your town who loves endo you will find him on Dentaltown I mean you will find all of that but I think that the 100 hours CE diet is probably the biggest clue that you are going to make it all the way to the top.
Mark Hyman: Right.
Howard Farran: Would you say that?
Mark Hyman: I think again, absolutely, I’ve heard that from one of my mentors in dentistry. My first year in private practice July 1st ‘86, I bought the practice July 1st. The doctor’s wife’s receptionist. The doctor’s wife’s best friend was a receptionist and she quit six weeks after I started and I fired the chain smoking hygienist and I had one employee left and God smiled upon me because my third month in practice I went to a Linda Miles seminar and Linda looked at me, some pathetic character from some Oliver Twist novel, please sir may I have some more. I said Linda I bought this practice, I don’t know what I’m doing and she said poor child, let’s have lunch and she sat with me and listened to me whine and moan and complain and she said why don’t you try this, that, gave me five little ideas. Next month the practice doubled and then doubled. Another buddy of mine said got to every course you can. If you get one idea out of the entire day it’s worth the whole thing.
Howard Farran: Or one friend.
Mark Hyman: One friend would be nice and then I heard Craig Stanley speak in 1986 with White Hall where he talked about living within your means. Paying cash for your cars, you want to buy a house put a third down, making sure that you save so I had done, I did an IRA each year of my two year GPR. I did an IRA my first year of practice. 1987 I started the office pension plan, ’88 I started fully funding it and every year I fully funded it and I also told the team, if you stick with me I promise you I’m going to pay every dollar I can towards your retirement so I have three or four teammates that have six figure retirement accounts.
Howard Farran: Yup, same here.
Mark Hyman: I’m very proud of that and I know there was an old dentist in my community and the tax laws used to be that if you fired somebody like at 15 years they can get their retirement plan and at 14 and a half years he would fire all his employees and I’m like way to go doc. Proud of you, you saved a couple of thousand dollars and you destroyed your team so I want to be of abundance Howard, I want people to be enthusiastic about dentistry. I want them to aim high and I don’t want them to let the poopy people in dentistry bring them down because there is too much good. There is too much abundance, there’s enough patients around that want to keep their teeth so I would ask people…as you say the FAGD, MAGD’s forces you to stretch. It’s an old cliché, you hear it at every seminar, and the mind expanded never returns to the same size. Once you see things that you have never seen before your life has changed and I want the young docs that are listening, just stick with the winners.
Howard Farran: Yeah when we started our 401K back in 1987 and some of my staff said that they didn’t want to do it and everything and I said well you’re going to do it and they said legally it’s our choice and I said well okay you hire an attorney and I can hire an attorney.
Mark Hyman: See who is going to win that one?
Howard Farran: I’m going to do it and if you want to go out and fight me you know whatever. What I’m very proud of that is Jenn, but sometimes over the years some of the employees have come to me and they want it cashed out because they have some kind of an emergency and I would say you know you think this is an emergency now but you know what’s going to be a bigger emergency is when you’re 70 years old and you can’t work and you can’t get a job and right now yes this is a big problem but you know you’re young and healthy or whatever and I said no every time and when they came to me and said I have the legal right to, I just told them to serve me, sue me and now 27 years later, talking about some spoilt lucky women that had a guy saying this is what we are going to do, we are going to save. And Craig Stanley is a neighbor of mine.
Mark Hyman: Really?
Howard Farran: We are both from Phoenix Arizona and so I got to see him in 1987, Craig Stanley with the White Hall Management.
Mark Hyman: Amazing.
Howard Farran: And I want to say one thing about these dentists. I want to say something people don’t like to talk about but you know they always talk about their $250 000 in student loans again three out of ten women in dental school will marry male dentist in their class and if you’re a dentist or MD or lawyer and you marry…if a doctor marries a doctor equivalent in dentistry, medicine and law it’s the lowest divorce rate in the United States it’s under ten percent. It’s nine percent.
Mark Hyman: Wow.
Howard Farran: So when a female dentist marries a male dentist in their class it’s a 91% chance the marriage will work and a big reason for that is that they both make $10 000 a month and women dentists have almost unheard of, I’ve only been able to one suicide by a female dentist and she was on mental pills for psychiatric issues.
Mark Hyman: Right.
