Episode 232 – Reframing Retirement

“A person with no goals is one of the most dangerous people because they don’t know when to stop, or even what to go after.” ~Brent Hogan

Retirement is a word that conjures up images of finishing up a long and hard career, and entering into a new phase of relaxation, travel, and leisure. But retirement doesn’t only have to be about hanging up the scrubs and kicking back on a beach – it can be a multifaceted journey that requires careful planning and consideration. 

In this episode of Everyday Practices Dental Podcast, co-host Regan Robertson is joined by Productive Dentist Academy Client Services Manager Brent Hogan as they discuss retirement, its evolution, and the possibilities that it brings for dentists looking to plan their lives beyond dentistry. Regan and Brent challenge the conventional view of retirement as an endpoint, urging listeners to refocus its definition and see it as a new beginning filled with different adventures. They emphasize the importance of understanding financial needs, evaluating the value of your dental practice, and setting realistic goals to ensure a secure and comfortable retirement. 

Regan and Brent’s candid conversation also encourages dentists to begin discovering their “why,” explore their passions outside of dentistry and find purpose beyond their dental careers. 

And as you listen to this episode, think about the following:

• What does your vision of retirement look like?
• Are you financially prepared for retirement?
• What is your post-dentistry mission or purpose? What would you like to accomplish following your dental career?
• Do you have a plan for transitioning out of your practice? What does it look like?

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Regan Robertson 0:01
Hi, Doctor. Regan Robertson, CCO of Productive Dentist Academy here and I have a question for you. Are you finding it hard to get your team aligned to your vision, but you know, you deserve growth just like everybody else? That’s why we’ve created the PDA productivity workshop. For nearly 20 years, PDA workshops have helped dentists just like you align their teams, get control of scheduling, and create productive practices that they love walking into every day. Just imagine how you will feel when you know your schedule is productive, your systems are humming, and your team is aligned to your vision. It’s simple, but it’s not necessarily easy. We can help, visit productivedentist.com/workshop that’s productive dentist.com/workshop to secure your seats now.

Brent Hogan 0:47
You’re going to transition the practice at some point in is planning for that transition. What is that going to be?

Regan Robertson 0:58
Welcome to the Everyday Practices Podcast. I’m Regan Robertson and my co-host, Dr. Chad Johnson, and I are on a mission to share the stories of everyday dentists who generate extraordinary results using practical proven methods you can take right into your own dental practice. If you’re ready to elevate patient care and produce results that are anything but ordinary buckle up and listen in.

Regan Robertson 1:30
Welcome to Everyday Practices Dental Podcast I am your host, Regan Robertson, here with a special guests today it was going to be a monologue because Chad is busy dentisting. However, I have with us today, Productive Dentist Academy‘s client success manager Brent Hogan. Brent, how are you today?

Brent Hogan 1:47
I am awesome. Thanks for having me, Regan

Regan Robertson 1:51
We hopped on this podcast to do it together because Brent and I like to discuss the end in mind and keeping the end in mind. So for those of you who don’t know, I work with Brent Hogan on a daily basis and I can tell you, first and foremost, you’re not going to find a better coach. Oddly enough Client Success Manager maybe doesn’t sound like a coaching capacity role. I’m not sure but you’ve been a great coach to me over the years that we’ve known each other and part of that is really looking at the end goal, and then figuring out how to work your way back to making it today and not a lot of people always think about the end end goal in mind. Maybe think about what a few years. I don’t know what the average is.

Brent Hogan 2:36
Oh, well, people that I talked to in the industry, they are really looking at the this year, they’re not looking beyond that and when I especially asked the question, “What does retirement look like for you? Where does that venture for you?” I always get the puzzled look, what do you mean, retirement? What is that? What is that? And retirements different for everybody. So it’s just it’s a number, but it’s a goal. Really what I’m asking is, “What do you have numbers or a vision of where you want to be down the road? Is that is that on a beach retire, sitting, sipping pina coladas? Is it in a mountain town? Is it doing living in your town? What are you, what does that Majan for you doing? Taking care of grandbabies?” That all can be things that we that you want to do is just what do you envision yourself being down the road and not a lot of people take that time to pause and think of what that looks like or even have the conversation with their spouses to see what is their dreams, what are their goals, and aligning that up and working it backwards.

