Listen on iTunes
Watch Video here
|
VIDEO - DUwHF #701 - Paula Harriss
|
Stream Audio here
|
AUDIO - DUwHF #701 - Paula Harriss
|
Paula Harriss is a nationally recognized motivational speaker, life coach, and business coach. She is an expert in Sales Training, Marketing, Cross-training, Life Coaching and a keynote speaker for the University of TN Student-Athletes, Dental Boot Kamp, The Power for Life, as well as Pac Live, eWomenNetwork, and the Chamber of Commerce. The John Maxwell company chose Paula as a Founder’s Circle coach, trainer and speaker. She also has three certificates in plant-based nutrition from Cornell University. Paula has over 10,000 hours of master coaching experience that has helped hundreds of practices reach their personal and professional goals to enhance productivity, and become insurance independent. She customizes training and presentations to any business as well as church retreats and couples retreats.
Paula specializes in SYSTEMS for personal and professional growth with an emphasis on people skills.
Paula has been a business owner twice, voted Entrepreneur of the Year in 1991, and was a team member in a six doctor practice in Knoxville, TN. She inspires teams with her contagious enthusiasm and commitment to excellence. For select practices, she also specializes in cross training a “Seamless Team”. With her business experience she has expert skills in marketing, collections, and stopping cancellations.
Paula appeared regularly on the STYLE television show, is a Miss USA Pageant judge, and a professional organist with a degree from the University of TN in Deaf Education. Originally from Charleston, SC, Paula now lives on the lake in East TN with her husband, Michael, is the mother of five daughters and eleven grandchildren.
www.paulaharrisscoaching.com
Howard Farran: It is just a huge honor for me today to be podcast interviewing Paula Harriss, all the way from Tennessee. You're in Baneberry?
Paula Harriss: Yeah, we are.
Howard Farran: What's that a suburb of? Is that Nashville or Memphis?
Paula Harriss: It's a suburb of Knoxville maybe.
Howard Farran: Knoxville, right on. Paula Harriss is a nationally recognized motivational speaker, life coach and business coach. She is an expert in sales training, marketing, cross-training, life coaching and a keynote speaker for the University of Tennessee Student-Athletes, Dental Boot Kamp, The Power for Life, as well as Pac Live, eWomenNetwork, and the Chamber of Commerce. The John Maxwell Company choose Paula as a Founder’s Circle coach, trainer and speaker. She also has three certificates in plant-based nutrition, I assume that's medical marijuana, could I be wrong? I might be wrong.
Paula Harriss: There you go.
Howard Farran: Paula has over 10,000 hours of master coaching experience that has helped hundreds of practices reach their personal and professional goals to enhance productivity, and become insurance independent. She customizes training and presentations to any business as well as church retreats and couples retreats. Paula specializes in systems for personal and professional growth with an emphasis on people skills.
Paula has been a business owner twice, voted Entrepreneur of the Year in 1991, and was a team member in a six-doctor practice in Knoxville, Tennessee. She inspires teams with her contagious enthusiasm and commitment to excellence. For select practices, she also specializes in cross-training a “Seamless Team”. With her business experience she has expert skills in marketing, collections, and stopping cancellations.
Paula appeared regularly on the STYLE television show, is a Miss USA Pageant judge, and a professional organist with a degree from the University of Tennessee in Deaf Education. Originally from Charleston, South Carolina, Paula now lives on the lake in East Tennessee with her husband, Michael, is the mother of five daughters and 11 grandchildren.
I have to tell you, I grew up with five sisters, I know there's a special place for you in heaven. I'll probably be in the basement and I'll be lucky to make first floor. You'll be up on the ... You'll have a penthouse suite on the very top floor. You know what, living ... growing up with five sisters I entered dentistry where most of the employees are female and females make 90% of all the employments. My first question to you is how did you get into dentistry? Of all the professions you could have served, how did you end up in dentistry?
Paula Harriss: It's amazing. You know, I had a business of my own and I was going through a terrible time in my life and one day I snapped and walked out and ran away somewhere for a little while, and went through a lot of counseling and therapy, and my dentist offered me a job. I said no for three months and he kept asking. I don't know why he wanted me to work there, I was 40 years old, I didn't know how to type, I didn't know how to use the computer, and he hired me for the admin. I did everything wrong, but I fell in love with it.
Howard Farran: If you lined up a 100 dentists and you say, "What is the toughest thing about being a dentist?" They always say it's the staff. I had a dentist that called me today and his labor is 31% and he hasn't paid himself in two months, and when he explained the whole thing to his staff the first thing one of the staff member said is, "Well, are we still going to get raises?" It's like ... The other problem is most dentists are introverts. I mean you only got A's in math and biology and calculus and physics if you sat in a library like a geek and studied 'til midnight every night. Dentistry is a people person game, we sell the invisible, they don't know if their root canal is any good, they just know they like you and love the team. How do you coach an introvert scientist, engineer, surgeon in having people skills to get along with the staff and patients? How do you do that?
Paula Harriss: Well, you know Howard, that's a very good question and I see that all day long everyday. I think the number one thing standing in their way is themselves and there's this little voice that goes on up here all day that tells them they're not good enough, they can't do it. They're afraid of their team many times. They get a scarcity mindset. They don't want to rock the boat. They don't want to go to the team and lead them because they're afraid they'll leave and then they'll be stranded. It just spirals. It spirals. If we don't have a conversation with the team, if we don't talk to them about what's happening and lead them they will run all over you. I mean that's just the way women are. I am one, I can say that. It's difficult for them to understand where the doctor is coming from.
Howard Farran: How do they get better with the man in the mirror? I mean they're looking at the man in the mirror and I know my homies like the back of my hand, they get up every morning like Stuart Smalley on Saturday Live and say ... what did he used to say? "I'm not good enough. I'm not smart enough and god darn it ..." How did that go? That was so funny, but how do you start with those guys ?
Paula Harriss: That's a good question and I'm glad you asked me that, and I want to thank you for what you do for dentists because they really need the support. I struggled with this too as a business owner, as a human being, and this sounds like let's get on the couch therapy here, but you have to go back and you have to deal with your stuff. If you don't deal with your stuff and you come and try to lead a team, it's not going to go over very well. It doesn't mean that you have to have worked through all of your stuff, but at least you're on the path. The first thing to identify is, "Where is my self-worth coming from? What am I giving power in my life?" For most of us, we were taught our performance. If we're performing well in lots of areas, our crowns look great and our numbers look good then we've got antenna on our head. If our team doesn't like us, patients are upset with us, our number's gone, we're down to one or two. Do you know any doctors like that?
