Stop Working for Free

If your business isn't working the way you expected, it's not because you're bad at business. It's because no one ever taught you how it actually works. We were trained to master algorithms in medicine, but when it comes to revenue teams and growth, we were never taught anything. We weren't even told to figure it out. We just assumed somehow we'd know. Like it would magically make sense. But it doesn't. The era of the seven Figure Physician CEO is here. And it's not about working harder. It's about learning entrepreneurship as a system. The same way you mastered ACLs and pals, you can master the algorithm of building a profitable scalable business. That's why I recorded the seven Figure Physician CEO audiobook. Whether you're building a medical or non medical business, and whether your goal is your first million, first 2 million, first 5 million, first 10 million, this is where the journey starts. There is no calvary coming to save us. We are the calvary. So. So go get your audiobook now. Www.entremd.com 7Figurebook. And let's rewrite the narrative for physicians starting today. Hi, docs. Welcome to the Entre MD podcast, where it's all about helping amazing physicians just like you. Embrace entrepreneurship so you can have the freedom to live life and practice medicine on your terms. I'm your host, Dr. Una. Well, hello. Hello, my friend. Welcome back to another episode of the On Trem Day podcast. As always, I am super pumped that you're here. Okay. And you know, today we're going to be looking at something that, it's really something that we have learned as physicians that we need to unlearn, which is working for free. And this is going to be really good. This is going to set your business free. This is gonna set you free as an entrepreneur. This is gonna give you a time back. This is gonna uplevel your financial freedom. This is going to be amazing. Okay. And I'm gonna start off just saying it, like, stop working for free. Okay. All right. So I see this a lot, especially, I mean, like, really for physician entrepreneurs. Right? You know, I talk, I talk a lot about us being, you know, positioned so well that we can be some of the best entrepreneurs, but we do have things we need to. This is one of them. And so in my experience, you know, if I, if I could start with me, I remember, you know, when I started off in private practice as physicians, we've done this for so long that we have trained our patients on how to teach it that treat us for Instance, and so, you know, like for co pays and deductibles and things like that. We didn't want to collect. I didn't want to collect. I didn't want to have money conversations. And I would say. And we would bill them, right? Like we'll send you a bill. Which makes no sense. The person is right in front of you. They have their wallet. In their wallet there's a card. They can pay right then, right? And so we're like, yeah. So we'd send them bills. And what I found out later is that a lot of them wouldn't pay it. It was no longer urgent. You know, humans respond to deadlines. It wasn't urgent anymore. Maybe they'll pay in the sweet buy and buy. You send so many statements. You send the statements, like, what is the. Like, how much money do you spend trying to get a dollar copay or $40 or whatever that is, right? And so, you know, we changed our policy. I want to say this was three years in, right? And this, you know, this is something I tell the doctors in the entre business school. I took one for the team. Like, don't do it. Like, it took me three years to figure this out. How about we figure this out before you even start, right? Took us about three years. And we, we created this policy. Like, you know, your payment is due at the time of service. And of course, people are like, oh my goodness, like, I cannot pay this $40 co pay. I need to be seen. You know, and, and we're just like, you know, like, hey, there's this week. We can do card, we can do check. You know, there's an ATM down the street. Like we gave them all these options. The option we do not get that give them is come, we'll see you and will not collect a copay. And so a lot of times people call our bluff. And you know, this is when miracles are happening in my office. Because then people are like, well, I guess I'll just have to reschedule the appointment. Oh, well, we can get Johnny and we can reschedule that for Tuesday the 25th at 4, 8 4pm will that work for you? And when they say that. Because a lot of times it's manipulation. When they say that this magical thing would happen, all of a sudden, they would reach into their pockets, they would pull out their wallets, they would give us many times cash, sometimes their card, like, okay, let me do this. I don't want to have to come back. And it taught me a lesson, right? Like, we need to get out of people's pockets. Because sometimes they're like, you know, this is a trying time or whatever that is. But I'm telling you, so many people just gave us kickback. We would have people who sit there for 30 minutes, like stuff like that, but then they pay. So, so then I learned, right, that was my lesson in human psychology when it comes to paying medical bills, right? Because otherwise we don't. And this is something I had to treat my staff on. You don't get paid like you're in private practice. You don't get paid because you saw a patient. You get paid because you saw the patient and you build the patient, right? Like those $2 don't drop into your lap because you saw a patient, right? And so technically not collecting co pays, not collecting deductibles and all of that, that is working for free. And we're going to talk about how dangerous that is. We're going to talk about why you should stop, like immediately stop doing that. Okay? I see this a lot. And it's not just in private practice, right? Like in an insurance based private practice. See a lot in DPC as well, right? Oh yeah, they couldn't, they couldn't pay that for their membership. And they've been there for five months, six months, and they have not paid. But guess what? Many doctors have found in conversation, these patients will tell them about people they're paying three times, five times, ten times their membership for other things that are valuable to them in health care, right? Stop working for free. I see it a lot amongst, amongst coaches as well, right? And so it happens everywhere. And you know, we're going to, we're going to do inventory after this. But I want to just invite you. It doesn't