Planning for Your Life Beyond Dentistry (E.292)

“Exit planning isn’t a someday conversation. It’s business planning, and it should’ve started yesterday.” – Angela Golden

Too many dentists hit their limit and think, “I’ll sell when I’m ready.” But the hard truth? Most aren’t ready, and their practice pays the price. In this sobering and empowering episode, Certified Exit Planning Advisor Angela Golden joins Dr. Maggie Augustyn, Dr. Chad Johnson, and Regan Robertson to dismantle the myths around practice exit and show you what it really takes to leave well.

From building value in your team and systems to preparing your family for the unexpected, this episode goes beyond the money. Angela brings personal experience, real-life cautionary tales, and a proven process to help you plan your exit on your terms with your future intact.

You’ll learn:

• Why 80% of your practice’s value is intangible and how to grow it
• What most doctors overlook until it’s too late
• How to protect your family, team, and legacy from chaos
• Why your spouse needs to be in the room for exit planning
• How emotional clarity drives smarter financial outcomes
• What to do today even if your retirement is 20 years away

Key Reflection Questions for Listeners

• If I got hit by a bus tomorrow, would my family know what to do with my practice?
• Have I clearly defined what “retirement” means to me beyond just money?
• Is my practice actually set up to sell or just running on hope?

Suggested Next Steps

• Email Angela at angela@productivedentist.com to request your free Value Gap Assessment
• Include your financial advisor, CPA, and spouse in your next planning conversation
• Reframe your “exit” as a strategic business move, not an emotional goodbye

TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] Angela Golden: No, it’s, it, it is a, an emotional hurdle because they’ve built something so that’s, they put their blood, sweat, and tears into for so many years that it’s like selling a baby. 

[00:00:19] Regan Robertson: Welcome to another episode of Everyday Practices. I am here with my beautiful co-hosts, Dr. Chad Johnson and Dr. Maggie Augustine. You just heard. From Angela Golden, our guest today who has kicked us off. Chad and Maggie, before we bring Angela fully in, how are you both doing today? What are you excited about on this episode?

[00:00:39] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: It’s been a week, so, um, it’ll be nice to maybe transition from dealing with leadership and fantasize about walking away from this, um, gnarly teenager. Yeah.  That is the dental practice. That is the dental practice.

[00:01:04] Dr. Chad Johnson: Uh, for me personally, I’ve been in a position in the last year or or so that I’m so frustrated. I’m just like, I don’t even care about selling it. I’m just looking to maximize what I have right now and worry about that later. And that might resonate with some people ’cause it’s just like I’m, I am enough associates in and I feel like, um, I’m inadequate as a leader and or that, uh, they just want to learn and run and so that’s always tough too and all those factors play into what if I didn’t sell it? What if I just. You know, went to the end of my lease and just said, “You know what? Anyone want any extra paper or computer supplies? Get a keyboard if you want, ’cause I’m closing on on Friday. Screw this.” So, uh, I, I’ve been through the whole range of emotions, but that’s kind of where I sit currently and, uh, so when I saw this coming up, Angela, I was excited to, uh, to you know, walk through that, as you had mentioned earlier, with the, um, the psychological counseling of it all. So can you first start us off by telling us your CIPA certified and what exactly that means, so that way the listeners can know, uh, the context of what the world is he talking about.

[00:02:31] Regan Robertson: And who the heck is Angela?

[00:02:31] Dr. Chad Johnson: Yes.

[00:02:32] Angela Golden:  Well, um, to start off with, I am Angela and I am a certified exit planning advisor who helps dentists. I focus specifically on dental practices and growing the value of their practice before they sell and as I spoke earlier about selling your baby, um. When Ibought a practice back in a few years, I’ll say a few years ago, um, put my whole heart, soul, everything I had, my husband and I spent weekends in there um, spent the whole shutdown time during COVID remodeling and everything that we did. It was just like, “Oh, now what do I do?”

[00:03:24] Regan Robertson: I didn’t even realize that you were a practice owner, Angela.

[00:03:28] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: Yes, I was.

[00:03:29] Regan Robertson: What were some of the, what were some of the signals that you saw, you know, during those, those frustrating times too? What were some of the signals that, that you were like, “Okay, I’m. Thinking about, about an exit here,” whether it is I am, you know, on one end of the spectrum, I’m super frustrated and ready to go open up a Quiznos all the way over to, you know, this is my baby and I really care about this. Which we know it’s com it’s hashtag complicated. We, we know how business ownership goes.