Howard Farran: Yes.
Paula Harriss: It's very defeating and in dental school they were taught, "You're no good. That impression you just took is terrible. What are you doing in here? You shouldn't be a dentist." They beat them down. I don't know if they're doing that as much as they used to. Are you hearing that, they get beat up in dental school?
Howard Farran: All the dental schools run it like the Marine Corp 30 years ago, but now there's two schools, U of P and A.T. Still, where these deans now want to really get involved with their student body. Jack Dillenberg at A.T. Still, he has all the students before they start dental school the night before at his house, and they have a big party and they drink beer. The other one was the U of P guy, but yeah, there's still a lot of schools that just think, "The meaner and tougher and harder I am on you like boot camp, it will make you better." What's funny is that U of P ... Who is the guy at U of P? Arthur Dugoni. Guess who has the highest percent of alumni donating money back to their private school?
Paula Harriss: I bet you. I bet you.
Howard Farran: U of P, it's just a war chest.
Paula Harriss: They've been torn down, they've been shot down, maybe they have childhood stuff going on before that, I know that was my situation. The performance is one thing and then the opinion of other people. We give too much power to the opinion of whether the team likes you or not, whether the patients like you or not, and when we give that power away it really affects our leadership. We have to do a lot of self-talk. Our subconscious mind is 75% of our brain and whenever you say, "I am," like, "I am tired," you're giving orders up here, "Okay, I'll be tired," or, "I am fat," well, "Okay, I'll be fat. Don't work on it." Our conscious mind takes orders from the subconscious. We have to be very careful about what we say, that's our self-talk.
Everybody has stress. Where does stress come from? It comes from fear, fear of something, it might be fear of poverty. I know a lot of guys who fear poverty and they got a lot of school debt, they've got a debt for a practice, and they're freaking out over their finances. When that fear kicks in then the team sees that, the patient see that, it shows up in your nonverbal. Where does the fear come from? The fear comes from, "I'm not good enough," and we're taught that. Life has proven that true for some time.
In dental school they don't teach you well enough, in my opinion, how to run a business, how to talk to team members, how to lead them, how to guide them, how to share your vision with them. Until we start talking to ourselves, and this is another thing, Howard, that's so important, I just did a leadership retreat last weekend, and one of the things I hear from dentists all the time is they think they're the only ones going through this trouble and they're embarrassed to share it with anybody else. We get in a room and ... We have mastermind groups which is another super important thing that I'm recommending, and I have those mastermind groups. You get four or five doctors from different places. You're not going to get doctors together in your own hometown, they're afraid of each other, they're not going to admit their faults and their weaknesses. You get them from different states or somebody you went to school with that's spread out and not in your niche marketing area, they'll be more open.
One of the things we started with the retreat last weekend was we're all in the same boat. I wrote that on the flip chart, I say, "We're all in the same boat. Put your ego at the door, it's not time to put your ego out here. Let's get real. Let's get vulnerable and let's help each other, because we're all dealing with the same stuff." By the end of that meeting they were feeling safe. I think you got to find mentors and you are one of those out there for dentists. You got to find mentors. You got to find a mastermind group. That doesn't mean your local dental association, it means eagles, it means other doctors who are willing to share their knowledge, their expertise with you, their story, being real about where they're struggling. Does this make sense? Have you seen those work this way?
Howard Farran: Yeah, in fact at your retreat last weekend was one of my classmate, Scott Dahlquist, who I did a podcast with six months or a year ago. One of my favorite ... You know why he was my favorite classmate?
Paula Harriss: Why?
Howard Farran: Because in dental school you and all your alcoholic friends need a designated driver and Scott Dahlquist was Mormon and he never had a beer all through dental school. It was so nice to have a Mormon guy driving us from bars to bars to bars, but just ... what a great man, just a great ... He's just a great person from A to Z, and thank you, Scott, for being my designated driver for four years in Kansas City.
Do you think it's important to be, for them to more be working on a purpose or a mission as opposed to removing dental decay?
Paula Harriss: Yes, yes, yes, thank you for asking that. I tell you what, I get a lot of calls from doctors or team members who's struggling and they say, "Okay, I need a strategy." For example, "I've got cancellations and I want to stop those. Give me some scripts for the phone call and what kind of fees should we be charging?" They think that's going to solve their problem. Oh my gosh, I've got a full day talk on cancellation because it goes way deeper than that. If you're having a lot of cancellations for example, you've got to go talk to your clinical team, because we're not building value. If we're not building value it means they may not be passionate about what they're doing, they may be burnout. If they're burnout, we're going all the way back now, we're tracing this. One of the things I love to do is get to the root of the problem. Let's get to the root of the problem. That means maybe they don't understand the vision for the practice and that means maybe they don't even understand why we're here.
I have this little talk I give called, "The Bridge of Purpose." The dentist I used to work for, he really developed me as a team member, I owe everything to him for being a coach. He saw that through me and I was like, "Me? The one that's crying all the time and really messing up your schedule, and you want me? You think I should be a coach?" But one of the things he taught me was to think about purpose, "Why are you here? What's your calling? What's your passion?" I'll tell you, life gets in the way of that sometimes, I call it your towel on the beach. We were just at the beach last weekend and I grew up over there, in South Carolina and my mom always said, "You know, find your towel on the beach." When you get out there swimming the current is going to have you drift and you got to look back where's your towel or you get lost. I think so many dentists are lost, they're afraid to follow their passion. They don't even know what that is anymore, they've killed it.
If you're not on purpose, if your team doesn't know why you have a practice ... Let me give you an example. I ask team members all the time, I say, "Why are you here? Why do we have a dental office here? Why do you come here?" "Uh, it's close to my house." "Uh, I like the schedule. We don't have to work on Fridays all the time." "Uh, you don't have to work nights." That's not a reason to be in the dental practice. I've had dentist tell me, "Well, I have a shopping habit and this is the only job that will pay for my shopping habit." That's not a good reason to be a dentist. What is it? What is purpose?
Here's some of the things we've come up with. Part of our purpose is very simple, "Restoration, restoration." Now you might think drilling and filling, no, it's deeper than that. How many patients have you seen, Howard, that have lost trust in dentistry?
Howard Farran: A lot.
Paula Harriss: Part of our purpose is restoring trust. How many people have you seen who our admin team members have heard on the phone, "That office was not friendly?" Have you ever heard that?
