Very Dental Student: Dr. Andrew Clingan on Early Practice Ownership

[00:00:01] This is a production of The Very Dental Podcast Network.

[00:00:04] It's time for a Very Dental Podcast just for students and new dentists.

[00:00:14] Welcome to The Very Dental Student Podcast, and now here's your host, Muhammad Abu Basha.

[00:00:20] Hello everybody, welcome to another episode of The Very Dental Student Podcast. I'm your host, Muhammad Abu Basha.

[00:00:26] Today, I'm bringing on a guest for you guys, Dr. Andrew Klingon from Birmingham, Alabama.

[00:00:32] Andrew, how are you doing today?

[00:00:34] I'm good, Muhammad. Thanks for having me on.

[00:00:36] Yeah, it's a pleasure to have you on. I'm really excited for this chat.

[00:00:39] So, Andrew, before we get started, why don't you go ahead and give our listeners just a quick introduction to yourself and just like a brief backstory.

[00:00:49] Yeah, for sure. So I am a practicing dentist and practice owner in Birmingham, Alabama.

[00:00:56] I'm a very young dentist, new grad, class of 2023.

[00:01:00] So, I'm someone who bought a practice ride out of dental school, and I'm sure we'll get into more of that later.

[00:01:06] But I had a little bit of a business background.

[00:01:09] I worked for a podcasting and coaching company called Chair Practices throughout dental school.

[00:01:13] So that kind of journey of getting integrated with those guys and learning about practice management and acquisitions is really what put me on the path to owning ride out of school.

[00:01:24] And so, yeah, the data, this recording, I'm almost 10 months to the day when I bought the practice.

[00:01:32] So, yeah, things are going good. And it's been a fun journey thus far.

[00:01:36] So that's kind of who I am in the 60-second nutshell.

[00:01:39] Yeah. And remind me where you went to dental school?

[00:01:43] UAB, University of Alabama in Birmingham. So yeah.

[00:01:46] And you're from the area local or?

[00:01:49] Yeah, I'm from Alabama. I've lived in Alabama my entire life.

[00:01:53] Pretty much grew up an hour outside of Birmingham.

[00:01:55] So, yeah, when I was applying to dental schools, that was really where I wanted to go because this is home and this is where I knew.

[00:02:01] Turns out, I mean, this wasn't really planning on sharing this, but I had a very difficult time getting into dental school.

[00:02:08] I had to apply like three times, take the DAT a few times.

[00:02:12] Finally got in on my third round and I only interviewed at two schools, UAB and up in Baltimore, Maryland.

[00:02:20] And I remember I went up to that school and I was like, I mean, this is cool and all, but I really don't want to move up here.

[00:02:24] I just wanted to stay where I'm familiar.

[00:02:26] And also too, like UAB has probably one of the better clinical experiences in the country.

[00:02:31] At least they did when I was there.

[00:02:33] And it's probably one of the cheaper dental schools in the country.

[00:02:36] So that was pretty big on my list as well.

[00:02:38] Like, hey, I think this is like crown preps I get to do in dental school per dollar.

[00:02:43] This is probably the highest return investment we can get anywhere in the country.

[00:02:47] So yeah.

[00:02:48] Yeah, I also had to reapply to dental school so I can kind of commiserate with you there.

[00:02:55] Yeah, it turns out the people who made those decisions are just people who sit in academic buildings their whole life and don't know crap about dentistry in the real world.

[00:03:01] So you know.

[00:03:02] Yeah.

[00:03:03] Well, I'm still in dental school so don't want to harp on that too much yet.

[00:03:09] But so let's talk about real quick what you mentioned that you had pretty good clinical experience while you were in dental school.

[00:03:19] So talk to me just really briefly about like how many if you remember what your graduation requirements were roundabout for crown preps and stuff.

[00:03:29] Yeah, roughly.

[00:03:30] I mean, I probably prepped like 30 something crowns before I graduated.

[00:03:35] So not the top in the country but definitely up there.

[00:03:38] Couldn't tell you how many class twos and things like that.

[00:03:41] But I felt like I had a really solid yeah experience in dental school and that's kind of what UAB has been known for for a while.

[00:03:48] Did a good bit of removable, good bit of extractions.

[00:03:51] Our endo experience really tanked while I was there due to the guy who's the head of the department there now.

[00:03:56] He's not very good as a research guy.

[00:03:58] So that's typically at odds with predoctoral students getting root canal experience.

[00:04:03] But yeah, overall UAB was a great experience, good clinical and especially for like the in-state tuition was really good.

[00:04:10] We didn't wasn't normal to place like implants and stuff as part of the curriculum.

[00:04:14] I got to place two before I left.

[00:04:16] It was just kind of a special out of patient who needed them and was buddies with the perio resident and I planned the whole case up and they let me place the implant.

[00:04:25] I was like, that's cool but that's not a super normal thing.

[00:04:28] But yeah, I mean you get pretty good experience and just bread and butter dentistry.

[00:04:31] Yeah, that's awesome.

[00:04:32] Definitely 30 crowns is way above like the average nationally so that's pretty good.

[00:04:38] So do you feel like that weighed in on what eventually like kind of allowed you to pull the trigger,

[00:04:44] feel comfortable pulling the trigger, buying a practice straight out of practice or straight out of school?

[00:04:49] Yeah, definitely.

[00:04:50] And you know maybe as we unpack the story a little bit more as we go, I can give more context into that.

[00:04:55] But the short answer is yes like I felt confident in what I was doing enough to go like, hey, I can do this responsibly.

[00:05:04] I know it's going to be hard.

[00:05:06] It turned out it was way harder than I thought even with that much clinical experience because I don't care if you prep like 50 crowns in dental school.