[00:03:55] Angela Golden: And the, the emotional aspect of it is your team. You’ve built a team around you that has become part of your family. You’ve got your patients who have also become such dear friends and you know, in my opinion, they were part of my family as well. So I had such deep relationships with everybody and that’s when, when I discuss exit planning with doctors, um, there’s the value of the practice, but there’s also the value of the intangible assets or the intellectual property that you have, and that is your, um, we call ’em the four Cs, but that’s your human capital, that’s your employees, your patients are your customer capital, your structural capital, capital, which is all of the insides of the practice, and then your social capital, which is all of your reviews, um, what patients say about you, your social media following, um, all of that. So those are the types of things that when you’re looking at exiting your practice and increasing the value of the practice before you exit, is really honing in on those four things and making those things as the most value because there’s a, a, one of the things that I learned in my CPA certification was that 80% of business value is in those four intangible assets.

[00:05:28] Regan Robertson: Which one of those assets with all the dentists that you’ve worked with is the biggest, uh, gap to close?

[00:05:38] Angela Golden: That would be the customer capital.

[00:05:41] Regan Robertson: Really? Tell me more. Why?

[00:05:43] Angela Golden: Well, it’s kind of equal between human capital and customer capital. Your customer capital, how many active patients do you have in your practice and how many of those active patients are not scheduled right now? So reactivation is huge when it comes to increasing the value of your practice. It’s reactivation, re-engagement. Those kind of things are, they work hand in hand with getting more treatment on the books, more production, more collection, that’s all gonna increase the value. The human capital is if a person’s gonna want to buy your practice, are your employees and the systems that you have in place sellable.

[00:06:31] Regan Robertson: Tell us what makes it sellable. This is exciting to me because it feels, it is so intangible. It is. So humans are, you know, it’s messy and so that to me is like, you’re putting a system around this. This is exciting.

[00:06:41] Angela Golden: Yeah. So you look at, for instance, your hygienist. Your hygienist will most practices when you sell, they want to keep your staff because your staff has the relationships with the patients. For instance, your hygienist, they see the patients every three to six months. They know their names, they know their families, they have that actual relationship. The dental assistants have the same relationship with the patients. They know them and the anybody who wants to buy into a practice or buy that practice wants to keep as many of those key employees so that you have that relationship that the patients are used to but with that said, you also have to build the relationship with the outside world and the potential patients that you could have and the potential employees that you could have. So it’s something about building those, um, I, the relationships with everybody and really honing in on what the risk factors are and making sure that the patients understand that so that the philosophy of cares can be intertwined with whoever’s gonna buy the practice.

[00:07:57] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: Let’s step back for a minute because I think the way that we traditionally have looked at selling a practice has been, you know, we practice for a fair amount of time or until we are too tired or until we hurt ourselves, and then we sell our practice and generally when that happens, we, we sell the practice at a time when it’s not worth a whole lot, meaning that that practice has reduced in value, or at least is, is, is generally not an investment that we have relied on in our portfolio at least. Um, but there’s a different way of, of doing this. There’s a way of creating value in our practice and considering that an investment in our portfolio, um, talk to us about how to do that and when to consider walking away, or maybe not, maybe that’s not the right term of putting it. Um, talk to us about exiting our practice as owners in preserving as much value in it so that we walk away with those coffers filled as much as as they can be

[00:09:15] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: Hmm.

[00:09:16] Angela Golden: When I, when I meet with the doctors, I do a few assessments and one of obviously I do a valuation of the practice and where it’s at now and where the potential of through these assessments, where it could potentially be, and whether you sell to a private owner or a private equity or a DSO or something else, there’s all these different ways to look at it. So then with that being said, I take you through a journey of what your life’s gonna look like after you exit. What are the, the things that you’re wanting to achieve. Are you gonna do missions? Are you gonna go tour the world? Are you going to, what’s your plan? Are you gonna golf every day? Because a lot of doctors don’t have a plan. They don’t know what they’re gonna do, and they just think, I’m gonna practice dentistry till I die because I don’t have any other hobbies and there’s so many dentists that are that way. They don’t have any other hobbies. Their practice has an engulfs their entire life. So when they think about exiting, they need to have a plan, they need to have a vision, and then we need to fund that vision and how are we going going to do that?