Howard Farran: But then men in the last 40 years have historically…dentists have been historical high and one thing they always have in common is they’re always married to someone that doesn’t have a job, that spends $10 000 a month. If you talk about you know marriage failing on money, sex and substance abuse…and I want to talk about that substance abuse you know when you’re dating…you’re graduating dental school next month… when you go on a date with a girl and she doesn’t even try to pay for half the dinner, I mean she doesn’t even fake it like reach for her Visa. I mean when she is sitting there like I have zero intention, I’m hot and you’re not and you’re a rich dentist and you you’re going to marry… and you marry that person that destroys $10 000 a month. I want to remind you of one interesting study that got flipped on its head. When we were in undergrad they told us that drugs were addictive and it was all the drugs that fall under addiction and that. Every time they take rats and monkeys in cages and gave them water or water laced drugs they would always pick the water laced with drugs until they died and we all believed it and everybody believed it for like 30 years and just recently in 2005 some kid in Portugal said well wait a minute. Those animals are all in cages, let’s redo those studies. So we redo the studies where the cages pick water and drugs but the control was mice and rats and monkeys were in an environment that had everything that a mouse wanted. Toys all over the place and playmates and lovers and kids and all that stuff in and in the cages they all picked the substance abuse until they died and in the happy farm nobody picked the drugs. So when you say a third of marriages fail from substance abuse, a lot of that substance abuse is self medicating because you are spinning yourself blind.
Mark Hyman: Right.
Howard Farran: And so yeah so financial advice…we talked about during the FAGD, taking 100, he said success leaves clues. 100 hours of CE a year is amazing and you can do a lot of that low cost like on a podcast, online CE you don’t have to fly clear across the country but the other one is finance. You said White Hall Management, Craig Stanley. Learn it doesn’t matter how much you make it matters how much you spend, once you start spending more than you make, it doesn’t matter if you make $10 000 a year $ 100 000 a year, $100 000 000 a year. I will never forget when Keating got into legal problems and here was the thing, the guy had like nine mansions around the world, he had yachts, boats, helicopters and then the minute he blinked everybody was like oh my God he didn’t have a dollar saved. It’s like how can you have nine houses, nine yachts, helicopters.
Mark Hyman: Praying to a different God.
Howard Farran: Yeah.
Mark Hyman: It’s the greed factor and it’s terrible and I would say this to young docs again. You could say to me Dr. Mark okay I’m $250 00 dollars in debt and you’re telling me to start a 401K, to start an IRA, to do a Roth? Yeah I am. If you work 200 days a year and you put $10 a day away, that’s two grand right? That’s just, you can’t tell me you can’t save $10 day in your first year of practice. I would want them to borrow the money to start the IRA, to start the Roth to start their 401K because as you and I go 30 years down the road, we see the power of the compounding, the power of saving and the discipline. I got fired in 2005 I moved to the new building. One of the first things I did the first month.
Howard Farran: What do you mean you got fired in 2005?
Mark Hyman: My partnership broke apart.
Howard Farran: Okay but you’re taking the blame, you’re saying you got fired?
Mark Hyman: Yeah and I say that and it’s also a good seminar story.
Howard Farran: Yeah.
Mark Hyman: But the partnership broke and I had to leave my 19 year practice and move to a new facility which was stunning and it’s been an amazing thing and the first month of the payment was due, Patterson did the outfit. They were amazing, they were a joy to work with. Eight operatories of eight deck equipment, we’ve spent a fortune and my Mary-Catherine has been with me for 24 years and one of the first payments where due in July, end of July whatever it was and I said double it. Just take what we owe that month and pay it twice, what the note said. And she did and in August I said double, do it again, pay twice the note and so every month we did that and my wife kind of questioned that and said well, there’s things we could do with that money and I just said trust me, I know how the story is going to end. 2009 the economy tanked and I had almost paid of my debt already. So actually 2009 that was the biggest year I ever had in my practice career. So I was very fortunate with that and it’s liberating to practice being debt free. If the patient no, you say I don’t care.
Howard Farran: So where were your mom and dad born?
Mark Hyman: My mother was born in Baltimore, Maryland. My father I lovingly say is one of the few red neck Jews. We have bagels for breakfast with grits on top of them. He was born in Greensborough, North Carolina.