[00:05:13] You just can't quite simulate real world dentistry and dental school for a lot of different reasons.

[00:05:19] So yeah, I mean like that did give me some confidence.

[00:05:22] But yeah, that was still like an uphill road for sure.

[00:05:27] Yeah, for sure.

[00:05:29] So let's go ahead and dive straight into it.

[00:05:32] Talking about first of all the pros and cons of you know going into practice ownership immediately.

[00:05:39] I know we've already kind of just touched the surface on a couple of them but what do you think the pros and cons are of going into ownership right away?

[00:05:47] Well, I think before I answer that question it's just good to think about the pros and cons of ownership in general.

[00:05:54] And I mentioned at the top of the episode that I work for a coaching company called Share Practices like I said a lot of people if you're into dental podcasts you've probably heard of the podcast.

[00:06:04] So I saw from an early on stage like how influential, like how special practice ownership can be for a dentist since it's really cool.

[00:06:15] Not really a niche but this really cool part of our profession where it's still a lot of us do on private practices.

[00:06:22] And that's really what drew me to dentistry is like this kid in high school who wanted to do it.

[00:06:26] Like I saw my hometown dentist growing up and like I want to be like him.

[00:06:30] He had this team who liked him and he was a business owner and that part was always appealed to me.

[00:06:34] I always had a little bit of an entrepreneurial streak in me.

[00:06:36] I've always had something going on the side.

[00:06:39] So I knew I was never just going to go to dental school and like go work for somebody else.

[00:06:44] Didn't know anything about practice ownership prior to dental school but like I said got the opportunity to be an intern and work for Share Practices.

[00:06:51] And our entire thing we push people to is early practice ownership.

[00:06:56] And just how financially rewarding that can be for a dentist and having the autonomy.

[00:07:03] And really what it comes down to and the more I know about this Muhammad is just you know you ask what are the pros and cons.

[00:07:10] When I think of practice ownership and whether people should do it.

[00:07:13] I don't really look at it from like a pros and cons standpoint as much as like a being honest with yourself and like what kind of cloth are you cut from.

[00:07:20] Like what kind of a person are you and for the right person.

[00:07:24] Yeah, private practice ownership is alive and well all day and they should do it.

[00:07:28] But for some people they probably shouldn't right and some people you know.

[00:07:34] Dentists are always used to being the smartest person in the room and so sometimes they don't like being an associate but you also have to realize like.

[00:07:40] Signing up for practice ownership if you're talking pros and cons like it requires managing people and that stressful and it's something you don't learn in dental school and it's not easy and some people aren't cut out for it.

[00:07:50] And even the people who are cut out for it.

[00:07:53] It takes time to really like hone in on that set of skills.

[00:07:56] I thought I was a great leader until I had to lead and I found out early on just how poorly do I can be sometimes so yeah I mean the pros are like incompetentials higher.

[00:08:05] You have the ability to do what you want to do and for the certain kind of personality that's really appealing.

[00:08:11] I don't take instructions very well from people so that was always appealing to me.

[00:08:15] I can scratch that entrepreneurial itch I like leading people and creating things that's fine.

[00:08:20] You know cons are is tough right.

[00:08:23] You're not just wearing the hat of the clinician you're I have a really great team around me and I have well above average and capable people especially kind of in an office manager role but still like in its infancy stages right now I'm the manager in a lot of ways and so.

[00:08:39] I thought about like being the first year out of dental school and going all these fun vacations and I'm like well hope I can squeeze them in over the weekend because I cannot be going from the practice for like a week right now it's just like to go on.

[00:08:49] So I hope that answers that question a little bit.

[00:08:52] It definitely does and yeah I know that you you're speaking on being cut from a certain cloth you're definitely very entrepreneurial didn't you have like a DJing business or something.

[00:09:02] Dental school up until recently so that's my fun trivia for people that in a past life I was a wedding DJ and yeah started out in college just to know a few buddies but over like seven or eight years grew into a pretty sizable like DJ company where we had three or four people who worked under us and did well over a hundred weddings a year.

[00:09:18] So I had that experience like managing people and running my own business before that but yeah when I wanted to graduate and get straight into buying a practice my wife told me that something had to give so that was the.

[00:09:29] I've officially been bought out of the DJ company yeah yeah sure so yeah I like a lot of the things you mentioned there because.

[00:09:38] I'm also a huge proponent of early practice ownership that's something I kind of.

[00:09:43] Learn and figured out through listening to you on the person of ownership on the shared practices podcast so I definitely agree with all of that but I also wanted to just.

[00:09:53] Just mentioned that not everybody is going to be as prepared as you were not everybody was running a business during dental school not everybody.

[00:10:03] You know had the exposure that you had so maybe although ownership is going to be a maybe the end goal for them it's still not always the right decision like straight out of dental school would you agree with that.

[00:10:14] I mean I would probably more than agree with that I would probably like strongly advise against only right out of dental school and I don't say that because I'm like smarter than the average person like yes I did have the right experiences that allowed me to do this but.

[00:10:28] Don't get me wrong this was never my goal was never to own a practice right out of dental school even working as an intern for a practice management like coaching company even having experience running my own business even going to a dental school where I had well above average clinical experience.

[00:10:43] And I am that kind of person who's cut out for it I knew like man that's just an uphill battle and so always told myself hey flight the right opportunity comes along.

[00:10:53] I'll consider it but that was never my goal like my goal was to like go be an associate somewhere who could keep me busy I could get my efficiency up I could get all of like this first year like.

[00:11:02] Stupid new grad mistakes out on someone else's patient based not like my life alone patients and so.

[00:11:09] Yeah that was not my goal but like the right one felt my feet so you have 100% like not saying no one do it but you really do need to be honest with yourself about.