[00:10:34] Dr. Chad Johnson: So, uh, thinking along those lines, if, I’m trying to think of how to describe it but social media I think has a good and a bad within the context, specifically of the pressure of retiring with X dollars and, um, I think there are, um, there’s, how to describe it, there is, there, there are some who need to retire with a lot of money because they sure know how to spend it. And then there are others that could retire quite comfortably and live easy because they just spend um, frugally and, um, but on, on Facebook for example, you see people, you know, like, oh, I’m gonna try and retire with 20 million and stuff like that and then indirectly or directly, that can cause pressure. “I mean, I don’t have 20 million, should I retire with 20 million? How could I even get 2 million? You know, like, let alone 20 million”. And then you go, “Wait a second, this guy has a $5 million home in Miami and he’s. Got a hundred thousand dollars of equity into it,” and, uh, here I’m in Iowa and you know, I, I might have more of my home paid for and plan to just, you know, mow my lawn and take walks through the neighborhood and that doesn’t cost as much as taking your yacht out, you know, from your million dollar, um, dock, you know, so are, are there, are there, uh, surprises to some dentists when they go, you know, I actually don’t need a lot of money, because it seems as though a lot of times the the, the pressure is you’ll need more than you expect but it’s like, is it ever like you, you might actually need less than you’d expect.

[00:12:33] Angela Golden: Yeah, exactly, and, and through the assessments that I go through with, with the doctors, um, I talk about with them, you know, are you gonna be taking care of your family, um, your mother? Are you gonna need to put her in a care facility? How much is that gonna cost a month? And going through, um, different steps, how the first step is de-risking yourself. The next step is preparing yourself. Those two steps kind of intertwine a little bit. Um, because you’re, 

[00:13:07] Dr. Chad Johnson: What do you mean by preparing yourself?

[00:13:09] Angela Golden: Preparing yourself financially and emotionally. Okay. Emotionally. So when I first started this, um, podcast with you, we talked about selling your baby because that is exactly what you’re doing. You’ve put your life into this and mm-hmm. You want, you want what’s best for your baby, right? But you also want what’s best for yourself emotionally and so a lot of times we have to prepare, you know, de-risk and then prepare and that’s then we decide are we.

[00:13:50] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: Is there a good time to start talking to someone? You know, like, um, I’m, I’m almost 50 and I, I don’t plan on stopping to practice dentistry. I’m not plan. I don’t wanna sell my practice either. Um, I don’t wanna transition out. When should I talk to someone like you?

[00:14:14] Angela Golden: Well. I, I feel this is my own opinion that exit planning is business planning because you never know what’s gonna happen tomorrow. 

[00:14:25] Regan Robertson: I, I can’t say enough about, about this is, this is for any time in your life. Um, and, and yes, full disclosure, we all know that I don’t own a dental practice and I won’t own a dental practice. It doesn’t matter whether you own a dental practice or not, knowing your why and your purpose and where you’re going, the universe in and of itself starts to align you to that and I met with my financial advisor several years ago, so I’m in my forties for my full disclosure, and he helped me through an exercise that sounds eerily similar, Angela, to where I wanted to go and Chad, to your point, the why that sits underneath, why do you want 20 million? I don’t think it actually matters the number that you have. It’s the why and the purpose. That is what drives me anyway and I think that’s what drives humans. So I said the same thing, not with the money, but I said, “Okay. I’m gonna retire when I’m 53 because my son will be graduating and I wanted, and he was like, “Okay, well tell me what retirement means to you, Angela.” So he like started saying, “What hobbies do you wanna do? Um, what kinda lifestyle do you want? How many vacations do you wanna take?” All of those. It was the best exercise ever because what I discovered was, “Oh, I don’t really wanna retire. I just don’t wanna work like five days a week.” I, I still, I’m never gonna not be passionate Maggie, like you with the dental practice, like I’m never not gonna wanna be doing something, but my lifestyle will change. So we talked about the purpose and the why, and now this many years in, I’m so happy when I get on a call with him, and I have, I have a father and a father-in-law, two wildly different like outcomes for their lives and their retirement lifestyles, um, that run the gamut of, you know, um, wanting to do things versus being frugal. It’s what you want and it’s, it’s crafting that and then to me, I don’t know about you Angela, and so this is leading up to a question in that when they discover that purpose and get to their, why does the emotional hurdles like the bridge over into planning become aasier for them. For me, it was, um, yeah. Okay.

