December 04, 2024

Episode featuring Kiera Dent, Founder of The Dental A-Team

📋 Episode Description

Join Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan and Dr. Richard Offutt for an inspiring conversation with Kiera Dent, who shares her journey from the “2AM Crazy Lady” to becoming a leading dental consultant. Learn actionable strategies for practice growth, team development, and achieving work-life harmony in dentistry.

👤 Guest Expert Profile

Kiera Dent brings extensive expertise as:

  • Founder and CEO of The Dental A-Team
  • Leader of a national dental consulting firm
  • Host of The Dental A-Team Podcast
  • Specialist in practice growth and team development
  • Champion of work-life balance in dentistry

⏱️ Episode Navigation

  • 00:00 – Introduction and welcome
  • 01:15 – Current Dental A-Team initiatives
  • 04:58 – The “2AM Crazy Lady” transformation story
  • 09:15 – Life passion vs. dental platform discussion
  • 14:27 – Team development strategies
  • 20:08 – Mastermind group implementation
  • 23:31 – Business vision evolution
  • 37:43 – Identifying the need for consulting
  • 40:54 – NDTR system implementation guide

💡 Core Strategies & Implementation

Foundational Systems for Success

Morning Huddle Excellence

  • Set clear daily goals and opportunities
  • Foster team communication
  • Track progress consistently
  • Maintain accountability

NDTR System Implementation

  • Next visit scheduling protocols
  • Date and time commitment
  • Treatment plan clarity
  • Recare appointment confirmation

Practice Growth Framework

Under $1.5M Practice:

  • Focus on basic systems
  • Implement consistent protocols
  • Establish tracking metrics
  • Build team accountability

$2M-10M Practice:

  • Develop leadership capabilities
  • Scale systems effectively
  • Enhance team training
  • Optimize operations

$10M+ Practice:

  • Maintain consistent training
  • Develop advanced leadership
  • Scale successful systems
  • Foster sustainable growth

Team Development Blueprint

Standards and Culture

  • Maintain high performance standards
  • Implement “rise up or rise out” philosophy
  • Align team with practice culture
  • Invest in leadership development

Success Indicators

  • Consistent system execution
  • Strong team engagement
  • Clear communication channels
  • Measurable growth metrics

🎯 Key Success Principles

Work-Life Integration

  • Schedule regular breaks for enhanced productivity
  • Plan quarterly time off for sustained growth
  • Balance personal and professional development
  • Measure success through fulfillment

Practice Management Excellence

Consulting Trigger Points:

  • Cash flow challenges
  • Team morale issues
  • Growth plateaus
  • System inefficiencies
  • Leadership gaps

Success Metrics:

  • System consistency
  • Team alignment
  • Effective communication
  • Sustainable growth
  • Lifestyle balance

🤝 Connect and Learn More

Engage with Kiera Dent

  • The Dental A-Team Consulting services
  • Think Tank Tuesday Mastermind program
  • In-person events launching 2025
  • Business development programs

Join the Community

  • Simplify Dentistry Facebook group
  • Register at simplifydds.com for updates
  • Access exclusive resources and training

Topics: dental consulting, practice management, team development, dental systems, practice growth, work-life balance, dental leadership, morning huddle, case acceptance, dental business growth

Transcript

00:00
Dr. Richard Offut
Welcome to the Simplify Dentistry podcast. My name is Richard Offut. I’m joined by Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan. Today we have a very special guest. Kiera Dent. Kiera is the founder and CEO of the A Team, a national consulting and national consulting firm and host of the A Team podcast. Kiera, welcome. I’m so glad you can come do this.

00:22
Kiera Dent
Oh, thanks, guys. You are on our podcast. I’m so excited you guys have your own podcast. You guys are looking so fly over there. Like matching outfits, the microphones, and you guys are just doing such a beautiful thing for dentistry. So super honored to be here. Thank you for having me.

00:37
Dr. Richard Offut
Thank. Thank you, thank you. Dr. Shah-Khan and I have spoken often about being on your podcast, and one of the things that was so wonderful is we felt like we could have kept talking forever. Right? You know, I mean, if you hadn’t said, hey, guys, time’s up. We, we. We’d still be talking because we enjoyed it so much, but we very much appreciate you joining us today. And, and we enjoyed being part of the A Team podcast.

01:02
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
Yeah, we’re glad you could find time because, you know, as were talking earlier, Kiera is as busy as anybody can be in dentistry.

01:07
Dr. Richard Offut
That’s right. That’s exactly right.

01:09
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
And I think it’s fantastic. Kiera, tell us a little bit about kind of what you guys are up to these days.

01:15
Kiera Dent
Yeah, absolutely. So dental A team is fun. It’s the dentist and team consulting that we do. And so just really trying to figure out, like, what do our clients need? And we rolled out fun space. So we’ve been doing a doctor only mastermind for our doctors. I wanted it to be the. The space where doctors could come and kind of like, air their issues without feeling like teams are there. And so we’ve been running it. We call it Think Tank Tuesday. It’s the first Tuesday of the month. And we just brought in a few ambassadors, like some of our doctors that have been with us for a while, and we meet with them once a quarter and ask them, like, how are we doing? How’s the content? What can we do? This is built for you. You are the ones representing your doctor community.

01:53
Kiera Dent
And they said, Kiera, we want to come in person. And I was like, oh, no, the.

01:58
Dr. Richard Offut
Dreaded in person thing.

02:01
Kiera Dent
And so it’s been on my radar for a while. And so we just released it that in 2025, we’ll be doing in person business and leadership events for doctors in their office, managers, and kind of just being able to create and build that. Because I had an epiphany a couple months ago. I woke up in the middle of the night and I like wrote in my journal and I said, life is my passion, dentistry is my platform. And it just has really been my like where I’m starting to feel so much like passion and excitement of how can I help these dentists live their dreamiest lives and do it through everything that we love.