Howard Farran: Yes.
Paula Harriss: Part of our purpose is restoring friendliness. How many people isolate themselves? Team members isolate, doctors isolate, patients isolate, part of our purpose is to restore connection. How many people have disease in their mouth, which is oral-systemic now? We know that. Tons. Part of our purpose is to restore health, restore trust. We've lost all these because we're too busy trying to make the dollar, trying to pay the bills.
I heard something the other day, "You take care of your people, they'll take care of your overhead. You take care of your people, they'll take care of your overhead." In order to do that you have to be on purpose and your team has to know what your purpose is. The number one thing millennials want, you probably know, it's a big topic right now, we have a lot of millennials in the office, we have a lot of doctor millennials and team member millennials, one of the number one things that they want is impact. They want to make a difference. If we're not making a difference in our practice ... It's not just the run of the mill, "Let's get through the day. Let's make the money. Let's make bonus. Let's get the schedule full." It's making a difference in the lives of people, that's what they want or they'll leave. We don't ... Have you noticed this?
Howard Farran: You see it with declining birth rates, at the end of World War II the average American woman is having five and a half kids, now it's on a 2.3, 27% of baby boomer women didn't even have a kid. Japan, it's under one now, it's .9. We now have three countries giving economic incentives of a $1000 a month for that baby's entire life 'til it's 21 because they're already worried about who's going to take care of all the elderly.
When you talk about the man in the mirror being the problem and just ... I always love Al Franken, his daily affirmations, his character Stuart Smalley say, "I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and doggone it, people like me." You're right, humans live in so much fear. They fear what others think. They fear if they start their own practice they'll fail. They think if they have a baby it won't be healthy or they won't be a good mother or a father. Some people are just more fearless than others. I don't know where ... Do you think that's something they're born with? Why do you think some people are fearless and others are just consumed by fear?
Paula Harriss: You know that's a good point, in fact I have a quote that I love from Marianne Williamson, "Love is what we were born with. Fear is what we learned."
Howard Farran: Nice.
Paula Harriss: Babies are only born with a couple of fears and it's like falling and hunger or something like that, but you know, we learn fear. We learn it from our parents, we learn it from our media, the media sells fear. We're taught to be full of fear. Love is what we're born with and I believe love is the opposite of fear. When you're in a state of fear you can't give to someone else, that's why a healthy sense of self-worth frees you to focus on your patients, to focus on your team.
Yes, we've got a millennial generation who wants to have impact, they are full of fear and we've got fear failure, we've got fear of rejection. When you have a fear of failure you're pushed to perform and you feel like, "If I'm not performing I'm no good." Then you've got fear of rejection, "If people don't like me I'm no good and I'm not going to succeed," and it creates a approval addiction. Most dentists I know have some form of approval addiction, meaning ... I see young dentists coming out of school with this, and I see dentists who've been in practice 34 years with this is, "I'm afraid to tell the patient everything that's going on in their mouth, because they're going to think I want their money. They're not going to trust me." You know what I'm talking about?
Howard Farran: Uh-huh (affirmative).
Paula Harriss: How do you get around then? There's a lot of verbal skills that go with that. First of all, you've got to have antenna on your head when you walk in the room, "I have something that this patient needs. I am an answer for this patient. This patient came to me because they have a need. I'm on purpose, I can fulfill it. I can restore whatever is broken for him." Sometimes it's emo ... You know, dentistry is emotional.
Howard Farran: Exactly.
Paula Harriss: Have you ever had a patient cry on a chair?
Howard Farran: Of course.
Paula Harriss: I was one of those. I have six root canals in my mouth every time I cried. Dentistry is emotional. A lot of analytical dentists who are introverts are afraid of that, they think if a patient cries in their chair they're a failure, actually that can be a compliment, [inaudible 00:21:23]-
Howard Farran: If my homies go to your website, paulaharrisscoaching.com, what are they going to find on your website paulaharrisscoaching.com?
Paula Harriss: Well, they're going to find some info about me, which you already read and then they're going to see some of the things that I talk about. Dentistry is really, I mean a lot of people like this, but it's about sales. It's about learning how to sell, how to get yourself in a place where you believe in what you're doing, you have purpose and vision, and you are willing to sell that to someone who has a need. Everybody has a need for dentistry. Who does not have a need ... What human being would not have it?
Howard Farran: When dentists tell me they say, "Look, I didn't go to college for eight years to sell dentistry. I don't like sales, and it's a four-letter word," I'm like, "Dude, how gross of a statement is that? Women have told me in the last 30 years that when they lost all their teeth and got a denture they wanted to kill themselves. I had a lady crying to me one time when I was rehabbing her with implants and everything, that when she lost all of her teeth and having denture, she couldn't sleep with her denture in. She lied to her husband and said, 'You're snoring and you can't sleep in my room,' and locked him out of the bedroom because she had to take her teeth out. After he slept on the couch for a year or two he eventually left and she said, 'I lost the man of my life because I was sitting there and didn't get my teeth taken care of,' and then you're sitting there saying that you don't believe in dentistry enough to sell it."
"I mean if you have that belief dentistry doesn't want you. We don't need you. Get out of the profession. People kill themselves when they lost all their teeth and you have the arrogance to say you don't like selling dentistry. Then go sell cars, sell condos, what are you passionate about selling? Go work at a taco stand, sell something you're passionate about." That passion, that purpose is also ... Dentists always asks me in undergrad they say, "Well, do you think I should be a pediatric dentist or [inaudible 00:23:28]." I said, "Dude, you should be a pediatric dentist because you think that's the coolest, greatest thing on Earth. I mean if your passion is to do root canals all day, like Peewee Herman, go do it." Same thing with lasers and CAD/CAM, people say, "Well, what do you think about CAD/CAM as a business decision?" If you're totally passionate about it, it will be a good one, but if you're not passionate about it and you buy this machine, it will probably be a coat hanger or you won't be passionate enough to learn it and love it.
Passion is everything, how you talk to yourself ... You got to follow your dreams. Do you think ... You know when I got out of school, May 11, which is 30 years ago next week, I graduated May 11, I have my office at home September 21st. These kids now come out and their first limiting belief is that, "I should work for someone for five years." Do you think they dream big enough? Why aren't they walking out of school and say, "I'm going to open up my office in 90 days?" Do you think they're dreaming big enough?