[00:16:31] Angela Golden: Yeah. It gives them a, a purpose of what, of what their goal is. I mean, you have to have a purpose and when you actually write it down, it’s like having a vision board. This is what that vision board is gonna look like after I sell my practice or after I cut, hire an associate and cut back to two days a week instead of five days a week. It’s just incrementally, this is where I’m gonna go. It might be five years, it might be 10 years, it might be 20 years, but planning that and getting that vision is, is what’s really, really important.

[00:17:06] Dr. Chad Johnson: So tell us an example, Angela. Um, I mean, so if someone didn’t prepare properly, um, and have the glide path, the runway, um, to, to land the plane, uh, properly, you know, what did that end up costing them or, you know, like how did that difficulty play out?

[00:17:28] Angela Golden: Well, I’ve, I’ve worked with so many dentists over the last 30 years, but, um, I’ve, I’ve seen some dentists that will practice until they’re 80 because they didn’t have a plan. They didn’t have a purpose of what, what was gonna happen after. Um, I’ve also seen where the doctor is riding his bike in Lake Tahoe and of all of a sudden died of a heart attack.

[00:17:55] Dr. Chad Johnson: Mm-hmm.

[00:17:56] Angela Golden: Going through that whole phase with the doctor’s husband and children, and what are we gonna do now? That’s a whole thing and if we’re not prepared now, and we have a plan in place. Of what could happen and a vision in place for the future. It, it lines it all together.

[00:18:19] Dr. Chad Johnson: Cool.

[00:18:19] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: How does the, how does that plan change? So like, let’s say, you know, somebody has an unfortunate accident. How does that plan change that situation? Let us see that

[00:18:34] Angela Golden: Okay. For instance, I am working with a doctor now going through an exit planning sessions. The little assessments that I do with them and the questionnaires that I go with them, um, I sat down with his wife and asked her these questions. I said, “What if this happened? What would we do tomorrow?” And we lined it out. We made a plan for her and I that if something was to happen to him, this is the roadmap we’re gonna go on. So we have it written down if something happens to her, if something happens to him, her son has it written down. We have a plan and those are the things that I find that the doctors and the doctors’ spouses really, really need is they just need to know that there, there’s a plan and there’s support, and there aren’t going out this all by themselves because you never know. I mean, we’ve all, we’ve all known those doctors and that something happens tragically or they’re disabled. Something happened and, and did they have a plan? Now we have a plan in place and we know where we’re going and it’s just like you have a book that’s, this is gonna be your book that’s gonna guide you  through it, and that’s what we wanna see.

[00:20:03] Regan Robertson: I’m curious how you walk them through the process that kind of bridges the emotional and philosophical why over to the data, so you get them to visualize and get that plan in place and then there’s the data that has to back it up, the numbers of it. What are some of the red flags that you see typical, um, speaking of the doctor that had to work to 80, that you help them identify and then, you know, work through to close the gap again?

[00:20:31] Angela Golden: I, I, I could get a little bit emotional about this, um, because I, I have worked with that doctor that worked until his very last day of when he passed away, and I just, my biggest thing is to get the doctors to realize that there is life after dentistry there, there really is. You have a family, you have your passions, you have so many other things to look forward to in life, and there is life after dentistry and knowing that, you know, 90, I think Victoria says 95% of dentists can’t retire financially. Let’s, let’s make it happen so they can, because I don’t, I don’t wanna see that for any of them.

[00:21:20] Dr. Chad Johnson: So there’s psychology that plays into this. So I’m curious if, if someone makes a plan, um, how often. Is it executed well? Because here’s, here’s my thought is, you know, you have, let’s say a hundred dentists and they, they all make a plan with you, do 60 out of the a hundred, uh, end up, you know, satisfied with their plan ’cause this is kind of tough. You’d almost have to longitudinally to get a real answer, you know? But like I was wondering what your gut reaction is after 10 years, have them fill out kind, some kind of survey saying, “Are you happy with how you ran that plan?” ’cause I mean, you know, stuff happens and things change and that kind of goes back to Victoria’s Evergreen planning of, you know, business strategy and stuff like that. Your thoughts, Angela?