02:37
Kiera Dent
All of us love dentistry so much and how can I help them live at their highest level and serve their patients at a higher level, but do it with ease and fun and fulfillment? And so that’s what our events are going to be about. Kind of like stripping down their businesses to the bare bones, helping them get really prioritized on what’s most important. But like talking to the other doctors and, but I think it’s going to be fun because I’m just, I’ve been doing so much studying on how to find fulfillment and build your life, taking lots and lots of courses, CE courses, flying in person for places to just make sure that what we put forward is top notch for our doctors. So it’s been fun. I’m super excited. Our team is doing really well. It’s been fun to see them just blossom.

03:18
Kiera Dent
I love watching our team grow. And so yeah, that’s what we’ve been working on and just really excited for 2025. Like I said, I, I, we’ve been a consulting company for eight years and I’ve like steered clear of the in person and it’s finally like they finally got me because if that’s what the doctors want and they’re going to come and they’re speaking on behalf of their other offices, like let’s do it, let’s help them come together. So that’s kind of what we’re up to and what my passion project is right now, to give to our community of dentists.

03:46
Dr. Richard Offut
That sounds awesome. You know, one of the things that we talk about a lot is that practice of dentistry can be fairly isolating. You’re out there, you’re by yourself, you know, and dentists, they really want to be part of something bigger than that. So I think the in person thing is going to be awesome. I think you’ll really meet that need of providing and this is one of the things we’ll talk about. I know you’ve been a big believer in mastermind groups and having your support group around you, but before we get into something that serious, I have to have our Listeners here about the 2am Crazy lady, they just. They just have to. Because when I’ve looked at kind of your work that you’ve done a lot, that is kind of a. That’s kind of a foundational experience for you.

04:33
Dr. Richard Offut
And I think it’s shaped, you know, what you just said about these in person events. It shaped your, what you think it should not be. You know, I remember growing up, my mother always said, hey, it’s important to know what you don’t want as much as it is to know what you want. So if you’ll tell the 2am Crazy lady story or just kind of comment on it, I think. Because I think then we can go from there. Dr. Shah-Khan, because. Because it’s a nutso story.

04:58
Kiera Dent
Yeah. I mean, 2am Crazy lady definitely describes exactly who I was a few years ago. And I was young, I was invigorated. I was working at Midwestern University’s dental college. That’s where my husband was going to school. He was a pharmacist. And one of the students said, Kiera, do you want to come be a practice owner with me and help me open my practice? And I was like, yes, please. Like, I’m all for this. Why not? I think, I think sometimes being young and naive is actually one of the greatest gifts and also one of the greatest curves. And so I was like, yep, let’s do it. And so we took our practice from 500,000 to 2.4 million in nine months and opened our second location. But like you said, I was the 2am crazy lady.

05:40
Kiera Dent
I was waking up at 2am, I was not going to bed until 10pm, literally running on fumes. My marriage was in disaster, my health was in disaster. I’m 58 and I was weighing 98 pounds. I was definitely anorexic. I was giving everything I possibly could to the practice and still feeling like I was coming up short. And then we added a second child. Like, we add this other practice to the mix of it. And I remember just thinking, like, is there no easier way than this? Like, I get that people want success, and I get that there’s the hustle and I get that there’s the grind, and like, we gotta pay our dues, but is there no easier way? And like, am I really doing this? Because this is not sustainable. There’s no way.

06:22
Kiera Dent
And that, honestly, is what spurred me into, let me go try this on some other practices. Let me go see. Could I help people get the same type of, like, stats and like, throw those really great numbers up there, but do it in a way where their families stay intact, their health stays intact, their happiness stays intact, and it actually gets better, their family life gets better, their. Their physical fitness gets better, their fulfillment gets better. Is there a way to do it? And that’s really what Dental Aid Team has stemmed from, is I knew there had to be a better way to do it. I can get the success, but success without fulfillment and like health and life is absolutely and completely the utter failure in life, in my opinion.

06:58
Kiera Dent
And so coming here to the scene saying, let’s help dentists, not have to do that, not have to learn the way I learned, let’s give them the shortcuts, let’s give them the community. You don’t have to be lonely. Loneliness, they’re showing studies now of loneliness, is just as bad as smoking 13 cigarettes a day and is a killer for us as a society. So not feeling like we have to be alone is something that I think is just so important to notice as well.

07:24
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
Well, and Kiera, you know, you said earlier that dentistry, or life is your passion and dentistry is your platform. It seems like that kind of feeds into the, or the root of that may be the 2am Crazy lady. So when you’re consulting with these practices, you’re putting the tidbits in for them to be able to grow their practices and manage their practices and achieve the growth that you were. But I guess when you say life is your passion, are you trying to steer them a little bit more into what are the things that they can do to enjoy life and to. To be a better husband, to be a better wife, to be a better parent and to.

08:00
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
To enjoy the aspects, you know, the thing that I’m the son of two physicians, so I always thought I was going to be an MD and my dad worked 80, 90 hours a week. You know, there were times where he would leave before I woke up, he’d come back after I went to bed. And I just always assumed that’s just kind of what it was. Yeah, we never ate together. We never did anything like that. And when I started looking at my career path, I thought medicine was what it was going to be. I started spending some time with a. A dentist. And this guy was, you know, taking every, you know, second Thursday off, just all together. And, you know, before that, you know, the Thursdays, he was working.

08:46
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
He was working till one, then he was going to the beach, and he was at the beach all weekend. And he seemed to have a great lifestyle, a great, you know, economic life, too. And I Was like, you know, that’s more what I want. And, you know, I mean, that took discovery for me. You know, I think, you know, you see a lot of guys who get into practice and they’re going to do everything they can to have the 2 million, $3 million practice, have multiple practices. How do you keep docs rooted in. In not burning too much, you know?

