Episode 121 – Success Requires Support

“Success requires support, but which support, who are you choosing and why?” ~Regan Robertson

Are you caught in the DIY trap when it comes to growing your dental practice? Many dentists think they can handle everything on their own – taking online courses, joining message boards, and trying various tips and tricks to try to take their practice to the next level. Unfortunately, this often leads to spinning wheels without real productivity, eventually seeking professional help.

In this final part of our four-part series, Investment Grade Practices host Dr. Victoria Peterson, and Everyday Practices Dental Podcast co-host Regan Robertson finish their discussion of above- and below-the-line behaviors. They explore the concept of above- and below-the-line communication in your practice, emphasizing that success requires not just support but the right kind of support. 

Join Regan and Victoria as they discuss…

• The pitfalls of the DIY approach in dental practice management
• The expanded geography of what support looks like in an Investment Grade Practice
• The importance of accountability in support relationships
• Personal reflections on the journey from self-reliance to embracing support
• Practical advice on how to set standards and hold your team accountable

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Regan Robertson: Doctor, how often, I mean, realistically, really ask yourself this question, “How often have you taken the DIY approach when it comes to growing your practice?” The doctors that I have talked to by and large. have often said, “I can do this myself. I can take an online course. I can get into a message forum. I can sort of kick the tires, take a look and try this. How hard can it really be anyway?” Unfortunately, oftentimes that takes us down the path of spinning our wheels, uh, being busy without being productive and then they end up, you know, ending up in our laps and attending a productivity conference, uh, and the rest is sort of history. So this is our fourth part of our four-part series of Regan Robertson with Everyday Practices Dental Podcasts, and Victoria Peterson, the fantastical podcast collaboration of Investment Grade Practices coming together to talk about above and below-the-line communication in your practice. This particular series is all about support because success requires support. Victoria Peterson, welcome to our collaboration and final part of our series.

Dr. Victoria Peterson: Hello, Regan. You sound exceptionally podcasty today.

Regan Robertson:. You got to turn it on for the beginning, you know,

Dr. Victoria Peterson: That’s right. I love this topic so much. I think I first heard the phrase, s”Success requires support” from one of my coaches, Kendra Thornberry and it just made so much sense to me and I think we think about support. You know, just in dentistry with our team around us, right? My assistant is great. My office manager is great and all of that, but in Investment Grade Practices, we really expand the geography, if you will, of what support looks like in your life, because as an owner, as an owner, employee, producer, you cannot separate the stress and fatigue of your personal life from the stress and fatigue of your professional life. So in today’s environment, particularly post-pandemic, it requires more support.

Regan Robertson: I have a definite confession that for many years in my professional development, I had these, the, the stick. I carried the stick that I can do it myself. I, I can do it myself and there was honor in doing it myself and I, I can’t tell you exactly when or what day, if it was a flash of lightning, where that started to change. I think it was probably a series of small steps that I took over time, but I now see the world from such a different viewpoint and I realized that I am supported in all ways and, and that is not a stigma that is to be celebrated and I am a piece of something bigger and some of the errors that I made along the way, also in that mindset of individual contributor, meaning I do it all on myself, I robbed others of the opportunity to support me and I made my life that much harder. and I just was, yeah, it was, it was a really big moment for me to say, “Okay, I need support. Not all I did. No, I don’t need it. I deserve it.”

Dr. Victoria Peterson: Oh, I’m I’m reflecting back of when you moved into your first management position with us and I know I’ve told this story before, and you’re going to want me to stop telling it, but it’s just a milestone of growth where, you know, support means holding people accountable to support and I remember the end of the day and you were like, “Oh, I’m just so burned out. I got to do my things, but this person left and now I’m going to have to do her things too,” and I’m like, “There’s still two hours left in the workday. She literally lives two blocks from the office. Let’s go down and tell her she didn’t finish her job,” and you were like, “No, no, no, I’ll do it myself.”

Regan Robertson: Oh, yes.