[00:11:19] What your desires are in your strengths are and if you don't have any sort of business acumen it doesn't mean you can't learn it but try coming out as a new grad I don't care how talented the clinician you are and how good the dental school you go to real world dentistry is just different and it takes time to get figured out and become efficient.

[00:11:37] And proficient in like honestly you talk to people who've been doing it for 10 years and they feel like they haven't scratched the surface yet so your first year I mean.

[00:11:45] It's a lot of survival just to be honest and you know I will say I felt like I had the clinical skill set and the drive to learn and.

[00:11:53] The dental school experience and some other like continuing education experiences that like allow me to do this responsibly.

[00:11:59] You know I'm not like screwing up people's mouse left and right but yeah I have a long way to grow and learn as a clinician and I look at the last 10 months and where I am now versus where I started and there's a big growth curve there.

[00:12:11] But it's a lot to take that on and then when you pile on the other stuff and things have gone well for me in this first year but I've had like.

[00:12:19] I've called the right breaks and had the right people join my team I'm a really good team now I had the right experience behind me and the resources and all of the above and even with that it's been tough and so like I'm saying I mean.

[00:12:31] For 9.8 out of 10 people I'm gonna say like no you shouldn't and like I said even for myself it's not that I thought I was just more than everybody else and when did I just had.

[00:12:40] An opportunity fall in my lap that check some practice acquisition boxes that I knew I could grow but also check like some lifestyle boxes and being in the area my wife and I want to live and just need like hey I need to say yes to this is going to be hard in the short term I'm giving up like.

[00:12:55] Some peace and like some ability to be able to do things I would be able to do as an associate and lifestyle factors but it was gonna be worth it the long.

[00:13:03] Long run yeah for sure there yeah there's quite a few things I liked about that answer.

[00:13:08] But you do mention that the office kind of just fell in your lap.

[00:13:13] I know it's probably not that simple I know you did a lot of networking and you were very proactive so talk to me about what you did during dental school.

[00:13:25] To just make sure you had a good network and to make yourself available to make yourself known that you're available for these opportunities if you know what I mean yeah for sure I mean.

[00:13:35] Was definitely like intentional about preparing myself for that not only like in networking and reaching out but part of my experience in the sign book I have a part time job in dental school working for SP was I knew I was going to learn a lot and so.

[00:13:50] You know if you've ever heard like is it the Abraham Lincoln quote or something about like give me five days to cut down tree I'll spend for sharpening my answer is basically you know something to that extent like.

[00:14:02] I really took that kind of attitude to heart dental school of like hey I'm not planning on owning a practice for you know when I was at your point finishing my second year I thought was like three four years out from owning a practice and I was like I got three to four years.

[00:14:14] To learn everything I can before I so I can hit the ground running and so yeah I was learning the whole time but then also to.

[00:14:21] You know we kind of it share practices we take alongside like pre owners and we have a certain segment of the podcast where we really speak to dental students or young associates on hey how do you find a dental practice and what to look for and all that and so one of the methods we talk about is using mailers and finding ways to find off market practices.

[00:14:39] Just to be honest in our day and age what you're going to find on a broker's website normally is not very appealing.

[00:14:45] You know it's just gonna be a lot of underperforming for our practices and they're just not super great acquisitions and so we really teach people on getting creative and trying to find these practices that.

[00:14:56] You know happy maybe hidden potential or potential and they hit the market yet because that potential there's plenty of private equity or more established practice multi practice owners who know these brokers are willing to scoop them up in just an instant right so.

[00:15:11] The ones that potential don't last super long to go to a broker so we really teach people finding off markets one of the big thing we do is we send mailers and talk about.

[00:15:19] Looking at demographic areas and finding yet Dennis who appear to be around retirement ages and just sending them mailers that you kind of postcard about yourself I did that.

[00:15:30] You know get some decent results but nothing crazy but also just like network with like the dental supply reps around in the commercial real estate brokers who work in health care and those people need me and that's ultimately.

[00:15:42] Kind of what paid off for me about.

[00:15:46] January of my before year in the spring I was getting ready to sign an associate contract I found a.

[00:15:54] Like mid size DSO that I knew is going to keep me busy and I was gonna get some C.E. opportunities and make pretty good for a first year coming out and I was getting ready to sign the dotted line.

[00:16:03] And local supplier was like hey dude he I met with him through dental school he knew what my goal was.

[00:16:11] In guys like that there they want to take like sharp people and put them in practices because they know they're gonna order a bunch of cotton rolls from right so.

[00:16:18] He said hey I got a practice I should show you not to ask Paul like.

[00:16:23] Not trying to own out of school man that's an uphill battle is like just look at it and I was like dude I don't know he told me where it was in Hoover Alabama like.

[00:16:32] And there's like 500 Dennis and who I'm not trying to go practice or like there's only one place in the Birmingham Metro.

[00:16:38] Hoover Metro that I would go and it's this community and he laughed when I say that's exactly where it's at.

[00:16:44] I was like oh crap okay let's go look at it so I walk into this place and it's this is like really outdated dental practice it looks like straight out in 1980s wall paper on the wall still developing film it smells like burnt teeth and developing film inside of their right like your granddad's dental office.

[00:17:01] I'm surprised they didn't have sinks to spit in beside the.

[00:17:05] And I was like oh well this is something what why show me this Paul but we kind of looked around he showed me I was okay he's got room to get up to eight ops at school and then I remember I saw print out of their schedule they were mainly paper charts.

[00:17:18] Yeah I mean paper charts but they did like have this outdated software called practice works where they.

[00:17:25] You know kept the schedule on and I saw print out the schedule in two things really struck me there's two hygienists who were like slam full of patients doctor calling that just wasn't that busy.