Paula Harriss: You know that's a great question because I don't think they feel permission to dream. They don't feel permission to dream. One of the things I have people say is, "I have permission to dream," but you know, the number one thing that stops a dream is the first part of your, three letters of your name, how, H-O-W. If you start thinking about, "How am I going to do that?" It shuts down your dream. It shuts down your vision, and that's what the vision is, is your dream. What does it look like when it's perfect? If there were nothing standing in the way, as my mentor said to me, "If there were nothing standing in the way what would you do? If there were no fear what would you do?"
I see dentists coming out of school with all these debt and they don't know how to lead a team, they don't surround themselves with mentors, so they just go work for somebody else because it's the easy way out. Then I don't know about what you're seeing, Howard, but I'm seeing them about three years in, some less, some more. We had a leadership retreat last year in Colorado and there were some young ladies there and there were some fee for service dentists in the room, some insurance dentists in the room, and when they started listening to type of practice they had they were like, "Nobody told us. We didn't know that was possible." That kind of freaks me out, that they're not being told this is even possible anymore. They are only seeing that one path of get out of school and go work for somebody else. It can be done. It can be done.
There are so many boomers out there looking for somebody to mentor and take them under their wing or sell their practice. I've got doctors in their late 60's and 70's who have fantastic practices that are looking for buyers. They would pour themselves into a young dentist who would be willing to learn.
Howard Farran: That leads them back to the biggest associate dilemma, is you see a post on Dental Town they're saying, "Okay, I'm going back, I'm going back to Bellevue, Texas and there's two dentists hiring, looking for an associate. One will pay 25%, but I have to pay half the lab bill. The other one will pay 30% [inaudible 00:26:44] lab bill. Well, which one do you think I should work for?" I'm just like, "God, you missed the entire boat."
Paula Harriss: That's not it.
Howard Farran: I mean, "Which one would be your mentor with passion? Which one has that staff that are 10, 20 years, same wife, big recall, faces coming back?" The other one might be on spouse number four, none of the staff in there are two to three years, it's a burn and churn mill. I mean go mentor someone who has passion and loves it. You paid money to go to school eight years, why do you sell yourself short and get the corporate job that pays the most instead of making 20% more and go working for old man McGregor who loves dentistry more than fishing, hunting, and golfing all on the same day?
Paula Harriss: Yes, I mean I just read an article today about and I know there's a place for corporate dentistry and I'm not against that, but it was like, "Okay, so ..." I actually heard this from three young female dentists, three in the same room, the owner of the practice is looking at the schedule from afar, may or may not be a dentist, saying to them, "Okay, I see you've got an emergency coming in at eight o'clock. You're going to do a root canal and crown in that person." I read an article today about malpractice, that owner of that dentist office can tell you to go do that, but if you're out of your skill level and you're doing something you're not trained to do just with production, and there's a lawsuit, it goes on that dentist.
Howard Farran: The State Board of Dental Examiner doesn't care who legally is it, they don't even want to know who is using the license to practice dentistry, but you know out of the corporate chains I like to say ... You know which one I really admire a lot, is Aspen, simply because they target the poor, they target the areas where ... All these dentists want to go to the rich areas, new cosmetic and Aspen is saying, "Okay, dentists don't like treating the poor, they don't like Medicaid, they don't like Medicare, we'll go." I know a lot of dentists who just feel more passion about treating poor people on Medicaid and Medicare than doing veneers on rich women who live in Scottsdale and Beverly Hills.
I couldn't stand cosmetic dentistry the most because it was always a beautiful woman who is already a nine and a half, and she come in with like two pages of all these problems of how she looks and I always say, "You know what, save the money and go see a psychiatrist. I mean, I don't want to peel all the enamel off your teeth. You don't need to [inaudible 00:29:24]. You need to go find out why you're not happy with the way you look." I always thought it's some kind body-morphing dysfunction thing, but if treating the poor turns you on that that's ... as opposed to, what? Going to the rich and driving a Rolls Royce, that ain't going to make ... The Rolls Royce ain't going to make you happy. What's going to make you happy is running 20 red lights on the way to work because you love what you do and you love the people you do it with.
Paula Harriss: Exactly.
Howard Farran: You just have purpose and passion and then-
Paula Harriss: That's [inaudible 00:29:55]-
Howard Farran: I want to talk about another fear. I want to go back to these dentists because I know dentists. They are introvert, they're scientists, they're surgeons, and they just can't communicate what they're really thinking to their staff. I want to hold your feet to the fire, how do you get somebody who's quiet, an engineer, a physicist, a surgeon to communicate? We'll, you've got five daughters, of your five daughters how many of them are batshit crazy?
Paula Harriss: Let's see, one, two, three.
Howard Farran: Of my five ... I always tell my mom that I'm the only normal child she had, and she can't stop laughing, she thinks I'm the craziest, but how do you get this person, and it's actually ... I believe it's actually harder for the female dentist, I believe it's harder for a woman to lead five women than it is a man to lead five women. I really think the biological social wiring it makes it harder. Agree or disagree with that?
Paula Harriss: My oldest daughter is a doctor, she's a pediatrician, and I can see that. I can see that depending on the personality. Here's one of the things that I asked them to do, I say ... We talk about vision, we talk your dream, and they have a hard time, that's way over here on the right brain and left brain can't handle that, so I say, "Okay, make a list." When I say make a list they can do that. I say, "Make a list of all the things you don't like," everybody's good at that, right?
Make a list of all things you don't like, "I don't like this team member who's late all the time. I don't like the patient who doesn't pay. I don't like cancellations. I don't like the sterilization area not being cleaned up." Most people could come up with a huge list of everything they don't like, then I say, "Take that list and flip it to the positive." I say, "Okay, I want patients who pay and don't leave a big balance. I want patients who come to their appointment. I want team members who are on time." You see where I'm going?
That seems to break it down pretty simple for the doctors, and then I say, "Okay, I want you to take that paper and I want you to go read that ... read that to your team, 'This is what I want,'" and then I say, "I want you to ask them do they want these too, do they believe this is important." Most every team member is going, "Yeah, her, her, yeah, she is the one who needs to be on time. Yeah, yeah, yeah, get 'em, get 'em, [inaudible 00:32:42] doctor." If the doctor could realize that their eagle team members are just dying for her or him to address these things, they will stand behind the doctor and support them a 100%. Every time they do it they're overwhelmed with, "Gosh, my team respects me."