Dr. Victoria Peterson: I see a lot of leaders do that and young and old, like it’s just, it’s that mindset of if you want it done right, do it yourself. You know, the only person I can depend on is myself. These are as deeply ingrained in us, a personal responsibility for professionals, you know, in the dental space level. Some of those things are so deeply ingrained and just like our money myths of money doesn’t grow on trees and you must be a greedy person if you that wealthy and all of that. So there’s a lot of internal reflection about where your beliefs and your deserve comes from, but a great point that with support comes accountability and replacing your wishbone, “Oh, I wish they would do this and I wish they would do that,” with true backbone of this is the expectation. This is how we measure it and this is where we’ll check in on it. It goes back to the last podcast about cadence. So there’s employee, you know, cadence to it. Um, I also like to extend that. Outwardly, you know, I expect my lab to get my cases to me on time if not a day before extra to get that case in, I expect that case to seat with little to no, uh, adjustments, you know, I’ll grade that lab one, two, or three took one minute, two minutes, three minutes, I’m going to reject it after that. So support means setting the standard and holding those accountable to that standard. It doesn’t mean like, well, I guess that’s, you know, my CPA hasn’t sent me a P and L in three months. Well fire your CPA. I need support and you work for me, and I know that sounds so simple. I was just talking to Grace Yum about this on her podcast and particularly female dentists. Uh, well, I can’t say it’s exception to women, but you need to get in the habit of saying, “I’m sorry, our agreement was that you would have my financials to me by the fifth of the month. If for any reason you can’t, please let me know. I absolutely have to have them by the 10th, there’s no exceptions.” That’s support. Otherwise, you’re just begging people to do their job and you’re chasing them or you’re putting your employees in the cart and pushing it uphill for them.

Regan Robertson: And we’re not, we’re not here to be martyrs. That’s, that should not be.

Dr. Victoria Peterson: No, I had to learn that lesson the hard way. I remember, oh, 25 years ago, looking at one of my very first hires and I said, “What part of your job do I need to do so you could do these important things for me?” Sarcastically, but the sarcasm was so like sarcasm as a leadership tool does not work and she was like, “Oh my God, you’re such a great boss here. Take this,” and I was like, “No, I was kidding. Like, these things are your job, right?” So you do have to be a direct communicator in expectations.

Regan Robertson: You know, this reminds me of, uh, speaking of Skip Miller, since this four-part series is the above the below line, uh, you know, translation to dental practices. I thought of Skip Miller’s value star and I peruse the dental forums. I definitely am a lurker, longtime lurker, never a poster, but I do want to know, I always have my ear to what dentists are talking about and what they’re saying and one thing that does continue to fascinate me, this goes back to the DIY approach and the, the lowest level, I would say of a quality measure on the value star is the lack of willingness to invest. So one of the threads that I was on was about practice consulting. How can I either just do it myself or how can I do it as cheap as possible? Who’s the cheapest dental consultant? And I was honestly, I genuinely wanted to reach out and call them on the phone and, and say, “Can you even walk me through what this looks like? Because I would never want to go to a doctor and say, give me the cheapest doctor I can find for my health.” So a mind shift, like a mindset shift for me and, and if you’ve listened to everyday practices, you know, my journey was investing in myself and telling myself that I am worthy of high-quality care. I am worthy of the best and, and the, your business should be no different. So if you are stingy about seeking support and you are automatically thinking about cost as opposed to an investment and what it means, that could be a red flag for you to go internal and start to reflect on the success that you want to achieve and then what your factors are leading up to that, because, uh, I, I think. That is another area where success requires support, but which support and who are you choosing and why?

Dr. Victoria Peterson: Well, and I think cost is a big factor that keeps people from reaching out for support. I know one of the tenants that we talk about here at PDA, um, when we’re doing discovery calls, um, “Is there a 300, 000 problem to solve?” You don’t hire a consultant at, you know, uh, a premium consultant unless you’re solving big problems. So if you want the cheapest consultant, maybe it’s like, I have an, I have a quick fix, inexpensive problem. So, I know that my phone conversion is poor. Everything else in my practice is terrific, but that one new employee needs that one thing. Then I’m probably going to go on and find a virtual training, 250 bucks, get them up to speed a little bit of mentorship. So it really does break down into what problems am I trying to solve. Um, I don’t know that person’s, um, problems that they were trying to solve, but bringing in consulting at that level, you have to say, “Is there a gap between where I’m at and where I want to go and how quickly do I want to accelerate the process?” So consulting should always accelerate the process, help you get to a place where you’ve never been before, where you don’t know the path and you don’t know how to get there so you’re leaning into the experience of others, and you should be. You should be solving global problems with that. Same thing with your CPA. At some point, you’re going to up level. You’re going to go from a simple Quicken to QuickBooks, to QuickBooks Online, to Sage Intact. You’re going to go from mom-and-pop CPA that files your taxes to, um, something more of a financial planner, tax planning. Then you’re going to get into more estate planning. So your advisor should grow with you.