Howard Farran: So see I was starting to think that you might be first generation I would have guessed before you said that that your parents were not born in the United States because the one thing I see over and over and over is the biggest predictor of debt is where his kid is born. When they’re born, those dental students born outside of the United States, this is what I always see. If they are born in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, India whatever they walk out of dental school and they will go rent a 400 square foot studio apartment in San Fran. They will go work in a dental office and they will work seven to seven Monday through Saturday.
Mark Hyman: Yup.
Howard Farran: And they will walk to work.
Mark Hyman: They will do what they got to do to get there.
Howard Farran: My gosh if they were born in the United States of America they are going to jump out of there and go buy a brand new Honda or Toyota or Nissan. They’re going to buy probably a house that cost their dental school loans. I mean here they got $200 000 of dental school loans and they will go buy a $250 000 house and then the wife decides that she’s going to stay home and have kids and then you catch up with that dentist 10 years later and they are still servicing interest on that. They never get to where they have interest being made from savings.
Mark Hyman: Right
Howard Farran: In fact I can look at those 5000 graduates and say if you were born in this country when you are 50 years old you’ll still be paying interest every month on credits cards, mortgages, car payments and whatever but if you were lucky enough to be born in the old world anywhere none US especially Asia, Africa, Latin America. You probably will just absolutely have the lowest standard cost of living and you probably pay of all your debts in three to five years and when you’re 30 years old you will be making interest on savings. It’s huge Mark.
Mark Hyman: See my dad’s dad was from Lithuania so the great grandparents were Russia, Poland, Lithuania and Hungary so it was all Eastern European. A lot of people fleeing the Tsar.
Howard Farran: Now is that Yiddish?
Mark Hyman: Is it Yiddish?
Howard Farran: Yeah if they’re Eastern European Jewish?
Mark Hyman: Is of the Ashkenazi Jewish
Howard Farran: Okay.
Mark Hyman: The Sephardic Jews were the Spanish Jews.
Howard Farran: Okay
Mark Hyman: So but my father started a home building business. My mother was a guidance councilor and did political fundraising. My folks always worked really hard. My grandparents worked really hard it was a work ethic that I was taught. What’s interesting for the Americans for the story Howard just said, thinking that at 50 you will still have debt the difference in current young dentists that didn’t hear Howard and you’re this generation is that you just got the secret to success. Howard just gave you the key saying to the American born dentists, you don’t have to be like a predecessors that buy a big model English speaking car and buy a half million dollar home and buy a beach house and a mountain house and live a lifestyle as a dentist. Because you’ve heard it here today that you don’t have to put up with that, you san say from day one I’m going to save 10% of everything I do. You’re going to invest in your education, you’re going to live within your means. You are going to get your wife or your husband or significant other to be on board for a long term saving plan so because of this gift of time hearing you Howard these people don’t have to follow a pattern of failure.
Howard Farran: I want to say something else I got lot more money than you do, I don’t owe a boat. I have a friend with a boat. I don’t have a cabin I have a friend with a cabin and I don’t have a 4x4 Jeep I have friends who have 4x4 Jeeps, I don’t have any of that stuff. Your stupid, idiot, crazy friends will buy the boats and the cabins and the time shares and all that and they are going to invite you to go with them. I don’t have any of those toys. In fact my four boys if they tell me anything, well dad if you, how come you have so much money and you don’t have a jet ski, a boat, a cabin a blablabla it’s like…you know a fool and his cash will soon be parted and you know the best place to keep your cash is in your gosh darn bank and every time you go spend money, this is what you don’t understand. Every time you go and spend money you increase you stress and I’m taking about consumption. When Mark talks about building a new office with new equipment and all that’s a business that generates cash but when you go buy a big house and a cabin and a boat and a time share. These are all things that destroy cash and that make you stressful and if you come home every night and you are exhausted and you barely made your thousand dollars and then you walk in your house and your wife says oh look at the thousand dollars worth of stuff I bought today. That starts leading to depression and arguing and fighting and all that. You know how much nicer it is when you come home… and so my advice to the dental graduates out there, if you’re graduating next month, before you leave school marry one of this women dentists in the class. Just walk up to here and propose at graduation and say hey lets graduate and get married tonight. We’re in Las Vegas at Townie fly down to Vegas right now with one of those class mates to get married but spending is a huge part of success isn’t it?