[00:17:36] Yeah it was an older doctor who'd slowed down and all that when I saw that because my background working for us being although we have a very specific like practice management philosophy and even an acquisition philosophy of like hey here's what to look for you know.

[00:17:49] I'm going to side tangent for a second but you get on Facebook groups and everybody and their mama has an opinion about practice acquisitions and people go like.

[00:17:57] You know this is what you should look for there's tons of people who are asking for advice online I need a good referral for a CPA lawyer to help me evaluate this practice and it drives me nuts because I'm just going to right now the last person in the world who should be in the driver seat on a.

[00:18:10] Acquisition and a practice eval is a CPA the financials are a part but they're very small part of the future like potential of a practice that guy's overhead is not necessarily going to be my overhead.

[00:18:20] Yeah a few fixed expenses so sorry rabbit trail but yeah we have a very specific like practice acquisition philosophy that's based around really at the end of the day patient flow right and when I saw that print out the schedule I'm like gosh if these two hygienists are that full all the time.

[00:18:37] This place could have a lot of patients in it yeah just not like producing a bunch because there's an older doctor like everybody knows like doctors get older in their career they don't diagnose anymore they slow down and I mean after being a practicing dentist for 10 months I fully understand why.

[00:18:51] Yeah I was old I probably wouldn't want to do it either so.

[00:18:55] So that was enough for me to go I can overlook the film in the charts in the wallpaper and all of this and let's get some actual numbers on that so that's when I kind of saw a few reports and.

[00:19:06] Few of the reports that were run out of software were lining up with what I was thinking so that's when I officially like made a call to Suzanne Rassy who's our.

[00:19:14] Director of coaching SP and just really does everything she's also like over our buyers representation services so we represent.

[00:19:20] Buyers and help people evaluate practices and go hey what's the based on what you're wanting to do in dentistry this is fit the bill for you so she was one of my first calls and said Suzanne I think I got this like really good opportunity but.

[00:19:31] I've done this enough I've watched enough of these deals to know that everybody gets rose color glasses when it's their life being examine because.

[00:19:38] Everyone sees something that you picture yourself in the practice and all your success and you really get like you can't be objective about it and so I said here's everything I'm seeing what do you think and she was like.

[00:19:48] Andrew if what you're telling me is true like I think this may be definitely worth only right out of school it would be tough but yeah.

[00:19:54] So that's when I was like all right so we kind of kicked in like I went through the same process of our buyers representation.

[00:20:02] That we would do with any client that comes to us like she remoted and put a lot of reports we got all the financials did like a full dive deep dive into due diligence and.

[00:20:12] Turns out like.

[00:20:14] The practice is what we thought it was it was an underperforming.

[00:20:17] Single doctor practice that had the patient flow to be a really busy single doctor practice and then maybe even a little bit more.

[00:20:25] And just yeah this person great dude who built up a solid reputation over years and years he's still doing so comes work every day and hangs out he doesn't do as much dentistry anymore but he's an awesome guy really enjoy.

[00:20:36] To know him over the last year but yeah just slow down and you know technology wasn't up to date so diagnosis suffered.

[00:20:44] Lost a lot of long time team members so that front desk admin stuff wasn't quite buttoned up anymore kind of AR was a little bit of a mess.

[00:20:52] They were not retaining patients very well so they had all these patients and it was kind of like a thanks for coming get your cleaning will send you a postcard in six months and like we know statistically when people don't leave.

[00:21:02] With their next cleaning on the boats the chances that they come back on time are like 20% right so yeah when I see it saw that I just saw opportunity I saw a lot of work it's like a flipper on real estate like a house like.

[00:21:15] You see this beat down house in this great area and you're like okay it has the bones to be what it needs to be it just needs some TLC.

[00:21:23] And that's what this turned out to be there was some risk involved like new cash flow would be tied at first and yeah I was okay with that risk and so that's kind of what how things came about.

[00:21:35] Yeah I know all of these things individually would be typically seems like an area of opportunity but it seems like you had just like almost every aspect of the practice was an area of opportunity so it was like a lot of things that you had to implement like I don't know I don't know.

[00:21:52] Yeah I did work a single day with paper charts like it just seems like.

[00:21:57] Yeah it was like three weeks before I got my first sensor in there so I was diagnosing off three weeks yeah it's not it's not clinically acceptable like diagnostic quality I'm just gonna tell you right now.

[00:22:08] Yeah I can only imagine.

[00:22:11] Yeah you're right we got in there day one and me and my right hand man is my own and we're like where do we start.

[00:22:21] And I just said hey low hanging fruit we start by everyone who walks out this door has their next freaking hygiene appointment.

[00:22:28] We're going to live and die on that like and because like the schedules it was so funny like that in the high just like worth their own recall and were paid based on commission so you would see it in their schedule they would have like a busy day.

[00:22:40] And we could tell in their slower day they were worth their recall because it would be that full and just like yeah did this sort of deal and so like the minute we got in there and got good front desk and systems in place and the hygiene were doing it these people were low patients.

[00:22:53] Like they reported and guess what report went to like 90% guess what the schedule is slam full six months later.

[00:23:00] And then yeah people need dentistry done and it's just it's a numbers game at that point so it was overwhelming still is like we've seen a lot of growth in this first 10 months but every day we're just like gosh there's so much to do and yeah it can definitely become overwhelming at times.

[00:23:16] I do want to follow up on one thing you said like you mentioned that you had a really loyal patient base.

[00:23:23] But obviously you're a new doctor and a fresh grad and they were used to like kind of older more veteran doctors so how did that transition go because I know like that's like a lot of people's biggest kind of are one of their biggest concern.

[00:23:38] Yeah, yeah, I mean it was tough.