Regan Robertson: Yes.

Dr. Victoria Peterson: As you mature in your career, as you mature in your practice, the CPA that you started with is likely not the CPA you’ll end your career with, but we form such deep relationships and it becomes very difficult to say, “I’m sorry, mom, you can’t pay my bills anymore. I’ve got to, I’ve got to get a true professional to do this.” Um, and you know, for smaller practices, I think it’s great that doctors review and pay all their bills for larger practices, you’re going to want to have a comptroller. that you, um, entrust with that, but set up paying them for yourself for a while, then you know what to expect. Remember, inspect what you expect. You’ve got to learn enough to set the expectations, delegate it, and then come back and check into it.

Regan Robertson: That’s a powerful exercise that you just gave everyone to write down the problem and the value that that problem represents in the practice and use that as a, as a filter to think about the level of solution that you want to engage in. I’m going to throw one little wrench in there that I think is interesting though, because I have seen this with many dentists, the problem that they, they are focused on and think they have is, is a symptom of something systemic that is much greater.

Dr. Victoria Peterson: Yes.

Regan Robertson: And one of the counterintuitive ways, especially around the cost discussion, I don’t have the money. I don’t have the money, but I need 60 new patients, but I don’t have the money. I think my team is doing reviews and referrals. I mean, they say they are. Where can we go from there? And I can only see things now from a comprehensive perspective. So PDA has blessed and cursed me with this. I can only see it from the entire business perspective and so having that level of support, even if I mean, I’m riffing with you, but, but if I identified, okay, my phone conversion is down. If I’m that locked tight, maybe just one course would do it. Chances are you might not be that quite locked tight. You’re focusing on taking great care of patients and I doubt you’re in every element of the business. It would probably be worthy to invest in, in a consulting session in a big 90-minute or even a, uh, an, an analysis to kind of tell me everything and I look at this very selfishly from my own, uh, personal health perspective. I want to know everything that’s going on comprehensively because I want the best chance for long-term success and doctors, I know you want the long-term game. You want to create and maximize the value of your practice. So would that be a success recommendation that you would make Victoria, is perhaps engage in an analysis or something like that?

Dr. Victoria Peterson: Yeah. Just like your annual physical have an annual health checkup and we do that all the time. We do it for free, you know, just call Brent and he’ll walk through areas. Uh, and, and it’s mind-blowing. It’s like, “Wow, I had no idea. I had 2. 3 million in unscheduled treatment and I had no idea that only 2 percent of our patients were engaged in perio. No wonder we’re not filling the hygiene book or we’re missing radiographs or, you know,” all of those kinds of little things, um, those really add up over time and so, yeah, there’s lots of services to have a practice checkup and I think that’s highly, highly valuable and you’d want to do that before you engaged in support anyway. Um, one, I know our time is coming to a close here, but I also want to talk about the personal support.

Regan Robertson: Yes.

Dr. Victoria Peterson: Oh my gosh, we, I don’t know. I hope, I hope everybody has some type of domestic support. Like when you’re off work, are you working out because that energizes you or are you resting because that energizes you? Or are you stumbling over the Legos and picking up kids toys and mowing the grass? Like if mowing the grass is meditative and you love it, do it. I had one client who had a hundred acres. He loved to jump on the tractor. That was his thing but if it’s less than what you produce and collect per hour, like you’re at least 400 an hour, 600, 800, a thousand dollars an hour, if there are things at home that can be done, picking up the kids, doing this or that, first, identify your core values and what means the most to you of picking up the kids is the most important part of your day. Don’t compromise that but maybe you have a meal service that, you know, has, I don’t, I don’t even know what those are. We don’t have those here in Hawaii, but it’s called,

Regan Robertson: You just go out to your backyard and pick something from the tree.

Dr. Victoria Peterson: Yeah. There’s a mango in season. Um, but you know, don’t be afraid to have a housekeeper come in as often as you need them, even though now they’re 40 or 50 bucks an hour. What is that going to do for your peace of mind? What is that going to do for your life balance? Don’t be afraid to invest in your own physical health. Um, I was just reading an article the other day, and I think this is why I love the, um, uh, gospel method. We’ve brought them into our conferences before. Um, can’t remember what publication just came out of it, but it, the article was, um, “Is your, is your exercise routine hurting you as a dentist?”