09:15
Kiera Dent
Yeah, no, I. I love that you brought that up, because I also think that there’s a good. We need to com. Like, not compare in a negative way. But you’re right. Dentists actually do have a really dreamy life compared to what a lot of physicians have. And what. And I think it’s brilliant. I’m so happy that we do. And so keeping those doctors grounded, I realized also part of that life piece is not having your entire identity circled around your practice and your success at work, but helping you discover that there’s more to you as a person, there’s more to your success, there’s more to that success record. And as opposed to just like, what’s my practice producing? What’s my overhead? What’s my profitability? It’s what about my hobbies? What about my family? What about these other areas?

09:59
Kiera Dent
And so when you ask, how do we keep people rooted? I think one, giving perspective of where do you actually want to be in five and 10 years? Like, you as a person? And I think so many doctors don’t think about, where do I as a person want to be? What are the things I want to develop? They’re thinking, oh, I need my practice to be here. And I’m like, cut the ego from it. Like, in the most respectful way, let’s drive and make sure we’re putting your ladder and your sights and your vision where you ultimately want to end up, not on someone else’s path. And I know that can get tricky because dentists ask all the time, well, Kiera, how do I compare to this office and how do I compare to that office?

10:31
Kiera Dent
And I think it’s good if we’re comparing for potential, but not for where we need to be in life if that’s not our true passion. And so I’m just really big on. I’m happy to share the stats and I’m happy to tell you where we are, but my number one, where I will always drive every client within our company is, what are you ultimately doing this for? Where do you ultimately want to go? What do you ultimately want to be taking home? What hours do you want to be working? And now let’s craft A plan. Let’s craft a practice, let’s craft a team that gives you those ultimate outcomes and also letting you realize, like, this is the canvas I want today, but in two, three, four years, that canvas might look different.

11:05
Kiera Dent
And constantly allowing those doctors to realize that’s evolution, that’s not failure. If you want to change the canvas, you want to change the direction you’re going, it’s easy. The practice can truly serve your life. Let’s just build it. To do that. And not feeling bad about that, but realizing that’s why you became a doctor is to live this incredible life. Let’s now pull out the canvas and the drawing board and make it a reality for you.

11:26
Dr. Richard Offut
You know, Kiera, one of the things that I think is very cool as you talk, as I’ve listened to you in different podcasts, is your own podcast guests on others, is you talk about surrounding yourself by. With a group of believers, people that you know. So if you’re painting your own canvas to the metaphor that you were just saying, you can’t be around a bunch of naysayers. Right?

11:48
Kiera Dent
Right. For sure. Yeah. I think it’s power is proximity. Proximity is power. And so. And also what we focus on is what we achieve. And so I’m like, I’m. My mission is to positively impact the world in the greatest way possible, because I’m like, what’s bad is just as available as what’s good in this world. And, like, which one are we choosing to select from daily? Which crayon are we picking up from? And the more we can train our mental minds to be focused on what’s good and what’s going right, we build momentum. And so I’m like, do I want my snowball built of positivity and good things and abundance, or do I want my snowball built of negative negativity? And I’m failing and I’m not as good as this person, and I’m comparing and I’m beating myself up.

12:29
Kiera Dent
Both of those momentums are available for you. Which one are you choosing to feed and which one are you choosing to focus on? And so I’m obsessed with, like, people that I work with know that we’re going to have a positive mindset, we’re going to have an abundance mindset. We’re going to share our tips with each other. We want the best dentist to win. I want them to have their best lives. I want them to make the money they want to make. I want them to serve in their community at the highest level. They have the moral obligation to do that to their practice and to their patients. Let’s make that happen for them. And so really it’s like, how can we build that inner circle? And that’s what our in person is going to be is it’s like the inner circle.

13:01
Kiera Dent
Proximity is power. And how can you get around more of these people that inspire you, that charge up? That’s why I go to events, that’s why I go to places. But it’s like what we fuel our minds with is what we become. And I’m like, both coins are available, the positive and the negative. Both of them are available all the time. You’ve just got to train your mind, train your team, train your practice, that we focus on the abundance, we focus on the good. But that’s not to say that we just sit there and focus on it. We make it into a practical plan and do it tactically as well. So it’s not just sitting here wishing on stars, but not doing anything to make it happen.

13:31
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
So proximity is power. Obviously, you know, you want your team to share your mission. You know, I think too many docs walk into situations where they have a staff and they’re afraid to fire people. They’re afraid to, you know, this person, you know, isn’t doing what I want, isn’t committed to what I’m doing, but I’m not going to get rid of her. You know, when I’ve been practicing for 20 years, so when I first came into practice, you could do that a little bit more. Now you have an environment where, I mean, we all recognize that there’s a hygiene shortage, there’s an assistant shortage, there’s front desk shortage. How are you consulting with your teams? Say I came to you and said, hey, look, you know, I love three fifths of my team. I got two people that don’t buy in.

14:11
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
One is a hygienist. What am I going to do? You know, how. How do you get them to coach that person up? Or is there a point where you’re just like, look, you just got to take the. Take the pain, get rid of the employee and see what happens?

14:27
Kiera Dent
Yeah. So as a consultants have reputations that we love to come in and fire people, and that’s not mine.

14:34
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
You sound like Dr. Offut. He likes to fire.

14:38
Kiera Dent
But I think that it’s a balance on both sides. Right? I. I’m not here to ever come in and fire a team. That’s not what I’m about. And if we can rise them up, let’s do that. But let’s also not do it for so long that we’re ultimately, I’m like, they’re either rowing with us or they’re rowing against us. And I think you’ve got to come to the acceptance that’s what it is. And also, I want leaders to hear that the standards that you tolerate with your worst employee is what you’re setting the standard for the rest of your team. And like, how it’s super interesting. And I don’t think leaders realize, like, the worst thing you can do to your great A plus players is tolerate poor performance from your lower players.