[00:22:14] Angela Golden: It’s every 90 day we real, we need to reevaluate every Oh,

[00:22:19] Dr. Chad Johnson: Okay.

[00:22:19] Angela Golden: Because so many things change in life. You have babies, you get divorced, you, you never know. So we have to always be updating and changing the plan, and that’s where the strategy comes in of, you know, something. Let’s say you have a house fire, it’s the same kind of thing. We have to have a plan for that too, right? So, um, it’s every 90 days re just re-engaging, re-asking the same questions, go over what has changed in your life, and where do we need to adjust this.

[00:22:55] Dr. Chad Johnson: Mm-hmm.  

[00:22:57] Regan Robertson: You get what you focus on. Right. I mean, if you don’t, if you can’t, if you don’t stay on top of it or if you, it’s just too easy to get back into complacency and to think that something, I think so many times, um, or at least for me, I’ll just wanna hit that, that automate button, you know, so I can focus on other things and so to have a guide alongside me, to remind me, uh, and that, you know, that cadence, that quarterly. Cadence is incredible. What is, well, I do have a, I do have a deeper question for you. We talked about the 80-year-old doctor, and that sounds to me like that’s fueling your why, but you also went through the process yourself. Why, what drives you to help people through this? What, why do you care uh,bout other dentists?

[00:23:42] Angela Golden: I have been there, I’ve seen so many situations where it completely destroys. Your relationships with your family, your relationships with your team, and it can completely destroy you emotionally and. I, I mean, I’ve seen it with my own eyes and wi uh, I went through it myself. It completely destroyed me, and I, I felt like I’ve given up everything I’ve worked so hard for, why am I doing this? And I don’t want other people to feel that pain. Honestly, I mean, it’s aomething that really tugs up my heart because it, I’ve been there personally, but I’ve also sat next to the widow of the doctor that I worked with for so many years and was like, “How are we gonna get through this?” And that’s what my goal is, is to help everybody that I can get through one of life’s challenging, most challenging most impactful events of their life.

[00:24:51] Dr. Chad Johnson: Mm-hmm.

[00:24:53] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: And when you begin to design these plans, um, with your doctors and, and, and you kind of have this in place, the, the way that I can relate to this is over COVID, my husband and I decided to put together a will and we hadn’t before. I can’t get life insurance and we finally sat down and we hired an attorney to do that, and I felt like I could sleep better at night afterwards. Do you see a change in the doctors that you work with once you put this kind of plan in place, do you see an ease in them? Uh, perhaps in their spouses, um, and the people that are around them in that, “Okay, this is, this is taken care of. Um, I can go on, you know, breathing a little bit lighter as a result of having this safety net, knowing that if some, if, if, if these things don’t go to plan, um, and this is worst case scenario, my family will know how to maneuver through these really difficult moments.” 

[00:26:00] Angela Golden: Yes, absolutely. They, it’s like a weight has been lifted off of their shoulders and you can see it, you can feel it and you can hear it in their voice. So, um, it’s very impactful when they know that they have a strategy. They know that they have a, it’s all comes together for them, and they’re just like, oh, I can sleep at night. Now I know what, how I’m gonna pay my bills. I know how I’m gonna get through all of this and I have a plan that I’m gonna keep revisiting every 90 days that I know I can make work.

[00:26:37] Dr. Chad Johnson: All right, so someone comes and says, uh, I have 20 years left to practice. When should we talk? What’s your ideal answer?

[00:26:46] Angela Golden: Today

[00:26:47] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: And the question that you would pose to that person would be, what are your hobbies? When do you wanna stop working?

[00:26:56] Angela Golden: No, I would want, first of my very first thing would be to know in 20 years, what do you need to have in place? What do you need? I wanna know what their vision is for the next 20 years. What are they gonna be doing after that 20 years? I wanna know, is there, are they gonna fund their child’s, uh, college? Are they gonna pay for all the weddings? I need to start planning that ahead of time and I need to start budgeting for him or her to get that in line for that 20 year exit. It’s, it’s making sure that we have all things in place for no matter what. We can do it today or we can do it in 20 years.

