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Howard:
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It is a huge honor today to be interviewing a legend in dentistry, Kim McGuire, who's been with Fortune Management for 15 years, and Fortune Management is huge. It's been around 26 years. It was started by Bernie Stoltz as a CEO out in San Jose, and you're in Denver. I'm so glad I'm doing this because I'm interviewing you two days before the Super Bowl [crosstalk 00:00:29] Denver Broncos and the ... Who are they playing? The Carolina Panthers. I'm going on the record to say that I love Peyton Manning, just love him to death, but man, there's no one into the [sources 00:00:41] that could be [inaudible 00:00:42].
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Kim:
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I know. This podcast is going to be released after the Super Bowl, so I'm making no predictions, but I do know that people are having a lot of fun in Denver right now. There's a lot of orange ... My kids are going to school in orange, or my clients are Peyton Manning jerseys, so it's a lot of fun. We'll see what happens.
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Howard:
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Your company Fortune Management also has a sister company, hygienemastery.com, with Shannon Richkowski?
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Kim:
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Yes, and her amazing team of coaches.
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Howard:
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You've been consulting ... Your dad is a dentist, so you're born into dentistry and we see that ... Every time I lectured in [inaudible 00:01:21], I say, "Raise your hand if someone in your family is a dentist or a hygienist," and a third of the hands go up, so you still ... But it was the same growing up in Kansas. All my friends that are my age from high school that are wheat farmers, well, their daddy was a wheat farmer. Their grandfather, you know, a dairy farmer. Family business is really the backbone of the 7,300,000,000 monkeys around the world. It's true. You're born in Ethiopia and your dad is a goat farmer. What are you going to be? And then, you know goats. So, if you grew up in dentistry, been consulting for 15 years, what problems does Fortune Management ... What are you saying on a daily basis for the last 15 years that's fixable? What stuff will they call Kim, and Kim goes in there and says, "Hey, here's your five problems, and we'd like to fix these three." What do you like to fix? What do you see and what do you like to fix?
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Kim:
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First of all, I just wanted to say that we did have a couple of other co-founders. There's a René Schubert and a Paul Bass, and Gary McLeod, who founded Fortune along with Tony Robbins, which we can talk about, who you had on your podcast a couple of weeks ago, which was an amazing interview. I would say actually that-
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Howard:
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You know what would be cool? You know on this Skype, you can have ... How many can we have at one time?
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Speaker 3:
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[crosstalk 00:02:43].
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Kim:
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[inaudible 00:02:43].
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Howard:
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Four?
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Speaker 3:
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It's about eight, or seven, I think.
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Howard:
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You know what would be really cool? Get all the co-founders, and then the ...
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Kim:
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That will be hard.
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Howard:
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Because 90% of the listeners to our podcast is audio only. Most of it iTunes. Fewer is YouTube and Dentaltown, but we can have all of your six, seven, eight of them call in. That would be a great podcast.
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Kim:
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Would be awesome.
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Howard:
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Maybe Tony would even come back and get in on that.
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Kim:
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Indeed. He might. The reason why I bring that up was probably because I want to acknowledge our amazing co-founders, but also, that is really our special sauce. We really wear three different hats in Fortune as executive coach, so we are coaches and consultants, and that ... We are coaches, and that is really taking the Tony Robbins technology that we're licensed to teach, and helping to coach a client and their team. We also are practice management specialists, where we help with systems, and we help to implement running a solid business. We're also key business strategists, where we're helping doctors with things like: Are they going to bring in multi-specialty? Are they going to open up a new practice? When do they bring on an associate? Really, those key business questions that they have.
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What we see that is really our differentiator and how we can help people, is we are helping them with their communication and their mindset, and really who they're being with their team and their patients. You can go to the best dental school and you can graduate top of your class, and you can go to all the CE in the world, but if you don't have great business systems and if you don't have great communication skills, you're not going to be successful. Howard, you know this better than anyone. It's really that communication, and really that personal growth and development that people take on, that makes their practice just go leaps and bounds.
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Howard:
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I can tell your dad, who's a dentist, and you've been doing this for 15 years in a company that's been doing it 26 years, because every dentist believes the exact opposite. They believe that if they go to an institute and buy a laser, or a CAD/CAM, or a shiny toy, it's going to come back and fix all their problems, and what's silly is that it has nothing to do with anything. Those are toys. I have found some of the most amazing offices in the world, and they don't have CAD/CAM, they don't place lasers, they don't do surgeries, they don't do implants ... They just do fillings and crowns, but they have an amazing team-
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Kim:
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Amazing practice.
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Howard:
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Amazing systems. They make bank just doing family dentistry.
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Kim:
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Absolutely. I think that was one of the things that I did learn from father. He is an excellent clinician, but he has great communication skills. People loved who he is. And then, he started working with Fortune, and that really helped him take his practice to a whole other level, where he and my mum could retire, and he and Bernie kept in touch, but I really do think that ... It's funny, we talked about having it be a family business. Even though I'm not a dentist myself, I am so honored to be working in this industry where I can affect other practices and affect other teams, and then affect, of course, those patients. That is really what it is. It's those communication skills. It's really about who you're being, first. It's not what you're doing. It's who you're being. I know Tony talks about that on your podcast. Really, it's not just about the science of achieving things and achieving things all the time, it's about the art of fulfillment, and being fulfilled and loving what you do and giving back. That's what really makes the difference in people's lives.
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Howard:
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Just to be clear. You're not paying me to be on my show. You're talking to thousands of dentists. I'm volunteering. You're volunteering. No money is changing hand. No one makes a dime off the podcast. Here's what I want you to do. You're talking to thousands of dentists. Almost all of them right now are commuting to work, and my problem, I've been in here 20 years. Everybody who needs a consultant doesn't get one, and then everybody using consultants are trying to go from a 1,500,000 to 2 million. The reason I'm doing this is because I'm trying to get to the people suffering, doing 400 or 500, and burned out and want to quit. Some of them start drinking or [eating Vicodin 00:06:44] or kill themselves.
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I want you to paint a picture. I know how my homies think. They're thinking, "How much does this cost, and I can't afford it," but they'll go afford a laser or a CBCT, or whatever. How much do you cost? What do you [fix 00:06:59]? Try to paint a picture, so that one of my homies driving to work ... Paint a picture to say, "Dude, you know this is your problem in your office. This is a fixable problem." Call, go to my website. It's fortunemgmt.com, or they can email Kim McGuire at Fortune Management. I love you because I'm 100% Irish, and with the last name McGuire, you've got to be a [Mac 00:07:21]. That's Kim M-C-G-U-I-R-E at Fortune Management. Paint the scenario. Paint the picture so that they say, "Yeah, that's going in my office. What does it cost? How do they solve it?" I just want my homies to be happy and healthy-
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Kim:
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Your homies.