15:18
Kiera Dent
And so I’m like, if I think about that, I now have a moral obligation as a leader and as an owner and I coach our office managers and our doctors up on this. Of like, they’ve either got to rise up or they’ve got to rise out. And we can’t be so afraid of. I agree there’s a hygiene shortage, but I’m like, but that doesn’t mean there’s no hygienists. It doesn’t mean that we’re sunk. And so I’m like, to me, what is ultimately your end goal? Like, I just don’t put up with bad culture, period. Like, I will try and we will get here and we’ll put you on a nice pip, a performance improvement plan. And if you don’t get there, I have to be okay to move on and trust and believe that there’s someone just as good, if not better out there.

15:59
Kiera Dent
And why am I not the office that person wants to come to? I’m not the office that person wants to come to if I’m tolerating poor performance and poor behavior within our team because I’m so afraid to be the leader and to show up and to actually execute on what needs to happen. So it’s a. It’s a little bit of both. It’s, let’s rise them up, let’s give them the tools and the resour. But if they don’t want to be there and they don’t want to play with our, like, our. By the rules of our game, if they don’t want to row with us, we have to trust and believe that there’s someone just as good, if not better out there. And I’m like, hygienist, shoot.

16:30
Kiera Dent
You can run assisted hygiene, you can pay that hygienist more if you want to because, like, two hygienists this much, a hygienist and a half with an assistant, you can pay Them more. We can do it for a half a day. We can do a lot of other solutions. So I also think in the most respectful way, let’s not be lazy in thinking because we’re so afraid of taking action that we just pull into the woe is me and, oh, my gosh, there’s this. No. Drivers and leaders find the solution when there doesn’t seem to be a solution, and that’s what makes it successful.

17:00
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
So I think it’s motivating for your team too, to a certain degree. So I had a hygienist retire. It’s probably been two years ago, you know, had kids, retired, you know, and that’s why she left. So, you know, we hired one who was just not good. And were getting complaints from patients and things like that, and she wasn’t good with the staff. And I just kind of came in one day and I was like, look, this isn’t working out. You gotta go. We didn’t have another hygienist there. But it’s amazing how your staff becomes empowered when the person leading that. That group is like, look, this is not the right fit for us. We’re getting rid of them. We brought another one in. Still didn’t work out. So we’ve been kind of, you know, piecing things together with different temporary services.

17:46
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
But even just trying to find the right people in that to provide the right care and to create the right environment. I think that’s what docs have to do. I think too many docs are scared to ever tell that story. Everybody wants to think that, you know, Dr. Offut’s practice has 16 hygienists and they’re all happy and nobody leaves. And they all get paid, you know, 20% below market because that’s what’s going on there.

18:10
Dr. Richard Offut
If Dr. Offit had 20 hygienists, the only unhappy person would be Dr. Offut.

18:14
Kiera Dent
I was going to say, could you imagine all those exams?

18:17
Dr. Richard Offut
Like, you know, it’d be like, you know that new show on TV where the Rollerblade Game? You know, I’d be on skates and that wouldn’t work.

18:25
Kiera Dent
It is funny if we go Back to the 2am Crazy lady to just segue into this. I actually did buy me and the Dr. Heelys in that practice because were so busy and, like, we. We made sure it was the appropriate patient. But we, like, rolled into the exam room on Heelys one time. So it’s a doable thing. We surely tried it. It was actually quite entertaining. And don’t recommend it for all. But yeah, the roller skates, you’d be crazy with that many hygiene exams. It’d be insanity.

18:50
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
But, you know, kind of part of why we do this podcast and part of why we do Simplify Dentistry, which is our Facebook community, and just the whole community aspect that we’re doing, is I think docs, you know, dentistry is a isolated industry, and it’s a very solo industry. And I think docs have to hear stories from guys saying, hey, look, this didn’t work out for me, so I had to do these things to make it work. And they can go, well, man, that’s not working out for me. So, you know, if he can do it, then maybe I can do it. And I think, you know, you’re probably sharing those same things with. With the doctor you walk in to consult with.

19:23
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
You know, hey, look, you know, it’s not perfect for everybody, so you got to figure out how to make it perfect or how to make it as ideal for you.

19:30
Dr. Richard Offut
You know, it. I want to go back to some one thing. Just. I want to skip back a couple of steps. We were talking about your support group and were talking about surround yourself with believers and kind of your mastermind group. Kiera, who should be in that mastermind group? Who should dentists be looking to? Because, you know, you get four or five dentists together, and all of a sudden the story. The bad stories come out, right? You know, the ones, you know, so you don’t want. You don’t want to surround yourself with that. So who should. Who should be in our, you know, as our listeners are saying, okay, I get it. I get it. Surround yourself with winners type people. Who should they be? Who. Who should you have in there with you?

20:08
Kiera Dent
Yeah, no, it’s actually really brilliant because proximity is power, but it’s making sure it’s the right power that you want to be around. Right? Like we said, the positives available just as much as the negatives available. And so with that, I’m just. I’m very big on. I want the doctors who want to grow. I want the doctors who are humble. I want the doctors who are confident. I want the doctors who say, I know that there’s more in this life and there’s got to be a better, easier way. I want the doctors who love their teams and want to invest in their teams and want to have the right people, right seat. I want those doctors to be there. I am not here for excuses. Like, you will hear me. My. Like, it’s a famous quote that I have just been saying for years.