[00:27:45] Regan Robertson: I’m wondering if we can talk some, uh, successes that you’ve had, uh, first of all, it, it’s the be I mean, your purpose is to make sure that people don’t have to experience what, what you experienced, which to me is the epitome of a hero’s journey. A good  story is when bad things happen to good people, a great story is when bad things happen to heroes and they can turn around and hold out a hand and say, “I’m going to help you through this.” So it’s so opposite of the victim mindset because bad things happen to everybody. That’s just the reality of it. Intentionally or unintentionally, you’re gonna step in a pile sometimes, um, so through this process and the clients that you’ve helped, what are, what are some successes that you, you know, that make you feel particularly great?

[00:28:31] Angela Golden: Well, I, I, I would, I think this as a success. I had a doctor call a few weeks ago and ask me, he said, “I want to get into coaching because I’m gonna try to exit in five years,” and I said, “Okay, let’s go through some numbers and plans and what went through his valuation,” and I said, “This is where you are right now and if you do this, this is where, what kind of  value you would get for a private practice sale today, or if you went with this option, it would be this,” and he looked at me and he said, “Angela, now I have to rethink everything. I didn’t think my practice was that valuable. I didn’t think I would be able to, so now I have to rethink this because my wife wants to retire tomorrow. She’s my office manager. I wanna keep working for three years. Now I have to rethink everything.”

[00:29:30] Dr. Chad Johnson: Mm-hmm.

[00:29:30] Angela Golden: Now we’re going back and re looking at different situations because his mind shifted all of a sudden, and that’s where it all starts, is when you start thinking about, okay, this is where I’m at now and this is where I could be, your mind shifts and you start thinking about things differently, and that’s where we start really, really diving deep into things.

[00:29:56] Regan Robertson: So was his valuable or was his practice more valuable than he thought?

[00:30:00] Angela Golden: It was almost three times more valuable than he thought.

[00:30:03] Regan Robertson: No way. Normally I think the story is the opposite. They think it’s worth more and then they’re like, uh, it’s not worth as much. Yeah,

[00:30:10] Angela Golden: I’ve seen that too. I’ve seen that too already. We had a client who, uh, he wanted to sell his practice and get out from under the headache but then when I went through his valuation with him and I said, “Okay, this is where we’re at financially, you need to increase your EBITDA a little bit more.”

[00:30:30] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: Mm-hmm.

[00:30:31] Angela Golden: For the next two years, let’s really focus on this part and closing these little gaps that we have in the practice closing the, what I call the financial gaps. In the practice and in his personal financial life. We had to close those gaps before his EBITDA would be at a selling point and I’ve checked it in with him. I check in with him every 90 days. See where at?

[00:30:59] Regan Robertson: So what did, so what did he like? You just highlighted again, another intangible, like undercurrent that sits is what’s the real, real story? Okay, well, the real story is a surprise number one, right? Like, oh, it’s worth more, but the real story underneath is his wife wants to exit now, he wants to keep practicing. So he, I mean, how do you traverse that? Because to me that’s a stronger motivator than, you know, the actual numbers, the numbers play a very important part, but. How do you navigate that?

[00:31:31] Angela Golden: Well, then we, we talk about different situations. Um, like for instance, if he was to sell to a DSO, his wife is the office manager right now. So that would be an option for him that would take care of him possibly staying in practice, you know, in, in dentistry and still being able to work but his wife would be able to retire. She would not have to be in the office. So we talked through that a little bit. Um, we talked  through his daughter is also a dentist and if she was to come in and take over the practice, um, we talked about just, you know, how having an associate come in and take on a few days for him. That way him and his wife can go do retirement things while he’s still working. So there’s all different avenues that we have to talk through, and that’s why getting to know their goals and their vision is so important and that I do want, I always want to include the spouse in these conversations because that’s a huge driver in your decision making.

[00:32:41] Dr. Chad Johnson: Mm-hmm.

[00:32:44] Regan Robertson: I think that’s just really fascinating because as a somebody who engages coaching myself, but you know, from the, the dental perspective, like there’s lots of different coaches or guides or advisors that you can engage in, and to me it is a little confusing. Like who, who do we go for? For what? There’s financial advisors, there’s this, now the CPA, so the exit planning, like Chad and Maggie are both asking it, when is the right time to start and if the answer is today. Do I have a CPA for 90 days for the rest of my life? Um, how, how do you help people like sort, or, or what advice would you have for them on which type of, of guidance to like, engage in? To me, it would be confusing. I wouldn’t know which route to take or if it’s a combination.