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Howard:
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And pay back their student loans, and then have the money so if you want to learn sinus lift by Tatum, then have the money to fly to France, and put your spouse on the Mediterranean while you go learn Hilt Tatum sinus lift, whatever. That's all fun. I'd love that, but that's not the basis that gets you there, so do that.
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Kim:
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First of all, we always say that if we're going to give you a diagnosis without really looking at the mouth, we can't really do that, so we have to look at each practice individually. Anywhere from $2,000 to $3,000 a month we charge, and we are very much into having a relationship with people. It covers the gamut. It's really the most intense postgraduate program out there. Not only do we have in-house workshops, we typically have a local coach that works with the practice, so we're not flying people in. You have a local coach, and you typically go through what's called our Training University. We have five, two-day training universities that cover the whole entire gamut of running a dental practice. It's like getting a dental MBA. I know you have your MBA, but it's like getting a dental MBA, and not just the systems and the marketing, but like we were talking about earlier, the communication skills that will take your practice to the next level.
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Let me tell you, Howard. We've got to pay for ourselves. We have got to make sure that the doctors are making at least that much more in order to pay for the program. We have special coaching calls. We have a monitoring system. We have access to a ton of other companies that will help people out, whether it's HR or creating an in-office benefits program. We have all these different resources, but the biggest thing is, and Tony talks about this a lot, it's a modeling program. We're not reinventing the wheel here. There is specific things that you can do to help grow your practice, and there's lots of different ... We look at the five business engines. It really starts out with your vision. I know you talk about this, Howard, on your podcast with different folks that you have on. It's really about, "Doctor, how much money do you want to make? How hard to you want to work? What do you want your teeth to look like? What's your ideal patient look like? What does your facility look like?"
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You've got to figure out what you want, because if you can't figure out what you want, we don't know where we're going, and you can't coach anybody unless you know where they're going. It's easy to use these sports metaphors, especially the Super Bowl is in a couple of days, but it's like, if a coach doesn't know where the team wants to go, we can't steer them. Peyton Manning's coach isn't better than him, but he can show Peyton Manning where he might be off a little bit on his game. A coach is somebody who helps you see maybe where you're steering off and not going where you want to go. We really look at these five business engines. One of them is your finance engine. We've got make sure that your finances are in line. That's not just taking a look at your P&L, which by the way, a lot of people are putting their heads in the sand and don't want to look at their Profit and Loss statement. You do a beautiful job in your book, Howard, on showing people what a P&L should look like, and a balance sheet and everything. I was reading that part of the book the other day. Also, looking at your relationships with your insurance companies. Your fees schedules. Your financial arrangements and policies. Are all those areas, that finance engine, are they running like they should be?
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We also need to take a look at the systems engines. There's tons of systems in a practice. Oftentimes, where there is a breakdown in communication with systems, anything from scheduling, [the goal 00:11:09], to collecting money, to working the ARs, you've got lots and lots of different systems. The new patient experience. People don't realize you've got to figure out exactly how you want people to come to your practice. Reactivation. I hear doctors talking about it all the time, "I need more new patients. I need more new patients. More patients." They got to just reactive the ones they already have back into the hygiene program. Those people have already bought you. They already love you. They already know your brand. Bring them back in. Don't let them fall out of the hygiene program.
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Another area of the five business engines would be our marketing. I would say marketing is one of the big mysteries that practices have. They're doctors, they don't understand marketing. I always joke around with my dad, because back in the day when he was practicing, you just put your name on the door and people just came. It was just how it was. Not anymore. We have to brand, we have to ... The whole client and patient experience, that "wow" experience for whatever your demographic is that you're serving, you've got to be amazing. It's internal marketing, external marketing, branding and identity. Of course, social digital and digital media is a whole, entire subject in and of itself. One thing I think that people forget about is case presentation and enrollment. Enrolling your patients in the treatment that they need is a part of marketing. I think we get the patients in, but sometimes, we have trouble getting them to say "yes" to that treatment. That is an art and a science all in and of itself.
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We also need to take a look at our clinical and technology engine. Do you want to be doing Invisalign or placing your own implants? Or, using a laser or using the CEREC? What do you want to do? What's your vision in the clinical area? Of course, we have, last but not least, would be the people engine. I think the people engine is really the important, because it's about the culture of your practice and how you are all interacting with each other. Job description systems, all that. I've got your book right here. You talk a lot about that with the people, the people side of things is ... Really, it's about the people, being you the doctor, the team that surrounds you, and your patients, and really connecting with people on whole other level. We're looking at these five business engines. The nice thing about this model, the five business engines, is that a typical practice is going to need to work on two or three at one time, not all of them. It's not like the sky is falling. We can work at two at a time, or three at a time, whatever the case may be. We've got proven systems that work, that can help you go to that next level.
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Howard:
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Okay. Summarize distinctly. What are five again? One is ...
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Kim:
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The finance engine.
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Howard:
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One is finance.
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Kim:
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Well, they're in no particular order, but one of them is the finance engine. The systems.
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Howard:
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Okay.
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Kim:
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Marketing and sales. I know sales is a bad word in dentistry, but that's what it is. Clinical and technology, and the people engine.
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Howard:
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[inaudible 00:14:07].
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Kim:
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By the way, Howard, this is a model that's used ... This is from a business book. This is not just dental specific. I don't care if you're a grocery store, a hair salon, Apple computer, you've got to make sure you've got all engines run-
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Howard:
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Let's just number them. One is finance. Two was what?
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Kim:
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Systems.
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Howard:
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Systems. That includes scheduling, collections, the new patient experience, all that stuff.
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Kim:
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Yep.
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Howard:
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Three would be ...
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Kim:
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Marketing.
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Howard:
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Marketing and sales, including the ... The new patient experience would be under systems, so marketing, sales ...
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Kim:
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Well, yeah. It's really under both. It's how do patients enter your practice? How you're getting referrals. How are you externally/internally marketing your practice?
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Howard:
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Now, I want to talk about ... You've been doing this 16 years, you said?
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Kim:
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15, 16 years.
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Howard:
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15, 16 years. In your 15 years, are the problems different today than they were 15 years ago on these five systems?
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Kim:
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I think that the landscape is changing a little bit when it comes to marketing, and when it comes to customer service. Customer service has always been important, but I think it's even more important. I'd love to ask you how you see the dental landscape changing, but I think that there are different forces that are happening, and one of them is ... The advances in technology is just going gangbusters. People are expecting that. I mean, our whole entire is on our phone now, so people are expecting technology. We also see increase in corporate dentistry. We're not pooh-poohing corporate dentistry, but we just say, "All right, doctor. If you own your own practice, let's figure out what corporate dentistry does well, and let's model success. Let's get the same profit that they get. Let's expand our hours, and have maybe multi-specialty." There's lots of different things.