Regan Robertson 3:51
I almost want to throw away the word retirement because when I think of retirement, it makes me think of an ending. That could be very joyful. I mean, I love that you said you know, do you want to play with your grandchildren or be on a beach? Like what do you want to do, but I feel that retirement, to me, means a bit of an ending and I don’t, my brain doesn’t work like that. My brain works on, I guess, missions to accomplish things to enjoy and look forward to so I don’t think about myself ending. I think the other piece for me too, is what about all the dentists that absolutely eat up and enjoy and soak up being a dentist every single day or being a dental team member? I love what I do, for example and so the idea of retiring sort of pulls apart that identity and for me and tells me, “Okay, well you’re to stop doing that.” So what if we reframed retirement and instead thought about, “Okay, well, when you’re this age, what adventure do you want to be embarking on?” To me that makes it more fun. Like I know, I went through Donald Miller’s hero on a mission and he forces you to plan out 10 years and, and so it got me, it forced me to think out of that, like you said, just the next year and the next year. So it really put me outside of, “Okay, my children will be graduated at that time, what adventure do I want to embark on,” and then I can start working backwards and that made it a lot of fun. So I think I, I took the word like retirement is not something in my vocabulary index.

Brent Hogan 5:19
Well, and that’s the buzzword is retirement, what does retirement truly mean because you can retire fully out of the practice, or you could be working a few days in a week doing what you love, like it’s defining what you want, is where but we all know something at the end of the your career, you’re going to transition the practice at some point, and is planning for that transition. When is that going to be? There are people that I work with, that I’m talking to work with, that they’re in their 40s, and they have a plan to retire by 55. We have people that are older than that, and they, they’re looking for the attorney, what’s the next steps, but they haven’t even thought about the process. So a lot of it just comes into thought, put a plan together, and you can pivot along the way but you overall have that arching goal. Like we talked about having the end in mind. What is it? What are you trying to accomplish? What are your goals? A person with no goals is one of the most dangerous people because they don’t know whenever to stop, or even or what they’re going after. So being able to facilitate that conversation, it’s just not about retirement, it’s about what is that goal? What are you trying to do? What are you trying to accomplish? Because then how do you know you, you made it there? Like and when, when, because you can always keep on? Christine Uhen said, “This is like weight loss. You want to lose weight, well, when do you know when you’re done losing weight?”

Regan Robertson 7:04
Or are you mentally prepared? Once you hit your weight goal number, are you happy with yourself at that point?

Brent Hogan 7:10
So there’s a lot more that goes into that than just here’s a number, here’s this. It’s there is stretching it what and looking at a bigger picture of what do you want to accomplish and why? What is your whys behind this and you’ve you and I talked about this a lot of times at the workshop is getting to that third level why even with yourself of why do I want to retire, why do I want to do this knowing these these conversations and going on burned out? But why are you burned up? Why do you why do you want to exit the practice? What are the like? What are the reasons in getting down to the true level? Why that gets you to your goal of what you’re trying to actually solve and how we help a lot of doctors actually accomplish those, hit their milestones, hit their goals, and be able to enjoy their dreams of what they want to do.

Regan Robertson 8:10
You bring up a really good point when you talk about goals because goal, the goal in I mean the word goal is so ambiguous, it’s so large, it encompasses so much and I’ve heard 1000s I haven’t heard 1000s of podcasts, it feels like I’ve heard 1000s of podcasts on goals, and doing smart goals and how to get your goals accomplished. For me, two things that really helped me dial it in and articulate what’s important to me, there’s one piece that sits on the data side, and then one piece that sits on the philosophical emotional side, which is the why that you talked about. So Donald Miller was really good that the Hero in Mission was great for me, because it dialed into philosophically why I wanted to live the lifestyle that I want that I hope to have, as I age, that that was really important. The other piece of it, I picked up by Reese Harper at a he was when he first founded Dentist Advisors and I heard him at an event and he talked about knowing your net worth and what you would need to have in the bank to continue to live the lifestyle that you live today. So from the data perspective, he helped me articulate “Oh, okay, I know I’m going to want to have this amount coming in, per month to maintain the lifestyle that I have or exceeded,” and so I called the financial advisor and said, “Tell me how much I have to save every single month to get to this number to know what I want to do,” and the financial advisor pulled on a bit of philosophical why as well. He said, “You know what, how many vacations Do you Do you want to take per year? Do you want to have one house or two houses? Do you want to just rent? You know, where do you envision yourself being primarily most of the time, like tell me about your activities.” So he went through this really awesome lifestyle exercise with us as well. So at the end of all of that we were able to come up with a plan and I said the same thing. I and I didn’t have a word for it at the time. I was like this Deep Dive sounds good and but I didn’t want to say retirement, I don’t really want to retire. I’m constantly learning and I’m constantly helping I would, I could never stop helping people like that would be ridiculous. So it’s more about shifting and continuing. Like if I if somebody came to me and said, and said, “You don’t want to retire, but how do you want to continue your lifestyle, like doing things today to set you up so you can continue your lifestyle, so that maybe you don’t have to work so many hours moving forward,” that would get my attention, big time and I would pay attention to that. You also pulled up an article for me this morning that said, two thirds of peak baby boomers are not financially prepared for retirement and, and I was really disappointed to hear, because you and I were talking about pensions, and I said, “Why not baby boomers all would be set up?” I was, I was just my ignorant thought like, there was most companies at that time had pensions and wouldn’t you be protected? And the answer is no, not always.