Think about that word right there, respect. They do not respect a doctor, male or female, who will not take a stand for what they want, and you ask any doctor, "Do you want your team to respect you or do you just want them to like you?" Most of them will say, "I want them to respect me," and I'll say, "Well, when you're not addressing, when you're not telling them what you want you're not going to have respect. If you're only talking to them when you're not happy with something, it's one of the number one things I get is it's never good enough. Well, this is why I said deal with your stuff, because if the doctor doesn't feel good enough to begin with and he's never feeling good enough that's going to translate to the team, the team is never good enough. We can have the biggest month we've ever had, "Well, we could have done better if," that just blows the team away.
Howard Farran: One of my favorite songs when I was growing up was Cats In The Cradle, I forgot all the lyrics, "But as soon as I get out from high school I'm going to do this," then they're in college, "Well, soon as I get out of college I'd do this," but then they ... in dental school, [inaudible 00:34:14], and the next thing you know you're dead. I think people, they don't celebrate milestones enough. It seems like every time they reach their goal there are internal baggage, they're still not happy, all they do is kick the goal down the road even higher or further, and they just keep chasing this goal, but they're never celebrating the achievements, they're never celebrating their goals, and it's not really changing their state of happiness.
Paula Harriss: It's defeating, the team feels defeated. You think about a sports team, they win, if they win the championship they are going to celebrate the heck out of that. Do they go to the locker room, "Well, we could have done better, you all?" Now that's for next week's meeting. Let's look at the films, let's see where we screwed up ... I teach SWOT, Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats, what was good about it? What were the challenges? What's our opportunity? What could we have done better and what's stopping us from doing that? It's a Harvard Business Technology, it's well-known.
I say, "Meeting number one, let it be good enough, celebrate the heck out of it. Meeting number two, talk about what could we have done better? How can we aim higher?" One of the first things I tell a team when I start with them I say, "You know nothing's wrong, you guys have a great practice," most of the time that is the case. It's sad that most of the great practices want the coaching and the ones that are struggling are too embarrassed to ask for help.
Howard Farran: I've made that point a hundred times. I think this is podcast 700 or around there, that you look at the stats, "What's a dental office produce and collect?" It's about 650 and they take home about a $1.45. If you ask any consultant in dentistry, "What does the average dental office do?" "Oh, the average dental office is about 1.5, 1.4, and the doctor makes like 300." "Yeah, because you only see the people getting help and that's that fear thing." Everybody that would benefit the most from a consultant doesn't ever get one, and then everybody who's just crushing it ... Let's see my friends, because I'm 54, my friends are all in their 50's and 60's, and by our age they've used five or six consultants. Then the poor bastard across the street, whose wife is out selling Amway, has never used one.
Is it just ignorance or ego or fear that you're going to come in and see that the emperor has no clothes, kind of like the yellow brick road when they got to the Emerald City. Is that what they're afraid of, they're going to find out that the emperor has no clothes?
Paula Harriss: Yeah, it's ego. It goes back to the, "Well, I'm a failure, nobody likes me, and I don't want anybody to know that." The ego lies to you, it tells you, "You are what you have, you are what you do, you're separate from everything you want, and you are what people think of you." That's lie, lie, lie, lie, lie. Your true self-esteem, your true self-worth lives in your calling. It's what you were created to do, it's in your DNA, it's in your purpose, your calling from God, and that's what I really believe. I believe mine is helping people where they're stuck, because Lord, I've been there and I have a lot of people who helped me, and I resisted it. Why did I resist it?
The first dentist I worked for who got me into dentistry kept telling me, "Go for help, go for help," and I kept saying no because I didn't want to be wrong. I did not want to be wrong. If you study the analytical personality, their biggest fear is being wrong. If you feel wrong you're not going to ask for help, you're going to try to hide it and you end up spiraling. I like to tell them, "There is nothing wrong, let's just take that off the table, there's nothing wrong."
Howard Farran: What you just said to me I feel bad because my mom told me for 16 years that my calling was to be a priest and my sisters would be nuns, my two older sisters left high school and went straight to the nunnery. I think the reason have so much self-esteem is because my mom always said, "Howie, not only are you going to be a priest, but you're so smart, you're going to be the first American Pope. You're smart enough to be the first American Pope." I was all on board until I met this little blonde chick named Jane and then that whole dream just went down in the bath tub.
Paula Harriss: I can't do that. Exactly.
Howard Farran: I want to ask you another deeply personal question. On Dental Town there's a lot of threats of dentists saying, "I'm sorry, but I'm burned out." They're just burned out. What do you say to a dentist who is losing energy, burned out, hitting the snooze alarm three times, and doesn't want to come back from lunch? What do you tell a doc with burn out?
Paula Harriss: Gosh, I'm glad you asked me that because that was me. I mean I walked out, I had enough, I broke, I snapped, went to a hotel, sat there for three days and really contemplated suicide, left five kids at home, single mom. What causes burn out is approval addiction, number one. You feel like you've got to control everything, everything is your responsibility and you don't trust other people to do their job. Here is what I see dentistry that causes a lot of burnout, we've got dictatorships. We've got a lot of dictatorships of, "Just do what I said, don't ask me any questions, let's not have meetings because I don't like broad sessions, and I'm going to go to my office and just fume about these people who aren't doing what I asked them to do." Do you hear a lot of that?
Howard Farran: Uh-hmmm (affirmative).
Paula Harriss: Then you meditate on that. Meditating is just ruminating on the same thought over and over, it can be positive or negative. A lot of doctors are meditating and they're creating a lot of burn out with that. The flipside of the doctors who are in their late 60's, 70's thriving just like not wanting to leave dentistry are an empowered team.
I call this the President and Cabinet Model, instead of the doctor saying, "Numbers are down, I'm not getting paid, overhead's too high, you all going to ... we need more production. The schedule's empty, fix it." No, you go to a meeting and you say, "Okay, Hygiene Department, report to me. Tell me what are your numbers. What are you guys doing to fix that? What solutions do you have to bring to the table? Three solutions, one doesn't cost any money. Admin Department, give me a report. Let's see, we had four or five goals when we talk about last time with timelines and assignments, give me a report on those. How are those going? What support do you need? Okay, Hygiene Team, we already talked about that. Assisting, give me a report on the last things that we were talking about. The supplies you were looking into. Give me some suggestions what do you think we should do, one, two of three?"
You've got an empowered team who is supporting the doctor instead of the doctor feeling like, "If I'm not on this all the time it's going to crash and burn." In a nutshell that's the difference in the burn out doctor and the doctor who's empowered. Is that what you see? How would you describe it?