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I think it's a little bit different. There's some different challenges that are going on right now. And then of course, digital communications is the third area that's really changing things. That's because people, like our friend Fred Joyal talks about how ... Word of thumb. People can write a review online about you and it's there forever, whereas I used to tell my friend about Dr [Friend 00:16:31], and that would just be one-on-one person, but now I can tell the whole world using the internet. I think things are changing in those areas, and the doctors need to be aware of that.
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Howard:
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Is there any type of average type of doctor calling you? When your phone rings and they say, "I need help," what is some typical scenarios?
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Kim:
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Sure. Doctors come to us for a lot of different reasons. Some of them obviously do want to make more money. A lot of people want to make more money, but money isn't always the driving force, just like it's not always the first objection for your patients by the way, for why they may or may not schedule their treatment. They want to make more money, but oftentimes, they want to have less stress. They want to have their team get along. We transform teams like no one else. We can create team work that's not just about surface team work, because it's really looking at what's driving us and how we interact with people. I also think that the teamwork, that people come because they want to have less stress. They want to bring on an associate. They want to bring on another day of hygiene and they don't how to do that. Maybe they want to open up another practice. There's a lot of different reasons why people come to us.
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Howard:
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Would you say the number one reason that dentists call consultants is the stress from the team?
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Kim:
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Yes.
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Howard:
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What percent would you say is the number one problem is the stress from the team? What percentage of that would be versus, like say, finance, "My overhead's high. I'm not making money. I need more [crosstalk 00:18:13]."
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Kim:
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I think that's the second. I think it's [crosstalk 00:18:15] team.
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Howard:
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What percent would the team be?
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Kim:
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Well, it's well over 50% has challenges with the team. Well over 50%.
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Howard:
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I always like to start there, and I keep going back there because that's what my number one complaint is. They want to learn how to bone graft and how to do a sinus [crosstalk 00:18:32]. They're what keeps them up at night, but makes them want to puke, is dealing with the staff and/or the patient. The can fix the rock in the mouth. They can do a root canal. They want to take all their courses on how to fix rocks, and they want to spend all their money investing in high technology in rock-fixing equipment, but the problem is the people or the team. I want you to address ...
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Neither of us are making a penny. The goal here is, I believe, the dentist is not either aware of the problem, because after the root canal, the first thing the dentist always does, he walks right back to his office and closes the door. Whereas on the Super Bowl, the coach will be walking up and down the field, and his head will be right there on the goal line. They're just completely on task, and I see the dentist with loupes on working in a rubber dam, and as soon as he's done, walks in his office and closes the door, and is aloof to all this stuff. One of the reasons he doesn't want to deal with it is because it's just so damn stressful. Can you draw some red flags that are ... What is the staff doing that's a red flag, that is dysfunctional, that you can go in there and help? I don't think he sees it or gets it, or understands it, or he would fix it.
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Kim:
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That's what I think. I think [crosstalk 00:19:52].
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Howard:
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If he knew what the hell was going on and he didn't want to fix it, because I think [inaudible 00:19:57], I just want to sign a check and have you fix it. It's like when I go to a restaurant, I'll decide if I'm going to eat steak or pizza, then I'm going to give you a check to go make it. What is a red flag? Paint the dysfunction of the staff that's causing you stress that you can call and go fix.
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Kim:
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I know the doctors that are driving to work right now and listening to this are not going want to hear it, but I do believe it starts at the top, and it starts with them looking looking at themselves as a leader. They're owning their practice, or even if they are not, even if they're an associate working in any sort of situation, they are the doctor and they need to be the leader. Leadership can come in many different forms. Leadership does not need to be "I stand up and give a speech." Leadership is how you're being with people. Leadership is working on your emotional intelligence, and that's one of the things ... I know you know about this because you do a lot of reading. A lot of these doctors have very high IQ, but it's that EQ. We can't really change our IQ, we're born with our IQ. But our EQ, our Emotional Intelligence, that's how we're relating to ourselves and then how we're relating to other people, that we can increase. We can work on that. That's really what our program is all about.
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It's really about how we're identifying our own feelings and dealing with them with other people, because if you're just taking off your loupes and going into your office to play solitaire, which by the way, I had a client one time do that and I basically fired him because I couldn't ... You have to communicate with people. You've got to be with people. I think that it really starts with them. They've got to take a look and say, "How am I being with my ..." not just, "What am I doing," but, "How am I being with my team that makes them want to go to the next level? That makes them want to work harder? That makes them want to give a whole other level of service? What am I communicating to them about our vision? Am I giving them any incentives? Are we really ..." I think it starts with them. They've got to take on leadership, no kidding. [crosstalk 00:21:50].
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Howard:
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I want to throw some curve balls at you, because I listen to these guys ... I had breakfast this morning with three dentists, so I hear all the bits. I'm just going to throw some of their bits at you because you're dealing with ... In a dental office, there's dentists that are from the greatest generation, the older ones-
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Kim:
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That's true.
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Howard:
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They they think differently than the baby boomers, who think differently than the Generation X-ers, who think different from anyone else. Here's what grandpa dentist is saying, "Well, you know you don't understand those Millennials, they're just lazy. They're just born lazy," and so on. "How the hell are you going to come in and fix up my lazy staff because they're all a bunch of young, punk-ass, lazy Millennials born on an Xbox?"
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Kim:
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I do hear that, and I think you've got to shift what's going to motivate them. The study that I've done on Millennials, is that they are much more motivated by helping the world. Some of them want to go and save the world, so if you can connect what we're doing in this dental office is actually transforming peoples' lives through their mouth, transforming their health, and get them more connected with that. I also think that they've got to step up and learn. You've got to be a great role model to them and say, "Look, you've got to step up and work really heard," but they might not always know what that is. There is a little bit of a generation ... where they've been given a lot of trophies for just doing average, and we all know that that's happened. I think you've got to come to the heart with them, the heart and soul, and get them to see that we're actually changing peoples' lives here. You are a part of something bigger than yourself. I actually do think there is a searching for that. That's what I would say.
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Howard:
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I agree 100%. Millennials seem to thrive on purpose.
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Kim:
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Yeah, purpose. Exactly.
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Howard:
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In fact, I've seen Millennials taking a job at the Indian reservation in Tuba City, because it was more meaningful helping Navajos than it was going to Beverly Hills and doing cosmetic dentistry on rich old ladies who want to look 10 years younger. You know what I mean?
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Kim:
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[crosstalk 00:23:48]. Connecting with that, so the greatest generation, even the baby boomers, they were just taught, "You work hard. You make money," and that was just why you did it. This new generation, they've just go to connect with them. Just like you talked about in your book. You've got to be a life long learner. You've got to be a reader. You've got to say, "What are they doing differently," because every generation though looks at the other generation and saying, "Look at these kids these days. These kids these days." Every generation does that, and then look what happens. The generation comes and it transform the world. I think we've got to just look at every ... There's opportunity everywhere. It's also about their mindset. If they've got a mindset that these team mates are not going to amount to anything, then that's what they're going to get. One of the biggest things I think, as a leader, as if you can believe in somebody more than they believe in themselves, they are going to rise to the occasion. No doubt about it. "Sally, I know that you can do an amazing temporary. I believe in you. I want to work with you and help you do that." "Joe, you could be a great dentist. I'm going to mentor you. Do you want to be mentored?" We've got to believe in people more than they believe in themselves, because [crosstalk 00:24:55].