matter whether your business is really established or you're starting, it doesn't matter across the board. We have the capacity to do this. Okay? So sometimes the reason why, you know, we would let people, you know, like, work with for them for free is, you know, this thing of, oh, I can't pay, right? And a lot of times it's not true. And I'm not saying they're not. Please don't misunderstand me. I'm a philanthropist at heart, so I'm not talking about people who really can't do stuff, but I have had people who drive in a Mercedes and say they can't pay their copay, like, is that really true? And if it is, if it is a fact, like they don't have the money in their pocket, then something Needs to change. And this is not a, this is not a me problem. Okay? But I can't pay some, some of the time that's the kickback that we get that makes us do that. On the other hand, sometimes what I, what I see is, well, I paid you, you know, especially if you're in a DPC model, right? Like, so I could have used my insurance. But you don't take insurance. I paid you. So because of that, you're going to do all these other things for free, right? It's like blackmail almost, right? Maybe that's a strong word. But I paid you. So you have to do all these other things or you're a coach. Like, oh, they paid me $2,000. So I have to make myself available night and day. I have to do all these other things. Yes, it's this number of calls they're supposed to have, but I'm going to throw in these extra because they needed and because they paid. Right, So I paid you. So you owe me. You owe me. Right? And so that really is around a guilt for charging, you know what I mean? Like, I charge them and I feel bad about it almost. And so I'm going to throw away my boundaries and just let them do whatever. Okay, okay. So, so let me, let me share some thoughts here with you. I want us to just be aware of what we do when we say yes to free work. The first thing is working for free is too expensive. And this is a thought we must understand. Like, we're like, oh, well, it only took me five minutes. It only took me 10 minutes, only an extra hour. It didn't cost me anything. But time, your time is so valuable. And maybe looking at the opportunity cost will help you see how valuable the time you used to do that free work is time that you could have spent with your family. Like, really. And you know, I talk a lot about my 90th birthday. I talk to a lot of older people because we're all going there, right? And, and when I talk with them, I've never heard anybody say, oh, I wish I built a bigger company. Like, of course there are things like I, you know, I wish I deployed my potentials more. But the biggest thing to them is their family, their relationships and all of that stuff. When you're working, that's time you could spend with your family. When you're working for free, you gave up time with your spouse, your children, your siblings, your parents, like, your friends. You gave up all of that to do this for free. And so the question is that Is that, is that really what you were trying to do? Right? It is time that you could have used to improve yourself, your. Your. Your best performing asset. You could have used that time to listen to an audiobook. You could have used that time for coaching. You could have used that time for all kinds of things, but you didn't. You're like, oh, I don't have time to work out. You could have used that time to work out, but you're just like, oh, let me just do this. Because it's just time. It doesn't cost me anything. No, it costs you all of those things, right? It costs you. You gave up. You gave up stuff. Every time you say yes to something, you're saying no to something else. Now, we're not talking about serving your clients. We're talking about working for free, right? So the first thing is that it's just too expensive. It has a cost. It's not without a cost. It has a cost. That's number one. The second thought I want you to think about is when you start doing something, you want to make sure that when your business grows, like when you 10x your business, you want 10x that, okay? And so I've had people, right? Like, really, they, they have, you know, like maybe say, dpc and they have people who are texting them multiple times a day every day, right? And. And stuff like that. And so they're doing all this work beyond the scope of what they would need to do. Or you have coaches and they have all these, oh, but they just wanted an extra call, or they just wanted an extra this, extra that, and they're doing all this extra, like real extra stuff. The question is, if you get 40 more clients like that, you will throw your business away. You will throw your business away, right? Because you're doing all this extra work for no compensation, right? None. And so what that means is. So the second thought is this, that your new reward, you've created a business where the new reward for growth is burnout. Is burnout. Like, the more clients you get, the more free work you'll do, the less free time you'll have, the less time freedom you'll have. Like, it's burnout. And so what will happen is when you think about growth, you break out in a sweat. And because of that, everything that could create growth in your business, you'll stop doing it. I've seen this time and time and time again. Like, so why you're not doing this? Why are you not doing that? You've got the clients, the Money's coming in. What's the problem? And when I dig and dig and dig and dig, at the end of the day, it is taking them way too much time to service the clients that they do have, because there are no boundaries, because they're doing a lot of free work and all of those things. So they're just like, I don't want more of that. And I'm like, okay, so are you happy with the revenue you have now? Of course not. I'm like, stop working for free. One of the best things you do for your clients is you stop working for free. Okay, all right. So that. So that's the. So that's. The second thing is that you've created a system where the reward for growing your business is burnout. The third thing is you must remember business is an economic sport. If you are not making money, you have to go out of business. It is an economic sport. It is an economic. But one of the best things you will do for your clients, for your patients, is you build a profitable business. Because if you build a profitable business, you get to stay in business. If you don't build a profitable business, you have to leave. Now. I