Brent Hogan 10:56
Not always and that’s glaring sad that we saw as over half of the baby boomer generation, currently now sits with the quarter of a million or less in assets and, and these are people that are going in now, they’re looking at potentially exceeding or having to work longer or looking for the future, where they really want to hit their goals, and they haven’t set themselves up to the position or haven’t had the ability to set themselves up for the position. Life circumstances do happen in a lot of planning assets of this but being able to plan it out, be able to looking at the strategy of not tomorrow, I’m gonna do this but being I’ll have that journey that have that plan. So you do have the assets built up for you to do whatever you want to do. That’s, that’s the biggest part of that is how can you control your own journey? How, within extent, there’s still things that happen in life but as you’re setting yourself up, what are you expecting? What are you looking at not just in a year, but you’re looking at 510 years out of runway, especially if you’re looking at specially exiting the practice here and building a transition plan. We know typically, it’s that transition plan is typically five years at minimum, if not greater, but really working that through the process. Do you have your banking setup? Do you have your estate setup, do you have the, your team basically aligned for you to go down this journey and you are the the right people in, in your path. So as you’re getting there, like I said earlier, at some point, all of you, if you’re owning a practice will transition at some point and having that right team and being able to get to the greatest value of your asset that you are building with your Investment Grade Practice, that will get you to the milestones where you want and you have the ability to control that and build it over a period of time. Sometimes it’s shorter, sometimes it’s longer, but knowing that runway, having those goals and plan, those are the key steps of making sure that occurs.

Regan Robertson 13:30
You talk to dentists every single day, what are you seeing right now, as far as answers to some of those questions go? Are they are they prepared? Are they thinking about those things? What are some of the questions that you get from dentists?

Brent Hogan 13:43
A lot of people, one don’t know the value of their practice, either EBITA or value what they could do get on an open market. So that we there’s great partners that we have that can be able to do that. Not to say that you’re selling it today but knowing your baseline of where you want to be. Also, the other thing is, is they don’t have financial planners or that they do they don’t know what they’re getting. They don’t know if their accountant is doing the right accounting in getting them set up because the tax structure you’re running things through your business. Those are the conversations that where you start really having with your the right team and the right individuals around you. Do you have the right associates? Do you have the right team members in the practice? What is this whole look like? This, like there is so much that people ask me is like, “Am I ready?” I like that’s a loaded question. I don’t know if you’re ready, because it also comes emotionally

Regan Robertson 14:47
Ready for what? Ready for like a transition?

Brent Hogan 14:51
I don’t know because also part of this comes emotionally is you’ve been doing this for 20 plus years, it’s a change as a college athlete, when I transitioned from being a college athlete, that’s a change, you’re changing your identity of how you’re really focusing most of your time and do have you built out rip tour of serving others in in different ways? What do you enjoy doing in your hobbies? As Bruce told me, so, a while ago, he goes, “You can go on so many vacations, and you can play only so much golf? What are you going to do with your extra time?” And, and that’s where it comes in? What is your path? What is your journey? What’s your joy outside of the like? I can, I can help guide you to think about that but that’s your vision. We, I help people on the business side of looking at, “Hey, if we tweak this, this, this, these are little things that can help improve your practice growth and where you want to be in the long term.”