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Howard:
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I would take the same generation gap and apply it to marketing. Maybe my friends are getting too old [inaudible 00:25:03], and they sit here ... When you talk about digital marketing and social media, that's what they're going to say. They're going to say, "Howard, every time I do a full mouth implant, denture, partial, on grandma, she wouldn't know what Yelp was, the Google+, the Facebook. Everybody who gives me money doesn't know what any of this shit is you're talking about. Everybody who's staring at their Facebook doesn't have dental decay and isn't coming in and giving me money, so all that social media and digital marketing is a bunch of horse crap."
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Kim:
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What I would say to that is that if you look at the world, there's about seven billion people in the world, and there's a billion of them on Facebook. Actually, we've surpassed that. That statistic was from months or nearly even a year ago. People are on Facebook. We'll just want to talk about Facebook. Social media now, there's so many different aspects of it. Some, there are only younger kids on, but Facebook has got the 25 to 45 year old women on it, and guess who's making most of the decisions for your family around healthcare? The women who are aged 25 to 55. That's what it is. They're on there, and even though you don't like Facebook, that is a community that's on there. My friend, Craig Spodak, he's got thousands and thousands of people that follow him. They're going gangbusters, and a lot of their patients say, "I found you through Facebook." It's happening. You can bury your head in the sand, or you could say, "Let me learn about this." I know people in their 60s and 70s, that if you don't like their photo on Facebook, they get mad at you, "You didn't like my ..." They're on Facebook. They're on social media, and everyone is reading reviews.
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Amazon really was the one that changed the reviews. It used to be that you would have book review just done by the New York Times or whatever, and now, everybody can write a review. That transformed things. Now, we do all of our Amazon shopping like ... I know in my family. I'm a busy mum, so my kids, most of their Christmas presents came from Amazon. You bet I'm reading all the other parents, what they read. I don't know who they are, but somehow I'm trusting them. That's what's happening. It's this trusting economy. That's why, just bringing up the Super Bowl game, we're going to see a bunch of commercials on there. People are going to watch those commercials because they're watching it live, but people generally aren't watching live TV anymore. Madison Ave is trying to figure out how to get our eyeballs because people aren't watching TV either, not looking at advertisements, so reviews are the most important things, and it's huge for dentistry. It's huge. They've got to get reviews.
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Howard:
|
Since most of my fans are Millennials, every time I get an email from a dentist on this show, they're always under 30. "Man, I sure wish you'd write me a review for the Dentaltown app, or the iTunes show, or my book on Amazon, because it does help your SEOs. If you could do that for me, that would just be amazing." I want to go back ... I want to say something and I want you to address the back door because ... I grew up in restaurant industries. My dad owned restaurants, and if you ever saw people coming into a restaurant, they're just so damn happy. You go to Disneyland and all the kids are so happy they get in Disneyland. And then, you switch to dentistry and you see the unhappy side. They come in and they've got a toothache. They're in pain. Dentistry is tough.
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The thing that I think is a joke about how everybody worried about corporate is ... If a hygienist works 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year, that's 2,000 hours. That means she could see 1,000 people for an hour twice a year. If you're getting 25 new patients a month, that means every three years, you'd add another full time [inaudible 00:28:30]. Being a dentist for 30 years, I don't see anybody, any dentist, on earth that kept all their patients and not accepting new patients. You see a dentist that had been out there 25 years, and they're still needing 25 new patients a month, which means they're losing 25 patients a month. What I see with the corporate, is the corporate's back door seems to be wider open than anybody on the planet. If they hit a hundred new patients a month, they lose 99 of them that month. It's a revolving door. Dentistry is so hard. Nobody is keeping customers for life.
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I want you to talk about ... You also have hygienemastery.com, but what you said about new patients ... I don't like people talking about new patients and marketing and all that stuff, because most of their patients are going out the back door. You were saying the best way to get more new patients, reactivate the old ones. Why do you think patients are leaving dental ... Here's my question. Why do you think patients are leaving the dental office and not coming back? Then, why do you think the dentist listening to you right now have had new patients for 10 years. Why do they still need new patients after 10 years, when they're a town of 5,000? You're in a town of 5,000 and 10 years later, you still need marketing on [crosstalk 00:29:43]. My question is exactly this. Why does every dental office known to man lose patients every month? How could we lose patients less so we don't need to Twitter and Facebook our way to success?
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Kim:
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Because they're not continuously focusing on it. You've to continuously focus on delivering a different level of care. "I know, Mrs Jones, you hate coming to see the dentist, but we're going to give you an amazing experience anyways." If you have that mindset of "we're going to make everybody's day today," then people are going to have a difference experience. They're going to refer their friends and family, so it's partly about intention, intend to keep those patients in there. It's also about [inaudible 00:30:25] systems. You have to pre-appoint people before they leave the dental practice. You just do. People now are "busier" than ever, although I'm not exactly sure if I always believed that, I think we've always been really busy. I think we just have more information coming at us, so we feel like we're busier. You've got to pre-appoint people, but it's not just that. You've got to give them a reason to come back, and the reason that they want to come back is because they're totally connected with you. They're focused on you. You're connecting with them in such a way where you're asking them not just about their mouth, but their whole health.
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Yes, you're asking about their personal life and building rapport, but when you can connect with someone so strongly that they're not going to get ... Not that they're not going to get that from corporate, but they're going to get that less from corporate. They can't get you anywhere else. They can only get you at your dental practice, and the team, and the hand offs. When the team is getting along and the systems are being followed for keeping people into the practice, and people are really caring about them, the patients will stay. If there's conflict within the team, if people aren't handing off correctly, if the systems are falling to the wayside, then there's not really a reason to stay, and they can always go to their next ... or their buddy can tell them about another dentist they can go to. Always. That's always-
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Howard:
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Okay. Almost everybody that's ever contacted me, 99% from the show, they're older dentists. But the dentist is back there staring at a tooth, and when the receptionist and the assistant aren't just getting along, and a new patient walks into the waiting room, does she sense that?
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Kim:
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I think they can, sometimes. I think that these ladies sometimes think that they're Hollywood actresses and people can't tell, but I think people can tell. Then, the doctor has to stop the practice, have a team meeting, go to a training university. We have these training universities where they actually shut down their practice. They come with other practices there. There will maybe be 50 to 100 people in a room and we all mastermind. How can we be better when we go back in on Monday morning? How are we going to not have it be business as usual? What are we going to be thinking about and focusing on that transforms our lives? It transforms the lives of our teams and our patients. We've got to be thinking about this all the time. I think they just go back to business as usual, and it's just pick up the hand piece everyday. Pick up the hand piece, and they're not really saying, "What are we going to do differently? How are we going to be different? What are we going to do today that is different than yesterday?" I really believe that.