20:50
Kiera Dent
It just actually popped up on chat GPT under dental quotes of there is always a solution, find it. And so people who are solution oriented, people who know that, like, sure, there’s a hygiene shortage, but guess what, that can be for other people. I’m going to find the way, I’m going to figure it out, I’m going to make these hard decisions and they have to be committed to growth and doing the work. I’m not here for people blaming like, don’t join our group, don’t be a part of consulting. If you’re going to sit here and blame someone because you chose not to execute and follow through, I get spy. You can sit here and say, I didn’t do that.

21:21
Kiera Dent
But I want the people who want to take like, they want to take action, they want to make their lives better, they want to make their patients lives better, they want to make their team’s lives better. That’s why they’re showing up for it. And the reality is I’ve actually found that probably 75, 80% of the dental population is actually like that. I think we have 20% of naysayers who are sitting there like, I have a really interesting pt and she’s like, Kiera, I have a patient who’s a dentist. And they said, the glory days of dentistry are over. Do you agree with that? And I was like, no, I don’t believe that for one second. Because my doctors are seeing higher production than we’ve ever seen. They’re having great teams, they’re. But it’s like again, both sides of the coin are available.

22:02
Kiera Dent
Which one are you choosing to focus on? And so those are the type of doctors that I believe in. I don’t care if you’re a startup practice, I don’t care if you’ve been in practice for five years, 10 years, 20, 30, 40. To me, it doesn’t matter. It depends on what’s your DNA of you as a person, because your DNA doctors is truly what’s reflecting to your team. And I don’t think enough doctors realize you as the leader. That’s your team. Your team is just a mirror back to you. So if you don’t like the things they’re doing, look at you first. How can we change this? Who do we need to put into leadership so your team can elevate to that level? Those are the people I want the leaders, I want the doers.

22:35
Kiera Dent
You don’t have to be the high producer, you don’t have to be the person that has it all figured out. I want the people that are hungry, they’re willing to grow, and they want to help their team and their patients the most. That’s who we try to surround ourselves with.

22:46
Dr. Richard Offut
That’s perfect. That’s perfect. Let me ask you something. Eight years ago, when you started Dental A team, you had a vision for it. Is it still the same vision?

22:54
Kiera Dent
This is a great question. This summer, I actually took a little bit of a hiatus from the company. I. I got to this level of just like complete burnout. And I didn’t realize I was as burnt out as I was. I think I Learned from the 2:00am Crazy later, but I hadn’t quite continued on with learning the lessons that I had learned. And I felt like I just didn’t know my why anymore. I was like, I’ve achieved the things I thought I was going to go for. Like, I need to build a bigger why. What is it? And I actually took a lot of time away, like, not a lot. I took about a month away from the company, and then I came back partially the next month. So about two months of not being in the weeds as much.

23:31
Kiera Dent
And I needed to get that bird’s eye perspective from the company. And I just thought, like, I don’t even know what the why is. And we just had a leadership meeting. So I took some time, I stepped back, I gave myself some space to assess, and then I brought me and my three other team members on our leadership team in person with a mentor and a coach that was coaching us through it. And they were like, what’s your guys vision? What’s your mission? And it was crazy because literally the words that came out of my mouth are, I’ve always said that my vision and mission has been to positively impact the world of dentistry in the greatest way possible. And the only change that we made was my vision and mission is to positively impact the world in the greatest way possible.

24:11
Kiera Dent
And I do that through expert consulting for dentists and teams. So the answer is no. It’s exactly the same. It just got buried under a lot of different layers. And I think the reason I wanted to share that is because I think so many dentists feel like their why has been changed or that it’s not there. But I’m like, that’s core. That’s who you are as a person. And I don’t think that goes away. I think it just sometimes gets lost, forgotten. We. We don’t realize that this is where we’re headed and we lose sight of that. But the reality is, it’s still the same. It’s still the core. It’s still what I’m here and meant to do. But also I throw out there. I did hear another thing this summer of where on earth are we?

24:49
Kiera Dent
Do we think that we’re only made for one why or one purpose? And so I’ve been definitely, like, dabbling in that world, but absolutely why I created is still exactly why we’re doing it. It’s just now a little bit more refined and more focused as to why we’re here.

25:04
Dr. Richard Offut
Do you govern yourself by your. By. You know, you speak often about rules for success or rules of success where. So was that a little introspective? Look at that for yourself this summer. I mean, you know, sometimes dentists would be. I know the first time I took multiple weeks off was years into practice after finally having a partner doctor. Right. And then maybe I’d have been better served, you know, decades prior to take, take a month off and just kind of get your arms around the why.

25:40
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
Well, I think it’s also like, I remember when I first came into practice, there was a guy named Alan Samuelson in Chapel Hill who was a big panky guy. And he said the panky philosophy was always one week off a quarter. And if you take one week off quarter, your production actually goes up and your happiness goes up. You know, so are these the things that you’re saying, you know, or are people too scared to do stuff like that? Do they think, well, why am I going to take one week off a quarter? If I’m here, I’m going to work, I’m a work 220 days.

26:13
Kiera Dent
Totally. I think it’s both right. I actually do believe time away from the practice is paramount. We talk about it so often. You hear the cliche, work on the business, not in the business. And it’s wild because they have statistics of people who don’t work. Sundays are more profitable in business. They have statistics of, you take a week off, you will be more productive. And I don’t think we realize we need that mental clarity. We need that mental space. We need the ability to, like, step back. It’s like if you think about your body trying to pump iron all day long every single day, and you never have rest days. You actually fatigue the muscles so much that they can’t grow. And so looking at that, like, the rest days are just as important as the productive days.

26:51
Kiera Dent
The rest days give you the clarity that you need the rest days. I think as a society, I think we Learned it through 2020 with COVID of how important rest was. And then I think we’ve almost ratcheted it back up in the other direction because people are afraid. People feel like I can’t hit the production, but I’m like, for me, at least, and for a lot of the offices we coach, I was so buried in that I actually couldn’t even, like, get my head out of the sand. But I think you’ve got to also know. And that’s where I feel like, put in the week a quarter, because then it’s a cadence, so you don’t have to wait till you get buried under the sand. But it’s like, it feels counterintuitive, but it’s exactly what your body needs.