[00:33:32] Angela Golden: Yeah, it’s, it’s a combination actually because, um, as a certified exit planning advisor, I work a lot side by side with your financial advisor getting those, um, numbers and, and, um, details of everything that they have already planned and put in place. I also work side by side with your CPA, making sure that you’re profitable, making sure that we’re paying off debt on time and, and where we can move money this way, that way and so I intertwined with all of them, and then also with the business coach or the team development coaches on building that intangible asset of your team and your patient care and getting all of that. It’s working, I work with all three so that we are all on the same page, but we’re driving forward.

[00:34:29] Regan Robertson: This feels so ignorant on my part, but, but, uh, you know, sometimes ignorance comes to the, to the best conclusions.

[00:34:35] Dr. Chad Johnson: That’s right. The best questions.

[00:34:36] Regan Robertson: Yeah. Victoria, who is productive Dentist Academy, CEO, she always says success requires support. And I’ve taken that to heart over the years. And so if you’ve listened to previous episodes, you know, listener, you, you will know that I have like a healthcare team around me. Like I invest in my health, so I have different types of healthcare providers helping me and so from the business standpoint of it too, I would sit down and say, “What do I budget for this?” Like I know. I know I need help in certain areas and you’ve just done a great job of explaining Angela, how you hook into the different support networks. Is there ever a budget that’s recommended for, for doctors so that they can know how much to allocate? Like for me, I had to kind of figure it out on my own and I did have to make some sacrifices ’cause I could support myself all, you know, I could certainly help myself and then I would be missing certain, you know, financial commitments and so I had to like figure out what was right for me. Is there any sort of framework or formula or anything that you advise people on, on what they should spend on, on their support team?

[00:35:46] Angela Golden: Well, in, in dental consulting and, and coaching industries, um, it’s usually between five and 8% of your annual collections. In the actual outside of dentistry world of business, it’s a lot higher than that. It’s between eight and 15%. So, um, I think depending on the type of practice you have and where you wanna go is the key, is what is comfortable. You don’t wanna put yourself under trying to make this vision happen, but you also want to be smart with, with your money and making sure that you have the proper advice and advisors in your corner, so it’s an investment in yourself.

[00:36:40] Regan Robertson: I can’t say enough. Understanding where I’m going and understanding my why helped me prioritize, like, it, it helped me kind of create an algorithm of sorts and, um, thank you for the number piece of it. Right. So the, the actual percentage of what people do, um, is it, how do people, how do people get in? I guess how did they get in touch with you? But how, but more importantly is, let’s start there. Like with the valuation piece of it. Is there any any tools or anything that you offer that people could get sort of a snapshot and, and even start the conversation even if they don’t engage with you, is there something they can do on their own, uh, to get that ball started?

[00:37:20] Angela Golden: Yeah. Um, I, at Productive Dentist Academy, um, I do offer a complimentary value gap assessment to every doctor that. Is interested. I’m happy to do that for you. It requires me either linking with your QuickBooks or your other software that you use, or you providing me with the numbers that I need, and I will do a complimentary value assessment and tell you where your value gap is.

[00:37:52] Regan Robertson: Mm-hmm. Can they email you to reach out for that?

[00:37:55] Angela Golden: Yes, angela@productivedentist.com. Thank you.

[00:37:59] Regan Robertson: And you’re, are you gonna be at some events coming up over the summer of 2025 for everyone listening to this?

[00:38:06] Angela Golden: I will be at the Dentist Money Summit

[00:38:11] Dr. Chad Johnson: Oh yeah.

[00:38:11] Angela Golden: In Park City, Utah on June 18th. 19th.

[00:38:16] Dr. Chad Johnson: Mm-hmm.

[00:38:17] Angela Golden: Um, I will be at AADOM. Oh.

[00:38:22] Regan Robertson: Oh, AADOM 20th anniversary.

[00:38:25] Angela Golden: Mm-hmm.

[00:38:27] Regan Robertson: And that’s in, I don’t remember where that’s

[00:38:29] Angela Golden: in. I’m going, or Jessica’s going, but either way I’m in contact with them, so. Mm-hmm.

[00:38:35] Regan Robertson: And Dentist Money Summit is Dentist Advisors. Right. That’s put on by dentist advisors. Excellent. 