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Howard:
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Dentaltown has 50 forums, root canals, fillings, crowns, and their practice manager when he deals with on staff is, if you scroll down the list, the number one reoccurring problem that the title is, "I can't believe my hygienist wants a raise. I'm barely paying my bills." That's one of those common problems. What can my homies do when the hygienist says, "Can I come back and see you over lunch? I have a question to ask," and then she comes in and says, "Dr Kim McGuire, as you know, the planet has gone round the sun one more time, and I'm going to need another dollar because according to the zodiac, every time the earth goes around the sun, you give me another buck."
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Kim:
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[crosstalk 00:33:32].
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Howard:
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And he's sitting there coughing up a blood clot because he's thinking, "I've so much overhead." What's wrong?
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Kim:
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First of all, and you do need to make sure that your staff overhead is in line, and I totally agree with what your book says, that 25% is appropriate for most dental practices. There might be some differences around the country with some different socio-economic areas, but generally, we want a hygienist ... Let me back up. "Doctor, do you have daily goals for this hygienist? Are we scheduling to goal? Are we making sure that there's enough production in her schedule so that she can produce three times her salary?" Just using round numbers, if she makes 40 bucks an hour, she needs to be producing at least $120 per hour. Period, end of story. That is my absolute rule. If she wants to be making more, then that's when these doctors say that hygiene is a lost [leader 00:34:32], which of course I do not believe in at all. I think the hygienist is the lifeblood of the practice, but she needs to be taking a look at, obviously not doing inappropriate procedures, but is our perio program in line? Are we doing FMXs appropriately when the patient needs it? Are we making sure that everything is ... Are we doing fluoride? What other adjunct services could we be doing so that I could be producing $120 an hour? Or whatever it is for your practice. It depends on your area and your fee schedule and all that.
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I really think that it's about putting the onus on Miss Hygienist and saying, "Susie, this is your operatory. This is your little business within my business. You need to be producing X amount, and if you produce over than that, I will consider giving you a raise." It needs to be about dollars and cents because the doctor is looking at dollars and cents. He or she is saying, "We're collecting X-amount of dollars a month, and all of this money is going out, and the rest is for me." They are looking at dollars and cents, and the hygienist needs to ... I think they need to look at themselves as business people more than they do, perhaps, and that's what our Hygiene Mastery program does. They've got to take a look at their own continuing education, and where they can provide more value to their patients.
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Howard:
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Here's the problem. I'm going to throw a monkey wrench in what you just said. My homies won't show their staff any of the numbers. They're not transparent. I go in the staff and I say, "9 out of 10 offices, what do we have to do to break even today?" They say, "I don't even know what we collect in a month," and they'll say, "Well, what is your overhead?" then go, "He's never showed us a number." And then, I asked my homie, "Did you show your staff your numbers?" They go, "I don't want them to see how much I make," and I go, "You're back here coughing up blood clots into a toilet, you know." So, when you talk about ... Dentists are typically ... Well, all social animals, all monkeys and apes are control freaks. They all want to be the [inaudible 00:36:19] and they don't want to be transparent. Governments don't want to be transparent. China, North Korea, most people, man-made institute. The Catholic Church doesn't want to be transparent. So how can you teach this dentist listening to you, that if she was just ... How open should she be with the numbers? Is there a problem if the staff sees that last year, she made $150,000 a year?
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Kim:
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Yeah. Really what it goes down to is peoples' belief systems around money and belief systems around it. First of all, it's not appropriate for the team to know how much money the doctor spent or the doctor makes. Absolutely not. What is appropriate though, is for them to understand what the variable costs are of the practice that they can actually affect, and it is appropriate for them to know ... They can know what percentage of all the money coming in, the percentage that goes out to the team. Actually, our bonus structure that we have, our band bonus system, is based on that. It's based-
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Howard:
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Band being bare ass minimum?
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Kim:
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Bare ass minimum. That's right, or the basic amount of money the practice needs to bring in, but it is based on that percentage. We need to take a look at a healthy dental practice, "Hey guys, you ..." I always say this, so I'm going to say a couple of things. Doctors, this is what you need to tell your team, "You guys are the most expensive investment that I make in my practice, but the most important, because I can't do without you, and you can't do without me, so we're on this together. I'm happy to pay you all, and we need to keep this an appropriate percentage." The other thing I would say about goals and about dollar amount. Here's the thing about human beings. People come to work for money, but that's not why they stay. They stay because they're a part of something bigger than themselves. Just like you said in your book, "Money is a yardstick that shows you how much value you've given to another person," and people like to be a part of something. It's like if you have a goal to do a million dollars, and you chunk it down by the month and then by the day, what it's going to take, people get excited about that. "Awesome, we hit the goal today. The next day we didn't hit it, but the next day we blew it out of the water."
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People can get excited about that, and that doesn't mean that they know how much money you make. "By the way, doctor, you've got a lot of bills. We went to dental school and undergrad, you probably are paying those off, and you put yourself out there. You have a business. You should be paid handsomely for that." I have no problem with that. They don't need to know the dollar amounts, but what they do need to know is, "I want the hygienist to be producing $1,000 a day. We want the doctors to be producing $4,000 to $5,000 a day." Whatever it is, so that they have something to go for. Every year in December and January, all across the country, all the Fortune practices get into one ballroom. In Denver, here, or all of Colorado, they drove from all around. They came into one ballroom, in the Bay area, New York, every place, and they do annual planning where they crunch their numbers. They begin with the end in mind. I always have a coaching call with my doctor. "Doctor, how much money do you want to make this year?" You have to begin with the end in mind. "You want to make $200,000? $300,000?" Whatever it is, great. "What's your profitability? Well, we have to take that first, and then we have to figure out how much you need to produce and collect in order for you to take that home."
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Then, we go to the practice and we say, "Okay guys, this is how many days we're going to work. This is how much we want to make," so we chunk it down. We really are open about that because that's the only way to measure whether you've done better or not. I think that they need to maybe take a look at their belief systems around sharing numbers with their team, and know that it doesn't mean that they know how much money you make. It's about them. If you empower them to understand the numbers, they may start thinking more like business people, and then they're going to think, "Well, I'm a business person and I'm working for this practice." If you put a bonus structure that is about profit sharing, then they're saying, "Gosh, I want the practice to make more money, so I'm going to work harder. I'm going to do better at enrolling," or, "I'm going to give Mrs Jones an amazing experience," and then it flows. That's how it works. There's no magic to it.
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Howard:
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Okay, but you and I ... I'm 10 years older than you, but what percentage of dental offices have a budget at the beginning of the year? What percent would you say?