[00:23:41] I think I did everything that I could to mitigate against that like had a really strong endorsement from the selling doc these people trusted him and I've had so many people look at me and go Dr.

[00:23:52] Real trust you then I trust you like full stop we send out the letters to tell people man I came in for the first six months and I was the most charming guy who ever existed on the face of the planet and took as long as I needed to talk to that person no matter how far but I was running.

[00:24:08] And I think naturally like everybody has their strengths and weaknesses one of my strengths is like I can get along with people make first impressions pretty well most of the time especially by older people and I had a lot of these in my practice.

[00:24:20] So yeah all that like worked really hard at it and guess what some people still didn't like and I was we knew that was going to happen.

[00:24:27] I was very slow to make any changes at first right like for 10 months in and I just painted like one room just like two months ago like it still looks kind of outdated when you walk in right and all my friends give me a hard time about it but I'm like no like people been coming with it looking like this we're going to leave it for a while.

[00:24:43] Let them kind of get used to me.

[00:24:46] You know and so that's been hard I have gotten a little less impatient like little less patient as time is gone so I've started to make more changes in the last few months and guess what I've slowly and steadily that made a few more people mad than I did the first six months right and yeah that's fine because I'm making this my practice right I'm not going to always diagnose the way he did or run the business the way he did.

[00:25:05] These are super low and just to be responsible business or we had to raise fees right.

[00:25:10] And some people are going to feel a certain way about that especially when they were slow I had to raise them a good bit just to be average for our area so yeah people get mad at that.

[00:25:20] People get mad about you know it stinks but like sometimes you're trying to say this to think it takes two hours especially when you're new grad and I'm sure a lot of people are like I'm not going back to him that took forever and I'm tired of holding up.

[00:25:32] That stuff happens but also a lot of people really appreciated like fresh eyes there in my.

[00:25:37] Reinvesting the practice and technology like we've had a lot of good to so like you know we've seen some attrition and at this point it's too early in the game to fully know like how much it should we will have I do know like on average as people with our clients we see anywhere around 20% of attrition during an acquisition.

[00:25:53] This far ours hasn't been that high but you know it takes time to really find out because a lot of people are going to come and just go unless they're really mad.

[00:26:02] Send your text I'm not coming back some people just going to go find any dentists or there's a lot of long time patients who had moved away but still came to him and drove like an hour to see him and they met me the first time they're like hey no offense but I'm just going to get a dentist closer to home and I'm like I came to be mad at that I would do the same thing to I'm not going to.

[00:26:18] I went drop 60 minutes to this new guy that I didn't have a relationship with so yeah a lot of that's the stuff that we've kind of worked through and still are working through.

[00:26:27] Yeah how about the transition with the staff like did you have a lot of staff quit whenever you first started or were you able to retain most of them.

[00:26:37] I got lucky I retained everybody pretty much special ones I wanted to this guy being later in his career had a lot of a long time people retire and so he had a few people in places that were like family members who are just helping them out because you can find a front desk.

[00:26:53] He had a high genus Sue was ready to retire when he did right and so everybody stuck around for me until I could find a replacement but when I took over there was only really three at that point because he was under staffed.

[00:27:07] One was like a family member who was a work in the front desk and so I really only inherited three team members one of which came to me like before I even bought and said hey just to be honest and fair to you I'm tired I've been doing this for like 40 years.

[00:27:21] I'm ready to retire but you seem like a good person not going to get to draw so like I'll give you till the end of the year but if you find someone before that let me know and I'm good I'm ready to go.

[00:27:30] And so yeah got a new hygienist in there like month two or three and then just so there's really only two originals left assistant the hygienist and yes been tough especially for one of them like once just come clock into her job and go home person so.

[00:27:46] There's probably something she doesn't like but she's not that emotionally invested into it the other ones very emotionally invested into it so that's the one that's harder but she's been great she's done everything I've asked her to even though it's been difficult at times.

[00:27:58] So yeah I was really fortunate didn't have any turnover but 10 months in I have actually I'm about to go walk through a little bit of my first round of turnover I'm having some key staff members who are going part time just due to life reasons not mad and they're still going to be with me but like.

[00:28:14] Some people are relying pretty heavily so being there for this week or start being there two days a week so that stings and hurts but in the transition itself didn't actually have any turnover that we didn't want or plan for.

[00:28:26] I got you all right well that's a I mean that's definitely good news I'm sure even if you didn't have the turnover you probably would have been able to navigate it pretty well and I'm sure you'll handle it.

[00:28:37] Good like now it comes with it there's always something some challenge waiting around the corner that support that I said being cut out of the you know the right cloth to be a practice owner I'm learning.

[00:28:48] There's not always like steady state like there's typically some problem to solve and you have to be okay with that I'm learning how to like leave that at the office and come home and enjoy my weekend and know that whatever problem I was trying to solve Thursday at four o'clock will be there Monday at 8am you know.

[00:29:07] Yeah that's gonna be I feel like that's gonna be really hard for me to get used to because I'm the type of person that it's not easy.

[00:29:12] It's not easy.

[00:29:13] Yeah I'm still like actively figuring that out for sure.

[00:29:18] Yeah yeah I'm the type of person that like even as a second year that we haven't even really gotten to clinic yet I'm sitting here over my vacation like trying to plan out how I'm gonna get all my credits to graduate.

[00:29:29] Yeah I haven't even really gotten into the clinics that much.

[00:29:33] You're an achiever that's cool that's normal.

[00:29:35] Yeah so one thing I wanted to talk about as well like when I'm kind of curious how you were able to get lending for this office being a new grad.

[00:29:48] Can you walk us through kind of like how somebody would traditionally get lending and then what you were able to do to figure that out.