have seen people who, they're building a business, they're not building in a way that it will be profitable. So we're not talking about, you know, the beginning stages of a business or the transition stage of a business where you have to do a. A lot of things before you see the world. They were not talking about. That is just built to not be profitable. Right. You have to go out of business. You are not going to be able to serve the clients. You're not going to be able to serve the patients. You're not going to be able to build a team. You're not going to be able to advertise to sell, you know, like to. To grow your business. You're not going to be able to do any of that. Like you are literally working for free as a mechanism to kill your business, to just kill it and be done. You need revenue to stay in business. You need revenue to hit to match your overhead. You need to revenue to pay yourself in such a way that you have the financial freedom to give your all to your business. You need revenue so that you can advertise. You need revenue so you can build a team, a solid team, a dream team, so you can continue to grow. And you are sacrificing all of that to work for free. Yeah. So stop working for free. That's. That's the whole purpose of this episode Stop Working for Free Stop Working for free. Understand that one of the worst things you can do to your business is work for free. One of the worst things you can do is tell your family, I'm sacrificing all this time I have to be away. And you're doing it in a way that is not going to matter. At the end of the day. One of the worst things you can do to yourself is to work for free, right? Because you're going to have to, you're going to put in all that effort, there's going to be nothing to show for it. You're going to maybe go look for a job or something like. And one of the worst things you can do for your clients is work for free. I've told you guys this story, right? Like, I've had people that I've, I used to, I don't do this anymore. I don't do this anymore at all, at all. I had a, you know, someone who was like, you know, coaching for free. And you see there is a significant part of the transformation that is in the transaction. And so I have people who are paying me who I'm coaching, same coach, same kind of business. And they're getting. Monster wins, right? And you see them, they're growing from one step to the other to the other and have these other people that I coach for free and they're just like, oh, nice suggestion, I'll see if I'll do it, and all of those kind of things because there's no skin in the game. Why would you do something uncomfortable that somebody told you, right? And they just don't get any results. And when I realized what was happening, I apologize to them. I'm like, oh my goodness, I'm so sorry. Like, I am your problem, right? I am your problem. And so the transformation is a transaction. I remember when I did one on one coaching. So it's way back in the day and I had, I had a time where I changed my prices and somebody, one of my clients made a statement that I was like, wow. She was like, oh, wow. If I'm going to be paying that, then I need to really show up in a different way and I need to, you know, work so I can get the return on my investment, all of that. Now listen, she hadn't even swiped her card for the new amount yet, but she had already made a decision on how she was going to change because what she paid me was going to be different. It was fascinating to watch, right? And so nobody wins when you work for free. And so this is one of these episodes where let me tell you what I want you to do. I want you to stop. And it doesn't. You may go like, oh, I don't do that. I want you to really stop, and I want you to do an audit. Where am I working for free in my business? Some is like, your services, you're just giving them away for free. Some others is that you throw away your boundaries on time because maybe you changed your prices and you're like, so you're doing all this extra stuff for free. So just be humble enough and curious enough to say, yeah, I'm gonna. I'm gonna go look, I'm gonna do an audit here. Don't make any assumptions, okay? Do an audit. Like, where am I working for free? Okay? And then when you're done, I want you to make a decision. Today, not tomorrow. Not. Not next week. And all of that, I want you to make a decision like, I no longer work for free. I don't do that anymore. I don't work for free. Okay? I don't work for free. I want you to do that. And then the third thing I want you to do is for accountability. I want you to take a screenshot of this episode, and I want you to send it to send me a DM. Say, Dr. Una, I made the commitment. I don't work for free anymore. Right? I don't work for free anymore. Don't do it. Don't do it. I want you to build a business where you serve people, right? We lead with service, so you serve people at the highest capacity. I want you to build a business where you charge people appropriately, right? Like, so, you know, I did an episode on ethical pricing, right? So you can go listen to that. But I want you to think of it. You serve a lot of people. You charge ethically. And because of that, your business is an asset that creates time freedom and financial freedom for you. So you serve a lot, you earn a lot, right? It's an economic game. You serve a lot, you earn a lot. And at the end of the day, you built a business that, yes, it created financial freedom for you and all of those things, but, oh, my goodness, it had such a big impact in the world. You do that when you don't work for free. Working for free is giving up that dream. Giving up a dream of big impact because you're going to need money to do it. Giving up that dream of financial freedom for you and your family because you're going to need money to do that. And just imagine not giving that up because you learned and you made a commitment that I no longer work for free. Okay. All right. So this is one of those episodes to share. So share it with a doc in your life. They will thank you forever. And I'll see you on the next episode of the EntreMD podcast. Hey, if you love listening to the EntreMD podcast, I want to invite you to join Entre MD on demand. It is my signature subscription program that gives you access to a library of business courses designed to help you do one thing as a physician entrepreneur, and that is to thrive. Just head out to entreand. Com ondemand, and I love to have you join us. See you on the inside.