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Kim:
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All the ones that work with us do.
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Howard:
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I know, but what percent of the industry does?
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Kim:
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Very few. In fact, I always-
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Howard:
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Quantify it. Give a number.
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Kim:
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I'm going to say 70% [crosstalk 00:40:44].
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Howard:
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70% do not or do?
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Kim:
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Do not.
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Howard:
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Yes, so basically, two-thirds do not. 70% do not. If you're listening to this, you want to be in the 30%, you just can't finish the year strong by random chaos, luck, accident. You've got to have a plan.
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Kim:
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Yes.
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Howard:
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But they'll fly all the way to [inaudible 00:41:03] a five day occlusion. Occlusion. And then, they'll fly all over the country to learn about a sleep disorder. You're going to learn sleep medicine and you don't even have the budget for 2016?
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Kim:
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Right, [crosstalk 00:41:22]-
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Howard:
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And then I keep telling them, if they had all the budgets, bonuses, and they had the business, then they have the money to go play monkey dentistry anywhere on earth.
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Kim:
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Absolutely. You've brought up a great one. Sleep medicine. I have a couple of clients that are really getting into sleep medicine. It's not just about the doctor learning about occlusions or learning the airways, and maybe getting a cone beam. It's about having every single team member understand how to talk to the patients about their lifestyle and their sleeping and all the symptoms that they're having, so that we can enroll those patients in that treatment, because they can't just be all about the doctor. Again, this goes back to leadership and the doctor saying, "Okay guys, in 2016, I really want to do a lot more sleep apnea because I'm really passionate about that. I'm really passionate about helping people. These are the things I need you to know. These are the things I need you to understand." Shut down the office, do a training program and empower your team, because that is going to help you implement what you've learned.
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Howard:
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Well, the Caesars called it "circus circus" where they would give the people what they wanted, so let's give our townies some circus circus, because they only want to know about clinical.
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Kim:
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All right.
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Howard:
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That was one of your five things, clinical technology, implants, sleep ... Go over the hot areas, whether it'd be CAD/CAM, lasers, implants, sleep medicine, short term [orthos 00:42:41]. What do you see out there in the real world where some of this stuff is making an impact?
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Kim:
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Well, I probably drank the Sirona kool-aid, but I definitely think digital technology and CAD/CAM technology is ... Well, the future is here. It's already happening. The CEREC technology, the new releases of the technology is absolutely amazing, how it can integrate also with the Galileos, the cone beam technology, and patients are going to be expecting ... It's like our friend Fred says, "You want to do two visits or do you want to do one visit?" That's what people are going to want in the future, and by the way, that's what the corporate entities are buying, CERECs by the millions. In fact, at CEREC 30 last September, they gave Pacific dental services an award for the one millionth CEREC restoration, so it's here to say. You've got to make sure that you're on top of that technology. For sure, I would say that is the biggest thing, digital technology. Of course, Invisalign or other short term ortho is huge, especially with adults and people. That's becoming a household name, Invisalign.
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Here is what I always tell a general dentist, which I think ... I don't know if most of your listeners are general dentists. Even specialists, this is good for specialists to hear too. Even though a general dentist can do all of these things, I want them to do what they're passionate about. If you're passionate about placing implants, go learn it and do it, but if you're not passionate about it, then refer it out. It's just like you talked about time. You only have a certain amount of time. Figure out what you're passionate about and then focus on that, and you can outsource the rest. Or, bring in an associate or a partner who has those skills that complement you. I think that's really important at well.
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Howard:
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[inaudible 00:44:29] show ... I own Dentaltown and Orthotown. Orthotown magazine goes to 11,000 orthodontists each month and about 5,000 of them are on the website. They're big fans of the show, so you're talking to a lot of orthons. I agree, going back to the staff, that money is usually third or fourth reason why they're working there everyday. Like the people they're with, they feel good about what they're doing. Do they like the team? Same thing with dentistry. I don't want to rain on their parade. I mean, if your passion is placing implants or sleep medicine or CAD/CAM, go do it, but I just firmly believe that being a millionaire has nothing to do with whether you're an endodontist, a periodontist, a pedidontist, a [prosdon 00:45:12]. Business is business. I don't care if you're selling dentistry or doughnuts and all that.
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Kim:
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Absolutely.
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Howard:
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You mentioned a staff bonus system. Can you go over your staff bonus system?
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Kim:
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Sure. I'll-
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Howard:
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Or is that a secret trademark?
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Kim:
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No, it's not a secret. No, absolutely. We come from total abundance. I'm happy to share it with you. I'm just going to use round numbers. Let's say that we want to keep our staff salaries at 25% of what we collect every month, and our staff salaries are at $25,000, then that would mean of course that we need to collect $100,000 to keep that percentage in line. We do use a three-month rolling average where we are looking at three months in a row. It does get paid out every month, or it gets calculated every month, but we're using the last three months to look at the numbers. That really just takes away any ups and downs. If you've got really low months, you don't want to be ... Some doctors are like, "Well, I don't want to give out a bonus. I had a really low month," but then you maybe have a really high month, so it really evens everything out. You're looking at, in this example, if it's 25%, if you want to keep it at 25%, and it's $25,000 going out to the team, anything over that $100,000 on the three-month rolling average, 20% of the overage goes into a bonus pool.
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Basically, the doctor is saying, "Look, after $100,000, I have paid all my bills. I've gotten paid what I wanted to get paid. You guys have been paid what you want to be paid." Anything over the $100,000 is really a lot of gravy. There's going to be a couple of percentages in there for some supplies and a little bit here and there, and lab costs, depending on how you do your dentistry, but most of it then can go back to the staff. And then, that creates a bonus pool, and that bonus pool might be, say it's $2,000. If everybody works the same amount of days, you can divide it up, but if they worked different amounts of days, you can prorate it.
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The reason why we do it ... The whole team gets to share is because just because a hygienist sees the patients, the administrative team needs to schedule them, so we all need to work together. It's an even bonus. Boy, some of our practices are bonusing a tremendous amount because they're seeing that they can make more money that way than asking for a dollar raise. Plus, it's so exciting. If you have $1,000 to share with the rest of your team, and the doctor gets excited because ... Let's say, in this example, the average over the last three months was $110,000, the doctor is going to give $2,000 to the team, and he or she is making about $8,000 more. You should be excited about that.
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Howard:
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Okay. I'm going throw another curve ball at you.
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Kim:
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Curve ball. Throw it.
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Howard:
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When I looked at firemen, they show up to 100% of all the fires in Phoenix and put them all out. Policemen aren't very good. When I was in high school, they only solved and convicted in prison about 10% of people who murdered someone, and now they put a bunch of money and all that. Now, it's only about 30%. You still got two-thirds. They might know who killed you, but they're not going to take it to jury. They don't have enough evidence. When I look at my homies, we're in between police and firemen in the fact that when dentists in America diagnose 100 cavities, only 38 out of 100 get drilled, filled, and built. Policemen are about 30% on murderers, we're about 38% on cavities, and firemen get all the fires.