[00:29:54] So normally like a seasoned dentist wants to buy practice they're gonna go one of the big players like America provide whoever and go hey this is what I produce every month at my practice here's the practice I found some CPA says it cash flows can I have money and they're gonna go

[00:30:12] sure here's all the money you want if you want working capital and I'm not upgrading you know money as well here you go because banks love to loan to Dennis because.

[00:30:21] Really default on loans and so yeah it's a great business model for banks but they're really scared of new grads for a lot of the reasons I outlined early in the episode you know you have to learn to be a clinician in the real world and.

[00:30:32] New grads don't get business training in school so on average like yeah you grab probably has no business only a practice and banks know that and they're scared to lend to him.

[00:30:41] And they mitigate against that by saying hey we need to see six months to twelve months of production history before we're going to lend to you.

[00:30:47] We want to know that you can produce right.

[00:30:50] And so yeah that creates an issue for new grads and so a lot of times a new grad.

[00:30:57] Is going to be limited to maybe local banks or some sort of SBA loan.

[00:31:02] You have to get really creative sometimes on a financing.

[00:31:05] And so for me luckily once again I said I ran with like the local people who worked in the dental industry in the different like yeah commercial real estate and bankers and all that so I had contacts like.

[00:31:18] You know when it was time to think about a loan like I had a guy I've been to lunch with three times and gave him a call said hey dude.

[00:31:25] This is wild but here's what it is and he's lend on.

[00:31:29] You know practices like this before he's like yeah I think we'll be able to do this you know give me all the information and they were so yeah I went with a local bank.

[00:31:37] But sometimes people definitely have to get creative but that's probably your best route as a young grad or new grad in the young doctors the local bank because.

[00:31:46] The bigger players like they may be able to give you a little bit better interest rate but there's a lot of red tape involved in those bigger organizations right and it's just hard to cut through that the little guys can.

[00:31:59] Yeah that loan officer whom bought to their boss's office and go hey I think we should do this and it's easier to get that approved.

[00:32:06] Yeah that makes a ton of sense to me.

[00:32:08] So would you say like other than the interest rate is there really much of a difference like lending from a big like obviously said it's easier to get the lending from a local bank but is there any other major differences at all.

[00:32:24] I think the relationship you have to with the local guys always going to be a little bit better if you need stuff in the future or just help with anything.

[00:32:32] I promise you right now I could get on my phone right the second and call the guy at my local bank and it's like eight o'clock on Thursday night and he would pick up.

[00:32:40] Yeah what's up you know so anything I've needed yeah looking at making some big equipment purchases in the next probably six months and he's already said whatever you need let us know we'll give you more money.

[00:32:52] So yeah just having that relationship you know when I had a lot of stuff going back and forth with banks and getting stuff set up the first few months.

[00:33:01] I could call him anytime so that's really nice it's not necessary you know you're gonna be.

[00:33:05] That doesn't make or break your success as a dentist but is a nice little.

[00:33:09] Per to have to have a really strong relationship with your banker.

[00:33:14] Yeah yeah for sure.

[00:33:16] So following up on like clinical skills and kind of that topic so I know you've been really busy for the last 10 months with the office.

[00:33:26] How do you feel like your your clinical skills have adapted and also like have you are you sticking to mostly bread and butter procedures or have you gone to a bunch of C.E. as well.

[00:33:39] Yes to all of that so I'll work backwards here I have gone to C.E.

[00:33:46] It's been more like restorative treatment planning in nature which are really great.

[00:33:53] I really like spear online and I've taken their online platform for years and went to one of their in person courses in January was really great for me is a really great like young doctor course to go to you know it wasn't like full mouth rehab.

[00:34:04] That's not spear and coice you're thinking about full mouth rehab.

[00:34:08] No it wasn't that that was called restorative design those are really great course for a young grad.

[00:34:13] Taking a lot of online C just signed up for some other stuff and most of it's been around just treatment planning getting better at just restorative stuff.

[00:34:23] We're able to partial coverage now and it's bonding stuff that's valuable.

[00:34:28] Getting into like yes and then years and things like that but most of my did all of my stuff in bread and butter.

[00:34:35] I have not done a root canal since dental school I had a point 70% of my extractions to the oral surgeon for a few reasons and I was a guy who really liked surgery out of the dental school and I used like extra student loans to prepay for a big implant course.

[00:34:53] So I paid for a week long implant course and I haven't got out put it off.

[00:34:57] I email those like hey like can I just put this on pause and like reschedule this in a year and they're like yeah so like I'm waiting to go take an implant course but I haven't done that yet because one of a lot of like older patients who just like on kind of complex medically and I'm like I can take this to that it'll probably be fine but.

[00:35:13] I don't want to deal with like whatever complications you may or may not have you probably won't have any but I just don't want to deal with it because I'm busy enough doing like restorative things.

[00:35:23] In the other part to being like the new guy and taking the place of a guy who's been there for four fifty years literally and wanting to make good first impressions like hey man I mean maybe some people are just better than I am but like even like for the most skill clinician the tooth extractions not always the best experience.

[00:35:41] And at best it were sometimes it's just a downright awful experience for people involved and I just told myself early on like people's first experience with me doesn't probably need to be an extraction it needs to be other things unless I'm helping getting them out of pain.

[00:35:53] But it's different you know in that guy had referred out to us for years he had not pulled teeth in a really long time and so patients were just kind of trained like I have to get to take an out to go the role surgeon and so I wasn't going to convince him to let me do it and then you know.

[00:36:07] Because I don't sedate either since some people just don't know how numb they are this is not a fun feeling to be feeling somebody expanding your job so for that reason I put in a lot of surgery of putting a lot of implants because like hey.

[00:36:21] That's just getting used to these people let them have good experiences with me like letting them learn how to trust me and that'll come in the future but also to a broader practice that like I said there's a lot of under diagnosis so.