Regan Robertson 15:57
What are some of the missions that you’ve seen come from these discussions with dentists like what are some of the things that they want to do after they transition?

Brent Hogan 16:09
Some of them will just want to practice, like practice two days a week on the timeline that they want to do it, doing the dentistry that they want to, which is 100% completely fine and it’s sweet.

Regan Robertson 16:21
I love that that’s the answer. See, that’s not retirement, and it’s such a mind shift. That’s not when you transition, if it’s true, if you could transition down to two days a week, practice the dentistry that you love, and then have the rest of the week free to do your golfing or do whatever that to me sounds pretty cherry.

Brent Hogan 16:39
It is and not everybody gets that opportunity but setting yourself up to can you transition out of the practice meaning selling that practice from your side to person where you get to do and you’re basically the associate that comes in and does the things over period and to the team working with the team that you’ve loved working with the patients that you love? How can you get there for the milestones? And some people are like, “Hey, I’m just hanging out my handpiece and I’m done. I’m gone. I’m just, I’m moving down to Florida. I don’t want to do it.” That is okay. Like do you do what you enjoy. Um, some people like, “I’m going to take out,’ one individual that they wanted to take about a year’s worth of a trip. Um, after they done and in tour everything before it got too late, because they knew they’re already starting to have some health complications but they wanted to do the things that they wanted to do on their timeline.

Regan Robertson 17:40
I love that shout out since you said Florida shout out to one of my besties who moved down to Florida and opened up a like a crystal shop. So her and her husband, they’re they’re huge geologists, they love to look at rocks and gems and things and it’s a great way to go. She’ll do shows like blues, festivals, music festivals, and you can go down and enjoy life on your terms. I think it makes it a lot of fun.

Brent Hogan 18:03
Yeah, and that’s all um, but all comes into planning.  That’s the thing comes back to is like, tomorrow, you can’t just say, “Hey, I’m gonna do this,” and look, because you’re your own practice, you have a practice that you’re taking care of other people’s lives, you’re doing this. So you really want to have the right fit for the people to handing them over to your patients, that you that you. They trust you they believe in you. They want to be known that they’re going to be cared for loved as much as you care for them over the past year. Same thing with your team, their families, you’ve you’ve run a business and supported them in their journeys. How can you get them into the right mindset of what this means? It’s not Pam gone, see you later. You could do that but you do care for them you as family because you spend more time with them than actually your true family members. So setting that up for the long term is doing it the right way, is that is the best way I can say is in this transitioning. It is it today. I would start today if you haven’t done and those people that are purchasing their practice today and this is day one. Set it in the milestone. It’s never too early to start thinking about the end because where do you want to take this? What does what does good look like?

Regan Robertson 19:35
So walk us through what the steps are. So say I’ve got a five to 10 year runway, what steps do I, where do I start, Brent?

Brent Hogan 19:43
A couple things that you want to start one, talk to a financial planner in and be looking at your goals of what can you retire with if today’s the right day to retire? Do you have enough assets to live the lifestyle that you’re currently living from now on until you till you pass? That’s first step. Second step is, is your business going to be a component or majority of that, that the financial value? If so, is the practice currently worth that amount? If it is great, you’ve won the race? If not, we got some work to do. Really start then and start looking at the business systems, how do we grow the practice to be to get to where you need it to be over the timeline that you have, and really start putting that in place.

Regan Robertson 20:43
And that ,I think, I think business valuation is the sticking point, because I know that I have my self experienced dentists over the years that feel that the business is worth one amount, and then it gets down to valuation, and they find out that it’s a different mount entirely, even outside of dentistry, I find that quite a bit with businesses who think they should get X amount in goodwill and when it comes down to the negotiation phase, it’s not where they’re at. So I think is it PTS? PTS does business valuations really well.

Brent Hogan 21:13
Yes, practice transition strategies is, is a great partner of ours, Alliance site. They do free valuations for the people that and set them up with the knowledge, Kyle and his team. They’re very transparent of what they think and what your practice can be on the open market and he is one of the most honest individuals that I know and he’ll tell you straight up of what, like you should grow it, what you can do for it, what the value is out there in Is it ready to be leveraged. So I really have that honest respect for him and I’ve had these conversations with doctors is, “You’re not ready to go,” and they’re okay with it. They have that journey. They have that window and then those others that are completely surprised. I go back to Maggie Augustyn. She, when she heard her practice evaluation, and brought her to tears, that she found out that her practice is what could cost you generational wealth.