27:28
Kiera Dent
It’s exactly what your mind needs to be able to clear, have almost like a mental shower for yourself, clear away all the dust and the cobwebs and allow the true vision to come back into focus for you to reset yourself physically and mentally to come back in stronger with better ideas. And that’s actually how we’ve set it up. It’s every single quarter, we do something with our doctors to pull them out of the weeds, help them refocus on their life and their practice. So that way they’re not getting into that. That stagnant. But you have to trust, you have to believe. Like, the reality is you will make more money if you take time off. As weird as it sounds so counterproductive. It does not feel like one plus one equals two, but it does every single time for every dentist I’ve coached.

28:06
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
So are you seeing. For a little while, there was the big trend in facility utilization. You know, you have this facility sitting here. You know why you’re not using it five days a week, why you’re not using it 12 hours a day. So you started seeing docs running shifts. You know, there was a team that would come in, you know, from, you know, whatever, eight to two, then a team that would come in from, you know, 1 to 7 or something like that. And it was just kind of running crazy. And it seemed very mill oriented, very task oriented, production oriented kind of things. Do you consult with a group like that, or does somebody come into you and say, hey, this is what we do? And you’re like, I’m not touching you, or what? What do you.

28:45
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
What do you do with that philosophy?

28:47
Kiera Dent
So in Colorado, when were there, we actually ran that philosophy. We had two shifts, we had a five op practice, and were, how. How on earth are you able to produce 465,000amonth in five ops. Like were cranking shifts, were doing the things. And so I. There’s not a lot that the practices I won’t touch are ones that are unethical. Like, that’s really, I think my standard of ones I won’t touch. I’m not as strong in ortho, so I feel like there’s really great consultants that know ortho better in general practice. Adding ortho to it, easy. But if you’re a full ortho practice. Not my jam either. But with that philosophy, I actually, I think the question to ask now is what is the currency of today’s world? Is it time? Is it money? Is it appreciation? Is it work, life balances?

29:33
Kiera Dent
Because I actually think we’re seeing a shift of what the currency of today’s world is. And I also think a question is, what do you want your practice in your life to be as well? I don’t think there’s a problem with shift and maximizing your facility. I think that can totally be done. But question, what does your team want? And I’m noticing for me and a lot of our practices, the new currency is time and it’s work, life balance. And I think that shift actually came from COVID and they still want to be paid. That’s not. There’s no doubt about that. But I think people care more about time off, they care more about vacations, they care more than I’ve ever seen with 401ks and different things.

30:06
Kiera Dent
And so it’s like, if that’s the case, then let’s build schedules that accommodate that and let’s make sure that we’re doing that because there’s a lot of turnover, there’s a lot of work from home opportunities. And so it’s like, let’s make sure that we’re competitive within the workspace too. I don’t care if you run shifts or don’t run shifts, but let’s make sure that within that, like some people would run 12 hour days, but their team was only working three days at a time. So you’re running three, three. Excuse me, three. And then you just rotate it down. So then they would have like four days off all the time. It was a pretty incredible model that people did.

30:36
Kiera Dent
So again, I think it depends on your practice, who you as a dentist are and what your team is and what the currency is for them that they value the most. Pay attention to that. When people quit your practice or they leave if you can ask them, like with no ego, give me some honest feedback, you’ll start to hear what the currency is that they care about, and you can start to make the changes that way as well.

30:57
Dr. Richard Offut
When, when you go, when you go into a practice for dental, a team consulting, do you, is this, is, this is maybe a loaded question. Is it, does it. When you walk in and you do your background and you, and so you probably understand the practice better than the dentist does, right? You, I mean, you’ve got all the information, you understand the finances of it, you understand the personalities of it, probably better than the doc. So when you go in, are there classically. Now not always the same thing, but are there classically one or two main issues that you, that, that you go, hey, this is it. Boom. Or these two things, Boom. I mean, is it pretty obvious? And, and, and so you walk in and you say, oh, doc’s gotta go. How do you handle that? How do you handle that? Right?

31:54
Dr. Richard Offut
I mean, you know, Dar, Sean, today’s your last day.

31:56
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
You. Thank you for hiring me. You’re fired.

31:59
Kiera Dent
Exactly. Let’s find you a replacement. You know, go do a different career.

32:04
Dr. Richard Offut
We’re building a team, and it isn’t around you.

32:06
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
We figured out the prop. It’s you.

32:09
Dr. Richard Offut
So is it very obvious to you when you go in and what might be the top one or two things that, that you see? I mean, you know, other than firing the doc.

32:19
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
So is it.

32:20
Dr. Richard Offut
We’re not quitting.

32:21
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
Is it a consistent thing that you see across practices or is it, Are you saying that she finds something?

32:27
Dr. Richard Offut
Yeah, well, it’s probably a little of both, right? I mean, I’m sure there’s some novel problems, but I’m sure by the time you’ve been into hundreds of or thousands in your case of dental practices, you.

32:40
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
Know, you’re saying, is there a first thing that you look for?

32:43
Dr. Richard Offut
Yeah. Is there something that you look at it and you go, boom. If we don’t fix, you know, the leak under the sink, we’re going to need a new floor, new cabinet, new, you know, it’s going to flood the downstairs playroom, you know, I mean, so you walk in and you see the problem. I mean, are these things that are consistent? Yeah, yeah. Is it consistent across, you know, realizing there’s nuances?