[00:36:34] And it's a little bit older patient based as more dental needs anyway so yeah I'm.

[00:36:39] I'm pretty busy just doing crowning bridge and fillings and things like that.

[00:36:44] Now I think I've had a mini residency and like saving hopeless teeth that I never thought anybody could be able to say that's a conversation for another day but yeah I think.

[00:36:53] And to answer your first question where am I clinically.

[00:36:58] Once again I always thought I was above average I was not like the golden hands guy in school like not the best of my class I had to remediate some PCD stuff from time to time but I was definitely probably in the top third I always felt like and.

[00:37:11] But yeah first few months were tough I think I really just started to feel things shift a little bit around month nine or 10.

[00:37:18] Especially in the speed category like I was doing good work I was doing especially clinically acceptable work right and minimum.

[00:37:25] And for the days I didn't you know I remember my mentor told me one time like sometimes he does a plus work and he's had days and screws and effort and like anybody I've had some feelings that were not getting you know I did.

[00:37:38] You know like that happens and people are.

[00:37:41] They're cool they appreciate that you're honest with them and go hey I need 20 more minutes because that just I wouldn't want that in my mouth or I need to get you back to have to you know have the lab remake this crown or whatever people appreciate that.

[00:37:53] But yeah felt like especially the speed and efficiency really started to click and turn around month nine or 10 and I heard that from a lot of people beforehand go hey you're not going to really get efficient until like month nine or 10 and I felt that and seen that.

[00:38:06] But still just do a lot of things one and two like unit crown cases nothing big like a little bit of removable not a lot I do have some bigger cases going on right now that.

[00:38:16] I've been pretty like methodical about biting off like something that I can manage right and not getting into too much too soon.

[00:38:24] So yeah I mean I've done just recently a few anterior cases that involve four to six units and you know it just started to kind of dip my toes in that water but yeah early on to last time I was like hey I want to be near so I was like okay cool we'll talk about it later.

[00:38:38] I would just start trying to get them to forget about it because I'm like I just need to like get good at the basics right and be able to do that like predictably every single time not just you know most of the time.

[00:38:48] Yeah for sure.

[00:38:50] I feel like one thing that a lot of people might have that misconception and you kind of alluded to this earlier like people if you go on these forums or if you go on these Facebook groups people think that the way to be successful in a dental practice is to tack on all these complex procedures sometimes.

[00:39:11] Yeah I mean and you're gonna get me sorry on it now but that's one of the biggest things like a chair practices that I think we differ from other people is we push like.

[00:39:24] Practice ownership and growing your practice without necessarily having to grow your clinical skill set now don't get me wrong being a super producer helps like a lot of things and it can hide a lot of faults and that's really what happens for a lot of dentists most dentists aren't good business people.

[00:39:40] Full stop but our ability to produce and like the good overhead industry and all that like covers a lot of mistakes so yeah you can be a crappy business owner but like.

[00:39:51] A few implants that day I guess it covers up a lot of faults so yeah 100% like.

[00:39:57] A lot of what we teach is practice the right mindset around managing a practice and put in the right systems and stuff in place and you can yeah I mean like you think about the classic like million dollar practice or collecting $100,000 a year.

[00:40:09] I'm just gonna tell you right excuse me not here but $100,000 a month.

[00:40:13] You can do that without doing more indoor and this line.

[00:40:16] I'm up to right now that's what I'm doing right now and I do no window very little oral surgery no or though just crowning bridge busy.

[00:40:27] Recurring hygiene revenue diagnosing perio appropriately from hygiene you know few little bit of ancillary services like for iron stuff I mean.

[00:40:36] You can have a million dollar practice doing those things and guess what if you can place implants if you can do that more into efficiently or do or throw or.

[00:40:45] All for whatever that's just gravy like that's just icing on the cake at that point so 100% like.

[00:40:52] If you're yeah for this is struggling like in managing their practice and all that like.

[00:40:57] Everybody thinks their solution is to go learn how to do molar endo build up in crown in an hour and that's just not the solution like it's great when you can do that don't get me wrong but that's not the solution.

[00:41:08] Yeah yeah so kind of what in summary if you can be really sound on the business stuff and the running of the practice then it's not as important the clinical suite is what you're trying to say.

[00:41:21] Yeah I mean you can do yeah brain butter dentistry and I mean something like my area of the country with my remember like.

[00:41:27] I have low overhead but like my reimbursements and how that were pretty bad so like it can be done but it requires good patient flow and it requires good treatment acceptance and good systems to keep them on books right and.

[00:41:41] I'll tell you to like that inspires confidence in patients like you can be the best clinician in the world but if they're confused about what you're diagnosing or the front desk doesn't feel like.

[00:41:50] They know what the back office did or anything like that that's a really great way for a patient to go find another dentist and not have confidence in you it can have nothing to do with your clinical ability it can have everything to do with if they feel like they know they're being like cared for.

[00:42:03] And they have their questions answered and they know what their next steps are and that's something I've also learned like.

[00:42:09] You know I've learned from experience like I've had to learn how we grow in this area you know and so 100%.

[00:42:16] Yeah awesome well I want to ask you one last question and it's gonna be kind of like a pretty important one know what you know now would you.

[00:42:26] Still have jumped on this practice straight out of dental school or would you maybe have gone in associated first like after experiencing all the difficulties and everything of the first 10 months of ownership.

[00:42:42] Yeah I do think it's important you know I wasn't shy about talking about how hard it's been but.

[00:42:47] You know I'm a little slow to share too much because I don't want to brag or anything like that but I'll just be honest and real like.

[00:42:56] We've done well you know we saw that this practice was performing about it 50% of what it should be and now it's performing about 100% of what it should be you know so we've we've doubled this practice in 10 months and so.