Howard Farran: I think it's great. I want to ask you another question on totally different subject. What do you say to the dentist who says, "I just can't sell, I mean I just ... I can't tell you, Paula, you have eight cavities. I know you have five kids, I feel guilty that you came in here with Mountain Dew, eating Funyuns. I can't tell you that you have eight cavities and I'm embarrassed to tell you that maybe you want to whiten your teeth because you look like you just crawled out of a cave." How do you turn someone in from, "I hate sales," to, "I can sell and it's not my fault that you have eight cavities?"
Paula Harriss: Exactly.
Howard Farran: Just like it's not your fault that I'm bald and fat, you didn't caused it.
Paula Harriss: Exactly, that's a great question. One of the things is, like I said get up in the mirror and say, "I can do it." Be on purpose, "I care about this person." When you walk in the room what's the first thing you say to yourself, I need production or I care about this person? If you start out ... You got to have a system, I mean you've got to have a system. You've got to know where you are in a conversation with a patient. The first thing I want to know is what are those ... that patient that I'm talking to right now, what are their goals? What do they want?
You see, we've been taught to go in, assess the situation, give a treatment plan, present that and leave the room. That doesn't work. If we shift a little bit and go, "You know what, there's a human being in my chair who happens to have teeth, I'm going to connect to that human being and I'm going to find out what do they want? What's their dental IQ? Do they want the best or do they just want emergency treatment? You see, this is where we set ourselves up for rejection when we don't know where the patient is in their thinking. Maybe no one's ever asked them, "What are your goals for your mouth? What do you want? Do you want to lose your teeth? Do you want to keep your teeth?"
Here is the second piece, ask questions. Let the patient talk, it will relax you. When the patient starts talking you start asking them questions, "Tell me a little bit about you. Tell me about your past dental experiences. How have they gone? Do you hate the dentist? Did you have a rough time? Gosh, I'm sorry to hear that. You know what, we're going to make you feel comfortable here. I've got a Superman shirt on under here, Superwoman shirt, I'll show you." You start asking them, "What do you want?" Then you become their partner, this is something I say all the time, you become their partner instead of pushing. You should never have to push a patient because you partnered with them. From now on, once you find out their goals from here on it's, "You know what, Sally, you told me you didn't want to lose your teeth. I'm here to partner with you to help you get that." Now it's not really what I want, it's what they said they wanted. Step one.
Step two, is you say, "Okay, let's do an exam. Would you like for me to share with you everything I see or do you want me to keep secrets?" Pretty straightforward. Most patients would say, "Yeah, I want you to tell me." What does that do? That just frees the doctor up to go, "You know what, this patient said they want to know everything, so now I don't need to withhold, but I'm going to go against what they asked me to do." I'm not talking treatment, here's another big deal, Howard, conditions first, not treatment. If they will discuss the conditions first and leave the treatment plan out of it for a while it will make a huge difference. I go in offices all the time and I look at records and I don't see any conditions noted. We know what the treatment plan is but we don't have a clue why they need that.
Intraoral camera, if you don't have an intraoral camera, get one, it can be DrQuickLook or something simple or off eBay or Amazon. You don't have to spend a fortune, but this is a great tool because seeing is believing, picture's worth a thousand words, it will save you time, it will save you a lot of explanation. It builds trust. It will CYA and you show the patient what's going on in their mouth on the camera and you simply say, "Hey, what's that? How long has that been there? Is that bothering you? Do you want to know what we can do to fix that?" How easy is that? It takes some of the pressure off of the dentist of, "I don't want to sell." You're not selling, you're just revealing what's there.
Howard Farran: Doctor is a Latin word meaning teacher, just like Bible is a Latin word meaning book. A really good doctors is a really great teacher, but it comes to another thing that the dentist always think the answers to the universe is going to be found in math and physics and chemistry, and I go back and it's they never remember the work you did, they remember how you made them feel. There are so many dentists I know and so many in my own neighborhood where I know how they are for 30 years, because I've seen their patients in 30 years, where they made them feel bad. They talked down to them. They felt bad. How do you ... I don't even think a lot of these dentists are aware of it. How do you ... Why do you think some people talk down to others and make them feel bad as opposed to having fun?
I'll say one last parting shot on that, it seems like I can smell a million dollar office after walking into it for 20 seconds. You just feel the fun, you feel the energy, you just feel ... and then if you smell the dysfunction, then without looking for them, which I know their staff turnover. I know they got 5,000 charts, 4,000 of them never came back. How do you coach that fun feeling where people just are contagious, they refer their friends and loved ones, they're not condescending, you [inaudible 00:48:28]. That was about a hundred, I usually ask about questions in batches of 25 so that maybe one of them is good, and you might find one good question to follow up on.
Paula Harriss: [Inaudible 00:48:38] those questions, oh gosh, I just want to keep going. First of all, like we said earlier dentistry is emotional. What most dentists are trying to do is make it logical. Let me just take an example. I take my car into the shop ... I tell this story all the time, this actually happened to me. I'm taking my little old Honda Accord into the shop and I say, "I just want my brakes fixed." He takes my car back there and he comes back a in few minutes, you know the big old dude, the bobeye and he says, "Hey, ma'am you need a lot of work done on your car." That's how they talk in Tennessee. What's my immediate response? "No, I don't." He gave me the treatment plan and he didn't win me over, he didn't build trust.
He said, "Well, you need to come back here with me then." Then he shows me, he said, "Do you see that?" I said, "Yeah." He said, "Do you see what's wrong with that?" I say, "It's torn," and I said, "Yeah, yeah, um, oh so, what does that mean? What's going to happen if I don't fix that?" "Your wheels going to fall off." "Oh, now you got my attention." You see, people don't want to look stupid and when you talk to them in logic and big words ... Perry O'Donnell, well, I think that's some guy that I went to high school with named Perry O'Donnell.
Howard Farran: Good honest man, good honest man. I bet he had a bottle of Jameson in his locker.
Paula Harriss: Exactly. He dated Ginger Vitis. That's what they're hearing. There was a well-known six-figure income man who said, "Now, wait a minute, podiatry, periodontal," he got confused he said, "What does dentistry have to do with feet?" They don't understand these words. Why do we use them? Because we want to look smart and we lose the patient when we use those big words. They don't know what aclusion is, they don't know what amalgam is most of the time, why are we using those words. Let me ask you this, Howard, do you want to be scaled?
Howard Farran: Scaled, you mean do I want someone to climb me?
Paula Harriss: You want to be planed?