Mark Hyman: Well again the audience is fortunate they hearing this whether they apply it is our hope and prayer for you all that you live a wise life and live with in your means. If part of you attractions to dentistry was the lifestyle it’s not to late to hear a couple of old guys tell you there’s another side to it which is living wise, living with in your means. One of my all time most interesting patients always came and he hadn’t shaved, he wore suspenders, a flannel shirt and worn blue jeans and every time he came in he said you charge too much this is too expensive. I open the paper one day; he had donated 150 million dollars to start a school, and I charge too much.
Howard Farran: And we got a saying here in Phoenix when like while you drive a Lexus it’s paid in cash you know there is no mortgage but you got to Scottsdale and see you somebody in a Lexus or Mercedes it’s a lease. They all faking it till the make it.
Mark Hyman: Got you
Howard Farran: But if you see someone in Chandler or Phoenix with a Mercedes Benz they bought it.
Mark Hyman: Well it’s just again, it’s interesting and it’s up to your decision how you want to live, how you want to raise your children and I would be shocked if the Farran boys weren’t hard workers because you modeled it as you dad modeled for you. My dad was a home builder, he built 500 some house in Greensborough, he build three apartment complexes. I remember him coming home sweaty and smelly and with big muscles on his arms. He been in there working with his men and he modeled that and I hope I have done that for my children. Showing them how hard I’ve worked and try to be that I would be very proud of them and they’re off to a great start.
Howard Farran: You know my dad’s birthday would have been last Saturday he would’ve been 78 and a lot of times, my kids asked me well why did you work so many hours at Sonic because from 10 to 20 you know I mean he had Sonic drive ins and I loved Sonic because number one, that was the only time I got to see my dad and I would, do you want to stay home with you five sisters and play Barbie dolls or go to work with your dad with free hamburgers, French fries, onion rings, chocolate milkshakes and a bunch of beautiful teenage girl car hops?
Mark Hyman: Good choice.
Howard Farran: And all that stuff, my mom would always say Howie you go in every Saturday, don’t want to stay home and rest and I’m like God I want to go with my dad and eat cheeseburgers and see car hops. I just thought it was a blast and maybe that’s where we learned our work ethic. I mean my dad worked from first thing when he got up until when he went to sleep, seven days a week until he dropped dead. That’s all we knew.
Mark Hyman: Well it shows and I know your boys are proud of what you’ve created.
Howard Farran: So I want to take this one different direction because I only got you for seven more minutes. So we’ve been talking about a lot advice for these five thousand kids that graduate. I want you to wrap up the close of these five or six minutes with this very common problem. I hear this all the time Mark. They’re saying okay you know I’m in a small town and we are not in fancy New York City, we’re not in fancy Beverly Hills and out there in just humble bottom America and my practice has been flat for ten years and by the way Mark I’m a kind of burnt out. My husband fought for ten years, I am out there in Parsons Kansas, and we bill nothing fancy. Our economy is just flat, everything is flat and kind of burnt out what could you tell that guy to get him fired up in dentistry again?
Mark Hyman: I would sure try and find something to get myself turned on. I would work with Dale Carnegie bring a Carnegie trainer in to add enthusiasm to the practice. I would work with Jameson Management let them assess the systems. See what the road blocks to success are. I would make small investments in equipment that will lead to huge increases. I would make sure that you are exercising and avoiding the habits that you’ve talked about. I would push to go and do education and learn something new whether you apply it to the office or not. Again you will meet energized people you will see what bright people in the profession are doing besides that one of the gifts of going to Pankey in Key Biscayne Florida. The courses were long during the day but then at night you would sit with your classmates and say how do you hire, how do you fire? How would you solve this case so I would really want people to hang out with winners because you…it’s contagious when you’re around enthusiastic people. Dale Carnegie says if you act enthusiastic you will be enthusiastic and there’s not substitute for it. I would say to you Howard what would you do if you had a real job? I mean we get to do dentistry, it’s a hoot. You think about we get to make a great difference in people’s lives. Very few of them die when we’re working on them. We can work with whom we want where we want when we want, it’s a gift. Again I have now skills or ability.