Regan Robertson: Wow.

Dr. Victoria Peterson: Most trainers and most gyms put you through a standard, you know, build your quads, build your, you know, they’re, they’re working on peripheral bodybuilding sort of stuff. Dentistry needs the opposite of what you would do at a normal training piece because our posture is so collapsed exercises that open things up. We need hip, uh, flexors and different things like that. So you need to be really specific about I’m in dentistry and I need support. That’s the number one thing that causes disability, right? It’s your neck. It’s your wrist. It’s your back. It’s your hips. So find, um, a GOSCU trainers or find people, um, ergonomic, there are ergonomic, uh, people in dentistry who talk about chair ergonomics and things like that. Those are the things that give you career longevity. So we’ve mostly been talking about financial support, workflow support, clean my house support, uh, you know, but you are an athlete and your body mechanics are key to, to longevity in your career.

Regan Robertson: Man, you just, you just had me thinking of two exercises I would have people like you could do it right now. You taught me this in a little breakfast nook 14 or 15 years ago, and you called it the wheel. I think the wagon wheel is what it was and there is a center. So draw a little circle and then draw, you know, a bigger circle outside of that and your spokes and in between each spoke represents an, a facet of your life. So in Victoria, when you walked me through this, it was my career and it was the skill set that I had in my career and I ranked myself from least skilled to most experienced. So if you can envision this, this circle with all these little pie pieces in it here and say, one of them is communication. You would rank yourself. I’m, I’m either I’m, I’m solid at it. I’m like a five out of a 10. You would like draw in half of that little pie and then you go around your entire one and you fill it in and usually if you’re being really honest, you’ll find that that wagon wheel is a little chunky. It’s not gonna give you a smooth ride but the goal is to have it fleshed out to where you feel like you are living life in a balanced way. It’s, it’s a very rudimentary way to feel balanced and I highly recommend that. I read the book “Margin” with Chad Johnson, and that was a really good one because he, he helped, um, separate out into buckets, our own health. So there’s our physical health. There is our spiritual health. There’s our mental health and so in these different buckets of what matters to us, you could rank yourself. How do I feel in each of these areas? And the trick here is to honor each of these individual buckets and not starve yourself and so that can help inform where you might want to focus your support and you can do the same for your business on your own without an analysis, but it can give you an idea of where you might want to start prioritizing, uh, where you look for support,

Dr. Victoria Peterson: You know, what we could do is, um, we could put this as a download in our, um, show notes. Uh, Brent does this as he’s onboarding new clients. That’s the first thing we send out is the wheel of life and what’s working and not working in your life and we could offer that for anybody who’s listened to our four-part series here. What a way to celebrate.

Regan Robertson: Absolutely. We will do that. That sounds like a really great path to, to get us, get, get our listeners aligned. Just do a little summer refresh, see how you’re feeling and, uh,

Dr. Victoria Peterson: You know, there’s also, um, there’s also a pace and priority, uh, questionnaire in there. I call it the procrastinator’s quiz. It’s officially called pace and priorities. So yeah, we could put those three documents together and, and give that to listeners, just email us and we’ll, we’ll zip it all number.

Regan Robertson: Well, thank you. My, my summary is you deserve support. Everyone deserves support. Do not put yourself last. Do not, um, do not cheapen the experience. You deserve with high-quality support that you vet out and you choose yields, higher quality results and PDA has taught me that it, where you focus your investment is where you can get the longest value, um, to maximize your value over time. and I think that that is my takeaway from my session with you. Final thoughts, Victoria.

Dr. Victoria Peterson: Um, I love this so much. I wish we were podcasting together all the time.

Regan Robertson: I’m sure we’ll be together again. Well, thank you for listening to our four part series above the line and below the line. If you would love to see Victoria and I speak in person, ask us all of the questions. We are both presenters at PDA’s 20th anniversary conference. This September 12th to the 14th, we have curriculum that is one time only there. We have Emmett Smith. He is the Pro Football Hall of fame or entrepreneurial and I believe winner of dancing with the stars. We have brand new curriculum, including Clinical Calibration Institute, which is insane and, uh, I’m going to put that link in the show notes as well. So if you’d like to see us go to productivedentist.com and you can check us out. I know we’re almost sold out, so go ahead and register fast. We’ll see you there.