33:07
Kiera Dent
Of course, yes. And the answer is yes. And just to asterisk I. Well, yes, I might know, quote, unquote more because I see it I think the benefit I actually have over the dentist is I come in with no emotional attachment. I don’t know your team, I don’t know how long you’ve been there. I don’t know the stories, I don’t know the behind the SC seen stories. I know nothing. It’s truly black and white for me. I have no relationship with these people. My job is to come in and see how can I make your life easier. What are the efficiency pieces that we could do to help you, the team and the patients have a better experience. And I think because I have that’s the edge that a consultant really brings. Like no emotional attachment. And the answer is yes.

33:45
Kiera Dent
There are like very consistent pieces across the board. And I think it’s actually dependent upon the size of the practice. So like the smaller practices, the ones producing like right around that 1.5 million or below for sure, it’s systems like across the board. And the most simple systems are like, how’s your morning huddle? Let’s schedule to goal dollar per hour production and handoffs, like without fail, those are usually my top three things. And then teaching the dentist how to use numbers as a guide and having the team kind of track their numbers. But I’m not going to go in with those five things. I look to see where are they the weakest and then what?

34:17
Kiera Dent
What if I did one things the least amount of effort with the most amount of gain, that’s most likely what a team’s going to implement the quickest and fastest with me. So everything I’m implementing to make the team’s life easier, sure it might feel different, so you might feel a little awkward, but 100%, those are the things of the smaller practices. Now what I’m getting up to this 2 million, 5, 10, $15 million practices usually and I’ll do like from 2 to probably like 7, 8 million, 10 million. That space. Those practices usually are struggling with leadership. The doctor and the office manager are like tapped to capacity and they’re still trying to like hold all the balls in the air versus realizing like we need to get a leadership team, we need to start to delegate these things.

34:55
Kiera Dent
We need to start tracking differently and then refining the systems. But now we’re on a refinement and a leadership. And then when I’m in my 10 million plus to 20 million, those ones now are on like mass training, mass like how do we keep our quality and our continuity across the board for those size of practices? And that’s honestly it sounds so like non sexy but it’s truly just consistent training. So that’s where I put them in. Almost like our 12 systems model, where it’s like, here’s system for January, here’s the system for February. Train the whole teams and we can mass train all of them, get them in the same information. So that way the systems can just stay refined. But we’re most likely in the 10 to 20 million. We’re tracking the numbers. We’ve got a good leadership team in place.

35:35
Kiera Dent
We just need to keep the teams training at a consistent level. So those are kind of like the steps that I see based on the size of practice, but easily across the board. The number one complaint, the number one issue is communication. But I think it’s actually communication that’s built upon Patrick Lenciani’s five dysfunctions of a team. And teaching them how to have true trust, true healthy debate, fixing the true problems, having peer to peer accountability so they can ultimately win. That is a breakdown of communication on a soft skill side. And then you’ve got, and it’s usually 80% the soft skill side, 20% the actual tangible tools and skills that a practice needs to grow.

36:10
Dr. Richard Offut
So, so for our, for our listeners in this. And they’re sitting there and they’re, they’re driving to work and they’re listening to this podcast and they, and then they say, well, gosh, I got to go in and go to work. How do they know they need to call the dental aid team? How does a doctor know when he needs to hire a consultant? How does a doctor know when. And talk to us a little bit about that. I’m just curious. I mean, what are the, you know, the signs and, you know, well, what.

36:43
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
Does he or she hear from you to, like I said to know. Walking away from this podcast, walking into his or her office. Yeah, what, what do they hear from you right now? That’s like, you know, I need care.

36:56
Dr. Richard Offut
Yeah, I need, you know.

36:58
Kiera Dent
Yeah, yeah. Well, I think that there’s two motivators. There’s pain or pleasure, and that’s just in real life as well. That’s what motivates humans to change. And so the pain side, if a doctor, usually they’ll reach out to a consultant for usually cash flow, team morale, stress of the doctor feeling like they’ve plateaued and they can’t get past that plateau. Like they can’t get patients in the door. They feel like they’re doing everything on their own. They feel overwhelmed like that to me, like in, when you’re in those pain zones, we’re usually going to make the call. And that’s where most people actually call. I would say probably 80% of our clients who call usually call me in a pain zone. But then we have our like 20%, 30, 40% of doctors that are more in that, like what I call the optimization zone.

37:43
Kiera Dent
Practice is going well, cash flow is going pretty well. And they’re like, what’s next? What am I missing? And I want a coach to find my blind spots. I want you to come in and tell me, where could we better? How can I grow this to the next level? So that’s another zone. Or if you’re like, hey, I’ve been dreaming of wanting to do a DSO or multi practice ownership, I don’t know how to do that. I want to call you. And that can also fall back into the pain side of I don’t freaking know how to run this practice. Like, I went to dental school. I’m so lost. I don’t know how to tell an office manager how to do this. I don’t know how to tell them on the billing side of it.

38:17
Kiera Dent
Those are the extremes that I think when I’m walking into work. These are the reasons that I need to call a consultant. Because it’s like we either hit the pain of rock bottom, of something bad has happened, or I just can’t handle this anymore. I’m not going to have another bad year again. I’m not going to have my production this low. I’m not going to keep working this many hours or I want to keep growing and moving so I don’t get to that pain spot. I want to call somebody who knows this or like, I want them to train my team. I don’t know how to train my team. So let’s have somebody help me with that. I think those are usually the zones that have people call.

38:48
Kiera Dent
And for us in dental a team, I think our niche is that we train the doctor and the team. Like, I don’t want to just teach you guys how to do this. Like, hey, all right, you guys, I’ve just told you, here are the things to go look for. Now you go find it and you go tell your team. Usually that’s hard for a doctor because you’re drilling like you should be running that handpiece. That’s what you were like. The best thing of you working at the top of your license is you need to go and diagnose and do dentistry because none of us can do that. Other things can be delegated to other people.