Howard Farran: I’ve got this 85, 88 year old patient named Bernard Wells, every time he comes into my office he tells me the same thing. It’s been going since 1970 he comes in he goes hey I just want you to know that my entire life I worked with six ugly men in overalls in machine shop with no air conditioner and I did that my whole life and you’re inside with air conditioners, with all these beautiful women, do you know how lucky you are?
Mark Hyman: Yes we do.
Howard Farran: I just crack up laughing. And he always has to tell me that, how lucky I am.
Mark Hyman: I would ask the young dentists to avoid poopy dental people because I hate poopy dental people because I used to be one. I hated dental school. I hated first semester of dental school actually to the point that I quit school for about.
Howard Farran: You’ve quit dental school?
Mark Hyman: I quit dental school a Thursday night, my first week back spring semester and I went to tell the dean that I quit and he said great come back in half time we’ll sign you out and I went slicking down the hall of the UNC school of the dental school and ran into a young professor Dr. Ron Strauss who saved my life and he said Mark it’s okay, being a dental student is nothing like being a dentist. Just give it another hour, give it a day see how you do and I had a decent morning. I went back to see the dean at half time and told him I wasn’t going to quit and he acted disappointed, may he rest in peace, and I motored my way through the rest of semester. Started patient care and that summer caught fire and I graduated in three and a half years. Went to Israel for four months, met my wife, did the two year GPR, bought practice, bang I was off to the races so my wife and I endowed a scholarship at the UNC dental school in Dr. Strauss’s name and I would never forget it. So I would say that to the young docs in the house.
Howard Farran: Tell me your wife and you endowed a what? A scholarship?
Mark Hyman: A scholarship that won the Ron Strauss community award. It pays for young dentists to go overseas and work on a rotation.
Howard Farran: That is amazing.
Mark Hyman: Because my going over to Israel was such a big impact for me and we’ve done some other scholarships at UNC and I probably was the poster child of saying once I leave dental school I’m not going to give a penny to this place and I think that’s ridiculous. Our schools give us so much, they give us the privilege of doing what we do so if you’ve had some bumps in dental school you’ve got to let that go because there’s more good than bad.
Howard Farran: So I only got you for three more minutes so I want you to get real specific on something because I agree you know you exercise, you watch your spending, take 100 hours CE but give them absolute specifics about this Dale Carnegie thing how would he do that. Is there a website?
Mark Hyman: Right Dale Carnegie basic Dale course, their first level course Dale Carnegie is a 100 year old organization. They are in the every country in the world but they are basic. Their fist book was…Mr. Carnegie studied successful people and he wrote the book How to Win Friends and influence people. At the time I took it there was a 12 week training course that you took at night. Three hours at night, maybe you spend twelve hundred bucks on it, just wasn’t real money but it teaches you how to remember names, how to set goals, how to stand up and do a basic public presentation, how to present your elf in a situation, how to extemporaneously stand up and speak.
Howard Farran: Now did you win sharp and pencil?
Mark Hyman: I got a few of them.
Howard Farran: All right.
Mark Hyman: And the I did the two day HIP the High Impact Presentation Dale course where they video tape you doing eight three minute talks, because I thought that talking was the spread the word for our type of dentistry but I wasn’t very good. The first talk I did I stood behind the podium like everybody else and read my notes and I sucked and I took the Dale training and the first of the eight talks my hands where in my pockets and I’m reading my notes like everyone else and by number eight I’m outside myself and that was what I went to California for the CDA Meeting in April 1999. ‘99 I had five seminars, the year 2000 I had 20. Last year was 37 so I was off to the races.
Howard Farran: Well if you never have…if you’re looking for a speaker for your dental society or dental association meeting, we’re having him at Townie speaking a couple of different times at Townies on a podcast. Mark, I would say out of the 1000 people who probably speak in dentistry, you’re absolutely a hall of famer and a top 10. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who didn’t say that you’re awesome. I mean awesome. You’re amazing and by the way, it is a wig. It’s not real hair. Thank you so much for spending an hour with me.
Mark Hyman: Thanks Howard. Appreciate it. Good luck guys.
Howard Farran: Hey I want you to come next year to the 14th annual Townie meeting in April and have a blast. There’s nothing more fun than a Townie meeting.