[00:38:42] Dr. Chad Johnson: I went last year, today. That was a blast.

[00:38:44] Regan Robertson: Did you find it valuable?

[00:38:46] Dr. Chad Johnson: Uh, yeah. More than I expected. I, I just didn’t know quite what to expect, but I thought, you know what, let’s just go and check it out. Yeah.

[00:38:54] Regan Robertson: Well, Angela,

[00:38:57] Dr. Chad Johnson: Say that again.

[00:38:58] Angela Golden: I said we had fun, didn’t we chat?

[00:39:00] Dr. Chad Johnson: Yeah.

[00:39:02] Regan Robertson: Thank you for spending the time with us to, to walk through, you know, understanding what, what a CPA is, what, what is important when you’re, when you’re planning your future, and most importantly, keeping in mind that there’s life after dentistry and there are guides that can help you along the way. Chad, how about you? How was this hour for you?

[00:39:22] Dr. Chad Johnson: Good. And my, like I, if I were to surrogately, I’m gonna make that an adjective, an ave, uh, if I were to surrogately offer is get in touch with Angela, angela@productivedentists.com. Um, my thought is, I think we have head knowledge as dentists that, uh, this is something we should do and then actually making it tangible, um, there’s a friction gap. Gap like, of, you know, like not wanting to. I don’t know, maybe it’s even acknowledged that you are that close to being done sometimes. I’ve always thought that I wanted to go from 25 to 65, 40 years, just, you know, boom and there are days and weeks where sometimes I go, “I don’t know, 55 kind of sounds nice or tomorrow, or tomorrow. So yesterday sounds nice. Does anyone want the keys?” And so, um, and then there’s other days I go, “Man, I could do this forever.” So it’s really tough because I think there’s a lot of emotionality to it. You know, it’s, it’s not just a head knowledge of, well therefore when my bank account gets to here, then I’ll just put this for sale sign up. Uh, there’s more to it than that. So, Angela, thank you for, um, kind of helping people open their eyes to see that.

[00:40:40] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: Thank

[00:40:40] Regan Robertson: you.

[00:40:40] Dr. Chad Johnson: Yeah.

[00:40:42] Regan Robertson: Maggie, how about you?

[00:40:44] Dr. Maggie Augustyn: You know, this hits home for me because I just found out that my next door neighbor, who is a little bit older than me, he is a podiatrist and he owns his own practice. Uh, they’re, they were about to retire. They have three grown kids and grandkids, and he, um, he doesn’t have much life. Uh, he has glioblastoma and he’s dying and, um, we, and so I’m in the middle of writing an article about how we just wait and we wait for these moments of celebration and, and we wait and this is, this is part of these things that we’re waiting for, right? We’re waiting to retire and we push off these things because we’re uncomfortable with dealing with them and um, these questions of when we will retire, how we will exit, that’s all part of a very uncomfortable conversation. We don’t want to see ourselves age.  Right. Right. It doesn’t feel good even, even saying that I’m 50, that that, ugh, that doesn’t, that doesn’t, thanks.  Yeah. Yeah. I’ll take the other, I’ll take the 35 or, or whatever it is. Um, and then you have your teenage kids laughing at you that you’re 15. That’s gross but, um, so, so, so this is important. This is  important to, to force yourself to look at. Mm-hmm. Uh, and that would be one of my parting thoughts.

[00:42:07] Regan Robertson: It’s been an incredible episode. Angela, again, thank you for your time. Appreciate your insight so much and what you’re doing for dentists all over the nation. It’s just really, it’s really appreciated. We deserve to, to hold the clinicians and business owners really well. They got a lot on their shoulders and it’s really nice to be able to lessen that pressure and help ’em enjoy life. Maggie, I just, just had conversations with a really close girlfriend of mine about living life today instead of waiting, uh, you know, until your runway is, is so thin. So, uh, everybody, thank you so, so much. We’ll put Angela’s contact information in the show notes again, always. If you would love to leave us a review. We sure appreciate it on iTunes or Spotify, or if you wanna shoot us an email at any time, uh, I think we’re podcast@productivedentist.com. We’d love to hear your feedback and any episode ideas that you would like to hear.

[00:43:02] Dr. Chad Johnson: Thanks everyone.

[00:43:04] Regan Robertson: Bye-bye.