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You think you're a good dentist. I don't think you're a good dentist if two out of three people/times you diagnose a cavity, it walks out the door. You think you're a good dentist because used a rubber dam and this and that, this and that, and I'm looking at two out of three infections walking right out of the door. And then, a dentist could double his practice without any new patients if he went from getting 38%, have them drilled, billed, and built, to 76%. My specific question is, do you agree that if you raised your treatment plan case acceptance, that that's being a better doctor that'll make your mama proud? Isn't that our job? Isn't that our job to fight infections in the mouth?
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Kim:
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Yeah, [crosstalk 00:49:28].
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Howard:
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[crosstalk 00:49:30] to increase treatment plan acceptance? I'll go into a town with two dentists in the same medical dental building. They got the same number of charts, but one dentist does twice the revenue as the other one, and it all comes down to treatment plan acceptance, and paying and getting treatment. How can my homies get more than 38 out of 100 diagnosed cavities drilled, filled, and built?
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Kim:
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All right. Your homies need to take a look at why do people buy things. First of all, nobody likes to be sold, but everybody likes to buy. People like to buy things, but they don't like to get sold. That feels yucky, right? So we need to be thinking about why do people want to buy things. People buy for emotional reasons and they back it up with logic. People buy for emotional reasons and they back it up with logic. It's like, why do people spend $80,000 on a car when they could spend $25,000 on a similar type of car or/and another car that takes them from point A to point B? Well, there's all these emotional reasons. I want to look good. I want to look sexy. I want people to think I'm successful. There's all these emotional reasons, but then they'll back it up with logic. "Well, but it's very safe. I'm going get my kids to the mountains skiing, very safely." It's the same thing in dentistry. It's extremely logical, right?
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You find a tooth that needs a cavity. You diagnose the cavity, or it has decayed and you diagnosed the cavity, but we go to clinical with our patients, and we talk, and talk, and talk, and talk, and talk. We think we're educating them, and they have no connection. It's not connecting with them because you're not really connecting with what is going to motivate them to buy your dental treatment, and so, I think that this goes back to the beginning of our conversation. We've got to be more in touch with our own feelings and what's going on with the patient over there. Talk to them about what's most important to them in their health. What's the most important to them in the relationship with our practice? What is really bothering them? Not just what their chief complaint is, but really, what is ... because it might be their health. It might be they want to look good. They want to have a beautiful smile. It might be they want to chew their steak till they're 90. It might be time. It might be like, "Hey, I don't have a whole lot of time. I need you to do a whole quadrant all at once." Of course, they won't say "quadrant," they'll say "a whole side." You've got to figure out what makes this person tick.
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It also goes back to our conversation about social media. People think that everybody thinks like themselves. They don't. They think like they do, so you've got to get out of your world and get into the patient's world, and try and figure what's going to motivate them to say "yes" to your treatment, and then talk to them in those terms. Figure out what they want, and then tell them how your treatment is going to get them what they want, because your competition are flights to Hawaii and flat-screen televisions, and all the stuff that we've been talking about, so [crosstalk 00:52:21].
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Howard:
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Okay, but when I go into an office, the assistants and hygienists tell me that if she pulls out the intraoral camera and starts explaining to the assistant that I [inaudible 00:52:31], that they get in trouble, because the doctor says that they're not doctors and they don't know what they're talking about, and they're diagnosing, and blah blah. And then, when I go into the offices that have really high treatment plan acceptance rates, everybody has the freedom to educate.
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Kim:
|
Yes, absolutely. I think that the first example that you said, is just some people need to take a look again at their belief systems. That is a limiting belief that the other team members cannot enroll these patients. In fact, they might believe the hygienists and the assistants more than they'll believe you, doctor, unfortunately. It is a factor. When you get Shannon on, she'll probably talk about this, but it is a must for me that in that hygiene room, that there is an intraoral photo that is taken and up on the screen, so when doctor comes in, they can talk about it. Now, that might not be what they diagnosed, but it's called "co-discovery," because co-diagnosis, we're not supposed to say that.
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It's co-discovery. Hygienist is discovering, "You know, Dr Smith, Kim and I have been talking, and we really are concerned about tooth number 29." You can have the picture up there, so they're visually seeing what's wrong, and then there's a talk over, because you're actually talking about me, the patient, over me, and it's unbelievably impactful. You've got to empower your team to be able to do this. No, they are not going to diagnose. They're not the doctor. You are the doctor. However, they can help speed up the process of enrolling your patients by teeing it up for you, and then you could say, "Yep, I can see that's true," or, "Maybe we need to just take a look at next time you come in for your next hygiene appointment," whenever it might be. Although I don't like to see a lot of watches because I think we get ourselves in trouble there.
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Howard:
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You know what they say, it's illegal for a hygienist to diagnose. I'm just wondering in your career, Kim, how many hygienists have you met in prison, that went to jail for diagnosing [crosstalk 00:54:21]?
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Kim:
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[crosstalk 00:54:21]. Zero. They don't.
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Howard:
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I know. Crazy. I want to keep on this diagnosis [inaudible 00:54:26] in mind, because I really think the best firemen are the ones that put out all the fires. The best policemen are the ones that catch all the bad guys. If I gave out one gift for dentistry, it'd be, just get out the infection. I don't care what you fill it with. I don't care if it's amalgam, IRM, [inaudible 00:54:42], just get out all the decay. Did you see any higher success rates with any of these technologies like CAESY or some of these apps like DDS GP-
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Kim:
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Yes, [crosstalk 00:54:53].
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Howard:
|
Or do you just like the intraoral camera or digital X-rays. I guess my question is, are there any aids that you think help close treatment plans? Or do you just think it's just the salesperson?
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Kim:
|
I do like DDS GP. I've seen it a couple of times in a couple of demos with them. I think CAESY is great, I don't think people use it. I don't think people use it. They have it on their computers and they're not using it. I think the intraoral camera of their actual mouth is the best, coupled with sitting there and talking with the patient, and actually talking to them about what their long term goals are and what they really want out of their dental treatment, what they really want for their health. I think it's partly ... There are some great tools, but you've got to have a great person utilizing those tools, and utilizing them and utilizing it to the best of their ability. Again, going back to the drawing board and taking a team meeting and saying, "All right, so we've been using ..." Let's just use DDS GP or CAESY, I know there's some other education software out there. "What's going great? What could we improve on? You did really great when you explained X, Y, and Z, but on Mrs Smith over here, you didn't do a great job." We've got to have open and honest communication with our teams in order to be able to figure out what are we doing great and what do we need to work on, because that's what is really going to help you go to the next level. That whole self-awareness.