39:15
Kiera Dent
And so having a coach in your corner that can train your team for you, that can help you see what things you should be working on and what you could have an office manager help you with, I think that’s where it’s so clutch for you, like free up your time. I had a little tagline the other day of, you know how running a dental practice is hard. Dental 18 takes care of all that stress so you can be a dentist and love doing dentistry again. And I think that’s why I would call dental 18.

39:38
Dr. Richard Offut
That is awesome. Tell me something. I always try to do this and I always ask our guests to give us a parting thought. What should our listeners. Other than now knowing when, why and how, what should our. What should our listeners be taking? What, what can they take home right now and tomorrow walk into their office and say, huh? I listened to Simplify Dentistry podcast. They had this rock star cure ident on and, and now this is what I’m going to do today.

40:11
Kiera Dent
Well, I mean, thank you. That definitely like feeds my ego, so thank you on that.

40:15
Dr. Richard Offut
Well, I’m looking for a good answer here, Kiera.

40:17
Kiera Dent
I’m looking for a good answer. I think I’m always about like, let’s look for the lowest hanging fruit. And I know everybody says that, so it’s like rockstar with like the most simple explanation. And that’s truly what I do in consulting. People ask me, how do you add $50,000 to a month? And I’m like, honestly, it’s nothing sexy. It’s a great morning huddle. It’s a great handoff. It’s actually like diagnosing. So my favorite handoff, we call it ndtr. So doctors, at the end of your exam, if I could have you go do anything tomorrow or today or whenever. At the end of your exam, after you’ve done a comprehensive, you tell the patient, I want to see you back for the end, which stands for next visit. So I want. And it’s clean, it’s one option.

40:54
Kiera Dent
Like if you’ve got multiples, this is what I’d recommend. We can give you options for both the date I want to see you back in one to two weeks for that. I need you for about an hour and a half for that. And we want to make sure we’ve got your recare scheduled. So next visit date, time, recare. If you would do that consistently, your case acceptance, I promise you will go up exponentially. So a good morning huddle. Where we. We see our opportunities. A perfect handoff. Every person says that we repeat the same thing. Each person’s doing it. We’re tying the bow at the end of our exam. And then you’re actually tracking your numbers. And every person has a KPI to track. That’s like their one number that will influence to the goals of the practice. And then have fun.

41:30
Kiera Dent
Like, you have one life to live. Let’s make it incredible and let’s make it be the life you want. Like, live it on purpose. Create your life. Don’t just manage it, I think is what I would take and go implement. Like, truly though, that one. That one. NDTR. I’ve added $30,000 of production in one day to a practice. I’ve taken case acceptance from 50% to 100% in one day. Like, it is the magic drug that you could go implement tomorrow. But people, they forget, they stop doing it. But next visit date time recare. That will cut out half the excuses that your patient has. It helps them. And what I love is when you actually do this correctly, your patient walks right up to your front desk and they’re like, hey, doctor wants to see me back for a crown.

42:07
Kiera Dent
They want to see me in a week, and they want me in for 90 minutes. Like, they literally just tell you exactly what they’re supposed to come back for. Patients bought into it. Your case acceptance will skyrocket. And if you’re struggling with it, look at your case acceptance. Look to see why it’s not converting. Listen to yourself. Do an exam. That’s what I would do if it was my practice. And this is usually how I’m able to add things so quickly. But it’s through nothing sexy. It’s through nothing crazy. It’s literally the, like, little simple things that will move you forward exponentially here.

42:34
Dr. Richard Offut
I think that’s what. That’s a. That’s wonderful advice. And I think that’s something that, you know, if every practitioner I know, when I started practicing a million years ago, you know, you had to kind of fend off the dinosaurs and stuff. But.

42:47
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
But it’s a million and five now.

42:49
Kiera Dent
Yeah. I was going to say with your.

42:50
Dr. Richard Offut
200 hygienists, there were challenges. There were challenges beyond just this. But. But I think that’s wonderful advice and I want to thank you so very much for coming on with Dr. Shah-Khan on the Simplify Dentistry podcast and sharing your wisdom with us. And, and we will be happy to post your contact information and if you would help us with that. That would be awesome.

43:17
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
Yeah. We always like to say that dentistry is hard and kind of the tagline that we kind of throw out is together. Let’s dare to make it simple. Let’s dare to take the step of finding a consultant that’s going to help you. Let’s dare to make the changes in walking out of your exam to make your office more productive. I think you have to dare to do things, and I think that’s what our listeners should be able to hear from hearing you today. And I really appreciate you spending time with us and we can’t thank you enough for it.

43:52
Kiera Dent
Well, thank you guys. And just to piggyback on what you said, I love it because so many people want the magic pill of all this craziness to make their practice successful. And it’s like, truly, it’s a simple thing. And that’s why I love your podcast. It’s like, well, I love what you guys are doing. Discipline equals freedom. And it’s being disciplined in the small, simple things are ultimately going to get you the success that you want. And so just kudos. So excited to be a part of this. And for all the listeners, I agree. Dare to be simple. Dare to like. It’s not the sexy stuff. Like, I’m telling you, as a consultant, my magic, it’s simple. It’s literally a handoff. Like, go crush that.

44:29
Kiera Dent
Do that consistently and I will boost and add so much production to your schedule, you will not even believe your eyes. Like, it’s insane. Insane. And it’s one little simple thing. It’s not crazy. It’s nothing hard. And I really love the simplicity because dentistry is hard, but I think it’s hard because we make it hard rather than just doing the simple, non sexy things that ultimately drive the results every day. So thank you for having me.

44:50
Dr. Richard Offut
Thank you very much, Kiera.

44:51
Dr. Mustafa Shah-Khan
Thank you very much, Kiera.

44:52
Dr. Richard Offut
Thank you.