Regan Robertson 22:26
Oh you mean, yes. Dr. Maggie Augustine, in her article on generational wealth, if you guys Google that you can find her article on that from $100 in the bank to generational wealth in what less than three years, less than five years, something like that.

Brent Hogan 22:42
And so that is something that milestones is what are you worth today and being ill now he doesn’t want to give it up. She, she wants to keep on growing her practice, because she knows she can do more but that is something that she never thought was going to be possible for her in her life and now she is has it there and that’s where we want you to have the option, the financial freedom number out there to say, “Hey, I want to do this, I have the ability to do this.” Maggie is now stepping back. She’s working, I think, two to three days a week, and doing the things that she loves outside of the practice but she also loves serving the practice in a great way when she’s there in the patients that she’s doing, working on, and helping with so many smiles in the community. That’s her joy of giving back to the dental community, as a dentist as but also as a colleague, she wants to help the others all throughout the nation in the world.

Regan Robertson 23:48
So I heard you say three things. First, know, know your number. So know, know what your lifestyle number is going to have to be to maintain the lifestyle that you want. Number two, know your business value. So get your business evaluated now so you know where to go moving forward and then three, I heard discover your why. So what will your new mission be? What will your new purpose be? What will your identity be when you make that transition? Brent, what is it like personally for you, why do you like supporting doctors in uncovering these elements?

Brent Hogan 24:27
I love supporting dentists because I believe that they should have the right to be able to do this on their terms. You’ve built your life and this is even comes from myself as we worked so hard down on the down to the end. Victoria said, “It comes it’s not fair that 20 plus years of dentistry comes down to one sheet of paper,” and that’s it. That’s the truth about it comes down to one sheet of paper for business valuation and I think I, my joy is seeing people be able to get those accomplishments, they are able to grow the practice the right way, to something that they truly believe in and that can support them there, and their family for generational wealth, or others outside of that, because I know another dentist that he was growing, that his practice so he could give back to the community in a larger way. So it is whatever you want to do but that’s my choice, helping others helping others achieve their goals and their mission in life. That gives me joy. I guess that’s my mission and maybe we’ll help them and have the hard conversations in order for them to be able to get there and coach them to that point. If you’re not being stretched, if you’re not being pushed to the to your, your abilities, then you’re stagnant, you’re going backwards. So what is it constantly pushing the envelope and being able to do things a little bit better, just, just that 1% better? It means a lot for me to see the growth, because if you start adding up those one percents equals something larger.

Regan Robertson 26:18
Reminds me of when Victoria says, “Success requires support.”

Brent Hogan 26:20
It is it you can’t do this by yourself. Uhmm brokerage, the your banking, your accounting, your coaches, it, your marketing, all of it takes a team. You can’t do everything yourself and that’s what I just want to say is make sure you have the great a great team and support network behind you, that will help you in the long run.

Regan Robertson 26:57
This reminds me of you are the friends you keep.

Brent Hogan 27:00
Yes.

Regan Robertson 27:02
Well, thank you, Brent, this is a great episode today to keep the end in mind. It’s never too early or late to begin planning for your future today.

Brent Hogan 27:12
Right? The person that does not have a plan is going to be the one that’s going to be hurting down the end and that’s the biggest thing is have that plan in motion. Think about it take time. I really express that is just really take time of what are your goals, your mission and your values outside of dentistry in the coming years, and then start working it from there. What is your passion?

Regan Robertson 27:43
Thank you Brent for hopping on this episode of Everyday Practices Dental Podcast, and I wish you Happy Spring and happy Summer and we’ll see you in September at the 20th anniversary PDA conference in Frisco, Texas. Thank you for listening to another episode of Everyday Practices Podcast. Chad and I are here every week. Thanks to our community of listeners just like you and we’d love your help. It would mean the world if you can help spread the word by sharing this episode with a fellow dentist and leave us a review on iTunes or Spotify. Do you have an extraordinary story you’d like to share or feedback on how we can make this podcast even more awesome? Drop us an email at podcast@productivedentist.com and don’t forget to check out our other podcasts from Productive Dentist Academy at productivedentist.com/podcasts See you next week.