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The other thing that people need to do ... I love how you throw out the 38%, and I love that statistic, but do people really know what their case acceptance statistics are? I don't really think they do. I think they [crosstalk 00:56:24].
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Howard:
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Hell, no. They don't have any idea what it is.
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Kim:
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No, they don't. They have to track it, yeah.
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Howard:
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I have to say one thing being an old-timer, is that the first 10, 15 year ... Well, from '87 to 2000, when I had X-rays and little one-inch films on a view box or whatever. That was my world from '87 to 2000, and then when I switched to digital X-rays, which only half of the dentists in America have, I could pull up that X-ray. Now, it's 18 inches by 12 inches on a screen. I think that intraoral camera I had at '87. I bought it back when it was $38,000 [inaudible 00:57:12]. It was the size of a refrigerator. You could have put a keg of beer into that damn thing, it was a monster. Everybody said, "I'm not paying $30,000," but I already that it added $30,000 or more dentistry probably in the first 40, 50 days. I think that dentists, too, are on film X-rays. I think digital X-rays are as power as the intraoral camera.
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Kim:
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I would agree with that, absolutely. Of course, all the technology, these screens that we have ... The other thing that we teach, and we talked a lot about peoples' modalities, how we communicate in different ways. Tony Robbins goes into this a lot. We communicate with all three areas, but some people are stronger. Like, you might be right-handed or left-handed. If I'm right-handed, but if somebody cut off my right hand, I'd be able to write with my left hand if I had to. Some people are more visual, and they talk with their hands and they emote more. Some people are more auditory and they can hear things better, and some people are more kinesthetic, and they have to feel that something's right, and they're a little bit more emotionally connected. Most people though, when they're deciding on the dental treatment, are visual people, so you've got to put it up there. I think it's both connecting with them emotionally, and also figuring out where their modality is. We have a whole two-day seminar that we teach all this stuff, but figuring out and then speaking to them in their language. "See, Mrs Jones, where you've got this crack in your tooth," talking to them that way. Absolutely.
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Howard:
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You know what your best marketing would be? You don't need me. You don't need marketing. You guys were doing this forever, but we put out 350 online [inaudible 00:58:49] course on Dentaltown, and they've been viewed over half a million times. If you put up an online [inaudible 00:58:57] course over your key parts to your five business engines, or qualities of a successful leader, [inaudible 00:59:04] series like mastery, I think a lot of people would get turned on to you guys, and I think you would reach a whole different level of people. It's like-
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Kim:
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I'm going to take that on, Howard. I'm going to make it happen [crosstalk 00:59:17].
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Howard:
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Do your podcast on that.
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Kim:
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[crosstalk 00:59:19].
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Howard:
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We're out of time, but I'm going to ask you one overtime bonus question that I am not allowed to ask because I'm a boy, and if I ask it, I'm considered a sexist pig. There are conventions in meetings, even put on in my own backyard in Arizona State Dental Association. Here's the non-profit Arizona State Dental Association putting on seminars about women's issues in dentistry. My last question, and I'm not even going to comment or whatever, but you're a woman, and you've been in this thing forever. When you're out there consulting, are there any women's issue that don't apply to short, fat, bald men like me? Do women have any special issues in dentistry?
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Kim:
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I do see for the female clients that I work with, I do sometimes see a challenge with them crossing the "friend" versus "I'm your boss" line [crosstalk 01:00:12] to-
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Howard:
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Exactly. It's not just women. The next generation men don't do it. The baby boomers don't do it, but the Millennial boys do that too.
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Kim:
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Yep. There are-
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Howard:
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So you're saying Millennial male dentists are part-girl?
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Kim:
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That's not what I said, Howard. No, but I think-
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Howard:
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Can I quote you on that?
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Kim:
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I think they want to connect, though. They want to have a good time. They want it to be like just one of the guys, or just one of the girls. There's a difference here. I have one female dentist, who also is a Millennial, that I'm thinking about, and the way that sometimes her team speaks to her, I think to myself, "Doctor so and so, a 50-year-old man would never be spoken to that way." I don't know what it is, it's just something ... We're working on her leadership skills, and she's a beautiful leader. She's wonderful, but really setting those boundaries ... I think there is a unique challenge that they have there, but I think women dentists are fabulous. I love them.
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Howard:
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I love them too. Who could not? But be a little more specific. What behaviors do, not just women dentists, but Millennials, boy dentists too. What behaviors is crossing the line from friend to boss? Because if I go out and get drunk with you till 3:00 in the morning, how can I write you up for being five minutes late the next day? You know what I mean?
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Kim:
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[crosstalk 01:01:26].
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Howard:
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Is there any specific behaviors where you say, "This is crossing the line." You're no longer a boss, a leader that can fire you, and now you're too buddy-close friend, and now they're not going to respect you.
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Kim:
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There could be the going out and drinking, and everybody has different boundaries there, but I think it's really about how much they share with them. It's not black and white. It's pretty grey. I'm thinking of another client and she shares a lot about her life, so she becomes just one of the girls, and then when they don't like something, they're like, "We don't like the way you're doing that. Well, you said this this week, and now you're this the other week. What is it?" With this attitude in a team meeting? I'm going, "Time out, guys. It's inappropriate to say that." One thing I love about dentistry, is that it's not corporate, and it's fun and it's entrepreneurial, and we're changing peoples' lives, but I do think a level of professionalism could be increased. I think that there could be an increase of professionalism on both the doctors and the employee side, the teams. We're out here saving lives, and we're out here delivering beautiful smiles, and it's a huge industry, and I think that there could be a little bit of an increase there.
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Howard:
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My next door neighbor, out on the front lawn, friend of a friend's said, "Howard, have you heard of this new dentist blah, blah, blah?" And I said, "Yeah," and through a friend of a friend, he's now ... He showed me his Facebook picture, and this guy ... I'm 53, he's probably 68. He said, "I feel sorry for the poor bastard that goes to that guy as a dentist," because he was at a party and he's posting this on his Facebook page, and the grandpa next door just can't associate someone doing a root canal or a [inaudible 01:03:13] or an implant, half naked at a swimming pool party. Yeah, crazy. Hey, seriously, I'm your biggest fan. I think we set a world record. We're both 100% Irish. Two Irishmen were with each other for an hour and there is no beer exchange.
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Kim:
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Oh no. I know [inaudible 01:03:30].
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Howard:
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[crosstalk 01:03:30] is this a record? Seriously, thanks for all that you do. I'm your biggest fan. You guys have Tony Robbins for the length of time ... Thank you for all that you've done for dentistry, and thank you so much for giving me an hour of your life today.
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Kim:
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Absolutely, and Howard, right back at you. Namaste. Thank you for being who you are and Dentaltown, and what you've created. Maybe I'll see you in Arizona in a couple of weeks, at the meeting.
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Howard:
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Hey, whenever you're down, call me up. I'm [crosstalk 01:03:57].
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Kim:
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Yeah, we're going to hang out.
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