Howard Farran: I know. They purposely love speaking a stupid language, like they'll say, "You need endodontic therapy on 31." "Dude, it's a root canal." Then they'll say, "Why do you think I have TMJ?" They'll like, "Well, TMJ just is a joint. It's a [inaudible 00:51:08] of a joint. You must mean TMD." "Dude, if she says it's TMJ, it's TMJ, and you don't tell her she needs endodontic therapy. You tell her she needs a root canal." If you can't speak ... That was my favorite ... Growing up in Catholic school, my favorite priest was Martin Luther because he was the one who converted the Bible into German, so that all the common people could read it. He knew if they could read it they'd all realize that everything the priest was saying was not true, that you don't have to give 30 silver pieces to get your mom into heaven, it's not in this book.
Then 500 years after Martin Luther and the printing press, you still have dentists saying, "You have irreversible pulpitis, you will need endodontic therapy and a full coverage [inaudible 00:51:55] on number 12." I mean, God, I mean, Martin Luther-
Paula Harriss: You know what they say?
Howard Farran: It's pretty sad, it's pretty sad when the Catholic Church beats you 500 years in innovation.
Paula Harriss: There you go, but the main reason we do that is the patient saying, "You got me confused with somebody who cares about?" They don't want to let you know that they don't understand. They just leave and say, "I'm going to think about it." They don't understand what you said. You didn't relate to them. You didn't asked them what they wanted. You just shot off a bunch of step. This is all about ego, which is low self-esteem. The reason we do it, we're trying to impress the patient that we're knowledgeable and we're skilled, so we use words out of the patient's vocabulary to make them think that we know what we're doing. When really the patient just wants you to relate to them and connect with them. You know what I say? "Say you know what, that tooth is gone. It's broken, it's busted, it's nasty, you need a helmet on that thing."
Howard Farran: Love it, and I mean that's what works. They also sense if you care, they sense if you're passionate, they sense if you have empathy and sympathy, that's what moves the case, not the technicality of anything.
Paula Harriss: Let me tell you, this body language thing that we have going on, it's been proven, 94% of our communication is nonverbal. They know from gut check when you walk in the room whether you're coming in with ego or if you're coming in with, "I care about you." If you are trying to impress, and this is what I learned as a team member, I remember when I first started my self-esteem was so low. I felt like a failure, didn't know what I was doing, didn't know how to type, I told you all that computer, and a patient got upset with me about their bill. I couldn't get over it.
When I started getting on a path to healthy self-worth I realized the shift, I began to be less concerned about what they're thinking about me and I was more concerned about what's going on with them. If they're upset and angry and having a hard time I'm like, "Are you okay? Is there something going on in your life that's just really eating you right now?" Instead of ... I talked to somebody this morning and they're like, "This patient went ballistic on us and they're a jerk, and they're crazy and they've lost their mind." I'm like, "You know what, we need to examine them. You can pass it off and say the patient was crazy, but what did we do to cause that reaction?" You got to have a healthy self-esteem to be able to go back and look at, "Where did we drop the ball that the patient didn't feel like we were partnering with them?"
I think that if a nonverbal comes off like that we've lost the patient from hello. [inaudible 00:54:53] talk I do on phones skills, "You have me at hello." Well, you can lose them at hello too if you're not interested in them and you're trying to be interesting.
Howard Farran: You know I see them on the front office all the time, where they really think their job is to get the mail, file the insurance, enter the data, they think their job is all these tasks, yet the people who are crushing it, when they answer that phone that's the only priority. When that woman answers that phone, if she needs 10 minutes ... We went to a wireless headsets because I had some receptionist who, when it was really going to be a deep ... she wanted to get up and walk. There's too much going on at brunch she ... I wanted her to have a headset and she needed to go back in the break room and lead up the counter, and gesturing to the break room refrigerator to communicate with this one. It's the most important part of the entire funnel.
I mean it's taken three and a half strange people to call an office before she can convert one in the tier because she's answering, "Can you please hold?" Because she's got some PP on the line trying to verify our insurance and she thinks that's her task. If people would take all the soft ... Here's what I'm trying to say succinctly, the dentist master all the soft stuff, the people stuff, the HR, the communication, and our horrible dentists, they crush it. Some of the best dentists in the world will get a zero on the social skills, they never can understand why they're not the best. On this Earth it's-
Paula Harriss: Let me share a stat with you. You said it, 85% of the success comes from people skills, 15% clinical skills. You know what I see? Doctors spend 85% of their money on clinical training and 15% of their money on people skills training. I'll give you an example, I had a friend of mine who hadn't been to the dentist a long time, in her 50's, broken front tooth. She calls me, she says, "I'm a big fear, big chicken, I want you to refer me to somebody." I gave her two names. I wanted her to see Dr. Number One because he was the best clinically, I gave her another name instead, [inaudible 00:57:10]. I let her choose. I followed up with her and say, "Well, who did you choose?" She said, "Well, I choose Dr. Number Two."
I said, "Well, why did you choose Dr. Number Two?" She said, "Well, you know the first office I called the lady was just like ... she just didn't have the energy and she didn't seem excited that I called, and she didn't really make me feel comfortable. She didn't go out of her way to kind of help me, and the second office I called the lady on the phone acted like she had all the time in the world to spend with me. She wanted to know my story. She was excited. She was enthusiastic so that's where I'm going." I tell you what, the patients judge your clinical skills by the person answering the phone. I can't say that enough and when I teach phone skills I say, "You can have your patient 80% closed by the time they come in the door."
I would have patients come up to my guest, we do a lot of full-mouth cases and they'd say, "You know what, I decided after I hang up the phone that you were going to be my dentist because of the way you treated me on the phone." Let me just-
Howard Farran: Yeah.
Paula Harriss: It's not-
Howard Farran: I've had my first dental assistant since day one, Jan's with me for 30 years, and I just cannot believe how many people when they have a huge question, problem, dilemma, they don't even want to see me. They don't want to talk to me, they just want to talk to Jan. They want to see Jan. It's all the relationships with that long-term staff.
Paula Harriss: Well, yeah, I mean, it's the difference in having a satisfied patient and a loyal patient. That is a big a difference. I can go in Walmart and be satisfied that I got what I was looking for, but I'm not going to be loyal, I'm not a big Walmart fan, sorry, if there's out there that are Walmart fan. I would rather not go in there. I'm not loyal. You see? I got the commodity that I needed, but I'm not loyal because-
Howard Farran: How come you're not loyal to Walmart? Why don't you like Walmart?