[00:43:10] We're still like working through a lot you know nothing's promised you know three months from now the whole thing could fall apart right that's yeah that's the roller coasters of practice ownership and entrepreneurship and.

[00:43:21] Benefits of solar for sure nothing's guaranteed but you know even in the midst of all the difficulty even in the midst of like a new grab running the ship and not being very efficient and all of that.

[00:43:31] We've done well and yeah things are going well like from a number standpoint and it hasn't been easy like you know there's been times I haven't enjoyed my life but it's been also very rewarding because what I need to be true when I looked at this practice because of what I learned about practice management through dental school.

[00:43:51] I saw come to fruition.

[00:43:53] You know and when it started to happen I looked at my office manager who this person just like took a full chance on me like who goes and works for it didn't like this guy she was a preseason o.m. at a bigger office like who goes and works for a new grad she totally took a risk on me but.

[00:44:08] I looked at her when it finally things were kind of turn around and I said can just be honest with you this is not something really arrogant and I wouldn't say this to anybody else but you right now but I'm not surprised.

[00:44:19] Just because when I looked at this week what I've been trained on coming up at share practices we practice management through analytics lens we rely very heavily on the numbers and analytics to inform our decisions in practicing give us like the accurate state of a practice.

[00:44:36] And so I looked at the numbers and I knew what they could be and what they should be back then I just knew if I pulled the right two or three levers that this thing could really turn around and it did.

[00:44:46] And so yeah don't say that to brag still got a lot to learn as a boss and a leader and a clinician and all of the above but all that to say like.

[00:44:59] Seems like we made the right call and so to answer your question I would 100% do it again but I would also 100% put out that same feeler to people like hey like this is probably.

[00:45:11] The situation is the exception and not because Andrew super special or super smart or anything like that this is the exception because it was just the right opportunity.

[00:45:20] You know in there definitely are some opportunities out there and the right people and things just the stars kind of a line and they should buy practice right out of dental school but I would probably say for most people they just shouldn't because the reality is this like.

[00:45:33] People get kind of like scarce mind and go if I don't.

[00:45:37] Jump on this one I'm never going to practice like no like driven people who want to do it they're gonna figure it out one way or the other and for most people the path to ownership would probably be better for them in the future if they did travel through an associate ship or residency that.

[00:45:54] Keep them busy not just some random residency but at natural good ones so yeah I mean I would do it again.

[00:46:01] I would definitely encourage other people to put yourself in a position where if a similar opportunity landed in your lap that you could take it.

[00:46:09] Not gonna like say oh you can't do it only I know that's like I said this had very little to do with a house more than it was now I mean I was in the right positions I took advantage and learn what I need to learn but if yeah.

[00:46:23] Someone's out there listening to this and they have three years to really learn the ins and outs of practice management all that I'll put in a plug I come to share practices event.

[00:46:32] Will help teach you that but if they're that person in like once again you can sharpen that axe for three or four years well guess what the tree fell in front of me I could I was able to cut it down because I'd sharpen that axe for a few years and so.

[00:46:43] If that's you in the right opportunity comes fantastic if that's you and you prepare prepare prepare and guess what graduation comes and you need to go work somewhere for 18 months two years that's okay too.

[00:46:55] You know we really advocate for early practice ownership that doesn't mean the day you graduate dental school it just means like don't wait till you're like 45.

[00:47:02] You know you listen to the Facebook dentist to much so you need to pay your dues for 10 years in the light now that's that's kind of garbage but.

[00:47:09] Early practice ownership doesn't mean like I got my license last week and now I want to practice.

[00:47:15] Yep I agree with that wholeheartedly I definitely think that last point that you made waiting 10 years is just a load of crap and.

[00:47:24] Here's the other thing I'll add to that and this is really anybody I don't care how old you are how long you've been practicing this year but actually as a young dentist like.

[00:47:33] If you're going to do it and you think it's a good idea don't do it alone.

[00:47:37] Find a good company who helps you evaluate that practices that practice particularly a practice management focused company line will make a plug for our services at your practices but there's plenty of people like us who can help you.

[00:47:49] Like don't go find a CPA to be the person who just tells you oh you should buy this practice because at the end of the day I don't care if a practice has a 55% profit margin.

[00:47:59] If it has 800 active patients you're not going to be super successful in that practice unless you're doing something unsustainable or like big fee for service work or something crazy right.

[00:48:08] Get people who do this every day to help you be objective about the situation and then once you get in it get coaching with it once again like.

[00:48:18] If you ask me where to go I'm going to tell you us but there's several great like companies out there who do a great job at this.

[00:48:26] The take home point is like don't do it alone don't think that you're just so smart that you can figure it all out by yourself because you might figure it all out by yourself but you're going to get your butt kicked a bunch of times before you do so like do it with like people who can help you and be objective and yeah don't take the cheaper out.

[00:48:42] Yep awesome well there's a lot of pros in there that I hope our listeners were able to benefit from Andrew if is there any way in particular that if somebody had any questions or anything that they could reach out to you.

[00:48:56] Yeah man for sure I mean you can best email to hit me up about like practice management acquisitions it's just Andrew at share practices dot com.

[00:49:04] You can catch me though hanging out at any of our events or listen to me on the podcast from time to time or we do mastermind programs for what we call pre owners you know associates or dental students are wanting to.

[00:49:15] Like I said sharpen that axe a little bit so you can catch me hanging out in those spaces but also yet just Andrew at share practices on.

[00:49:22] You can probably tell man I live and breathe this stuff I'm passionate about it so I love to talk about it really with anybody who's willing to listen.

[00:49:27] Yep absolutely well and it's been a pleasure having you on thank you so much for being on and catch you next time.