Paula Harriss: Why I don't like Walmart is because, number one, it's too big, number two, it's too far for me, number three, the atmosphere in there is just ... I mean, have you seen the Walmart Facebook Page, of the people, the way they dress? I mean, I'm not judging, but it's just not my cup of tea.
Howard Farran: That picture, that was my mom, but you know, it's funny you say it because Walmart's figured it out. I mean, they had the first time ever where quarter after quarter they can track it and they came to the same conclusion. I mean I'm so bad I'd rather go to QuikTrip if I needed a gallon of milk just because I don't want to go to Safeway which is too big. I consider Walmart like going to a coliseum, and Amazon is crushing it. Did you hear the stock value of Amazon?
Paula Harriss: Oh my gosh.
Howard Farran: The market cap of Amazon is worth more than the market caps of everyone else, Walmart, JC Penney, Cole's, Sears, all of them. The convenience is huge and too far and too big.
Paula Harriss: I'm [inaudible 01:00:14] get in and get it and get out. I don't like to roam and wait through lines and people, and you can't find a parking spot that's three blocks away. You know, it's just not me.
Howard Farran: I know. Every single morning the guy at 7-11 says, "You know, this is a lot cheaper at the liquor store," and I say, "I don't care. I'll pay twice as much because I ...
Paula Harriss: Howard, just take that to the dental office they say, "Well, I'm not going to sell ... I'm not going to sell this toothbrush in here in our office because they can go to Walmart and get it cheaper." I'm like, "Wait a minute, you're saving them time, they're getting it now, they don't have to make another stop, one last thing on their list. So what? There are some people who don't care about the price, it's convenience." Why not sell a toothbrush in your office even if it's so close to [crosstalk 01:01:06]?
Howard Farran: I can't believe we went over an hour. We did our hour, but back to that convenience and price, you said earlier you got your commodity. When you're getting toilet paper, and you're getting milk, you're getting an iPhone and you're getting Folger's coffee, you know what you're getting, but in dentistry we sell the invisible, just like that car deal. When the mechanic says you need your lifters ... Hell, I don't know what lifters ... I have five sisters, I played Barbie dolls 'til I was 12, I'm living proof that your environment doesn't make you gay. Because if anybody should have been gay it would have been me playing Barbie dolls with my five sisters. When you tell someone they need a MO and a DO, it's based on trust. They're trying to size you up and say, "Who is this Paula Harriss and do I trust her? Do I really need this?"
I don't want to throw my country under a bridge because in my country where everybody says it's the greatest country in the world, I listen to the people. When the air conditioner/heater repairman shows up and says, "Your air conditioner's too old. We need to buy a whole new air conditioner." 99% of the women answering the door don't believe it, they think they're trying to be sold. When they get a coupon that says, "Go get your oil change for $20 bucks," they go on there and the man comes out and says, "Yeah, we did the oil change for $20 bucks, but you need to replace your air filter and plus your transmission." 99% of the women like, "I don't even believe you."
So many times a dentist will just go out there and say, "Yeah, you have more cavities and they're $250 each," and she's like, "You just want a $1000 bucks." When I listen to the people the people do not have a lot of trust in their fellow businesses and that's why the dentists who are crushing it in long-term staff, who ... the soft stuff, communicating, empathy ... I love the way you talked about asking questions for permission, "Do you want me to tell you everything I see?" Because if you can convey the trust you got the sell. In America the problem is if they don't know what it is, they don't trust what you're saying. They don't trust. They know their Cousin Eddy could come fix that air conditioner with duct tape and WD-40. "Who are you standing here telling me I need a $5,000 brand new air conditioner? And why do I need to get my air filter checked?" You got to get an A into trust, the relationship, the soft stuff and not the correct bonding agent.
Paula Harriss: You're absolutely true, Howard. People on the street tell me all the time, "Why is it that every time I go there's something wrong? I don't believe that." You know what tell them? I say, "It's not that something's wrong every time, they're too afraid to tell you everything that's wrong the first visit so they spread it out."
Howard Farran: I also hear a lot of people in Phoenix, because in Phoenix in the summer when it's a 119, if your air conditioner goes out you pretty much need to fix that day, but I always hear these grandmas, "Well, I quit calling such and such air conditioning, because you know what I realized? I realized that in five years I've had them out three times and every time it was a different man, and I say, 'Well, what happened to Greg?' 'Oh, he's no longer here.' The next time [inaudible 01:04:15], 'Well, what happened to Ryan?' 'Oh, he's no ... and they're like, "Well, damn. I mean, why am I using you for five years when none of your workers will stay five years, and now you're telling me I need to give you $8,000 for a new air conditioner."
Paula Harriss: Absolutely, I hear you. That team, team building and I'm with you on the teams that crush it. I mean, they have team who are not complacent, they are aiming higher, they are learning, they're always wanting to learn, they're always wanting to grow and improve. Maxwell has the Five Levels of Leadership and level four is personal development. If your team, like my doctor, he poured his life into me, he mentored me, he taught me, he raised me and that's what makes it work, when you've got team members who are willing to grow and the doctor's willing to grow. It doesn't-
Howard Farran: What did you call that? Maxwell's Five Levels of ...
Paula Harriss: Five Levels of Leadership. The first one is positional leadership like, "I'm the boss, you got to do what I say because I'm the boss." The second level is permission leadership, it means, "You know, I want to be friends, let's just be friends." I see this a lot with associates.
Howard Farran: What's Maxwell's first name?
Paula Harriss: John.
Howard Farran: John Maxwell.
Paula Harriss: John T. Maxwell. He's a leadership guru and I'm one of is certified coaches. The third level is production, they're following you because you produce and make bonus. The fourth level is the people development, "I'm following you because you have helped me grow." The fifth level is the pinnacle, like you Howard, "I'm following you because you're well-known and what you've done for the industry."
Howard Farran: I think people follow me because I don't bathe or I use soap and they just keep wondering where the smell is coming from, they just keep following me out of morbid curiosity. Is John T. Maxwell still, I mean is he still alive?
Paula Harriss: Oh yeah.
Howard Farran: Is he a friend of yours?
Paula Harriss: Well, I've been in his house, but you know.
Howard Farran: Nice.
Paula Harriss: I don't know.
Howard Farran: Well, I want to tell you seriously thank you so much for coming on my show today and next time you see Scott Dahlquist give him my love, tell him thanks for being my designated driver. Thanks for all that you do for dentistry and I hope you got a lot of these young kids on the right track today.
Paula Harriss: Thank you, you too, Howard, it's been a pleasure.