Million Dollar Dentistry Masterclass March 2021: "CPR: Cash in Your Pocket Right Now"

Hey, practice owners, welcome back. Our third in the series, Million Dollar Dentistry with Gary Katie the genius, the mastermind behind the mastermind. So, Gary, how's New York City before we get started?

Oh, man, it's starting to open up. Believe it or not. You know, this clampdown clam over here is really opening up. The Knicks are letting some people in and, you know, we're getting ready for Yankees. So it's a super exciting time here in New York City for sure.

Well, I know in dentistry in general, there's, there's kind of a momentum. You can feel it. And, and I'm getting, you know, the calls and the emails. One of the reasons we talked about in even starting this series was docs who last year realized they own a practice and it doesn't run itself. Sometimes that went good, sometimes it didn't go so good. But I'm getting all those emails and calls that say, okay, we're getting back, we're opening up. All the temporary stuff we put in place. Either now it's permanent or it's not. And so that was one of the cool things when we started talking about this is the fundamentals of business are the same. Whether it's, you know, a pandemic, you know, you have to modify a few things, but it's fundamentally the same. And it all is in your best selling book, Million Dollar Dentistry. For anybody who doesn't have it, I love to plug your book. I have the first edition, I have the collector's edition from 2000. When is this? 2006. Holy cow.

Seventh edition now. Seventh.

That is unbelievable. And really that's what we're here to talk about is the chapters in this book as we walk through them in this Mastermind. Chapter one was really sort of a day in the life of Larry dds that dentists figure out. Dentist practice owners. It's kind of a common experience. They came out of dental school the same way with clinical skills. Then they got into business and figured out all the things they didn't know. And then chapter two is the life you're entitled to lead, which is, I think, where you really start making that transition. You start saying, okay, you're a dentist, you decided to be a practice owner. You figured out things like taxes and payroll and employees and all this stuff. Nobody taught you how to deal with that. Now you're stuck doing it and getting your head in the right place and saying, okay, number one, I went to dental school and paid for it, so I'm good at what I do. My state gave Me a license so, you know, I'm safe. And now I'm running a business and I work really hard. I'm entitled to all the things that come with being a good business owner. And then chapter three, today's episode, one of my favorites, cash, cpr, cash in your pocket right now. And one of the things I want to do before we get, before we jump into that is tell the listeners and viewers we are answering questions live. So you'll see a little button down here. That is how to ask a question. Put your questions in. Gary has agreed. We'll answer them on the call. Now, if they come through, I'll kind of aggregate them. And usually what we get are two or three of the same questions. I'll kind of paraphrase them. If we don't get a chance to do it live, Gary will answer all your questions in a follow up, maybe tomorrow morning or whenever we can get to it. But he will answer all your questions, period. So don't hesitate. Put it in. Put in two or three as we go. If something pops in your head, just put the questions in and we'll make sure that they get answered for you. So is that fair? Am I making a promise you won't keep, Gary?

Oh, come on, Steve, you know better. You know better. I love, I love being of service to people, you know, that's what I stand for, you know, especially the great men and women who are heroes who, you know, didn't know what they were really signing up for when they came out of dental school. And for me, that gave me an amazing job, an amazing career and amazing purpose to really empower the men and women who come out of dental school. Get a team. Empower the team so that they can help patients get healthy. I mean, that's, that's the simple of it. But simple isn't always easy. And my job is to make it simple just so that they can implement and make the changes they want. So that's the game.

Well, and again, 2006, same principles, same same everything. And, and we are just for anybody listening, we're going to tell you at the end of the this episode how to get a copy of Gary's book free. We'll give you a link and tell you how to get that and offer some, maybe some free advice from Gary if you're interested, if you like what you hear and you say, hey, that's me, offer some free advice there. So stick around to the end for that. So, Gary, let's just jump. I love your acronyms. You're the acronym man, cpr. Cash in your pocket right now. If I came out of dental school and suddenly I'm in a practice and I liked what you said in the last episode, that, yeah, you know, I work my butt off. Part of that is taking care of my patients.

But.

But part of it is, you know, I didn't do this to live poor. I did this to live a comfortable life. So I'm there. And our episode tonight's more about money getting your, if I can paraphrase it, sort of getting your head right about money, which is the lifeblood of a business. And unfortunately, if you're in the dental practice business, then it's life blood of your dental practice. So what do you mean when you say cash in your pocket right now or kind of understanding your relationship with money?

Yeah, first, Steve, the first thing is I had a really horrible relationship with money because my ancestors were brought up during the Depression. The conversation was, work hard, go to work, get in there, work there for 30, 40, 50 years, get a retirement and live that kind of life. And that's cool, but I was living what they gave me. And it was like, you know, you know, money, the love of money, you know, is the root of all evil. And it's really like, I think they say money is the root of all evil. They forget that the love of money, the word love is really important, meaning that if you're obsessed with it, that is the root of all evil because you're taking advantage of people. And I think one of the things, and I talk about it in my second book, and we talked about it last week. So if you haven't seen last week's or, I mean, last month's session, I really get into this principle that I learned because I had to help Dennis Steve receive this distinction about having. This was a breakthrough for me. So there's three levels of living being. That's how you show up for yourself and others, like who I'm being, right? I'm. I am kind, I'm generous, I'm loving, I'm supportive. Not all the time. And if you ask my wife, she probably wouldn't say that all the time. But those are my. And I'm fun and I'm funny and I like making a difference. Like that's me at the core, right? That's being doing is I happen to do this webinar with you and have this conversation. I happen to coach dental CEOs. I happen to, you know, you had mentioned, I meet with doctors newly who are coming into our Community. And, like, that's what I love, and that's what I'm pat. That's my doing and my having. I used to, you know, it's sort of like the having distinction is your ability to receive. So defined very simply as your ability to receive. If I can give you a visual of it, it's like you're a farmer. You fertilize the ground, you nurture this tree. The tree bears fruit. And when the. When the fruit's ripe, you feel shameful, guilty, and unworthy, and the fruit drops to the floor and it rots, and nobody wins. And that's what happens in my observation in dentistry, largely, by the way, if you have what I just shared, please know that you're not alone. A lot of doctors live in an isolated world where, Steve. Where they're sitting there going, you know, why is my accounts receivable so high? Why? And this is where it manifests itself. This is the root cause. If you don't have the ability to receive. It's. It's an actual distinction. Your accounts receivable is going to be high. You're going to give away free dentistry. You are. Your fee schedule is going to be in the 25 percentile because you don't feel like you can charge. Your accounts receivable is going to be high because you don't feel like you can receive the money that's due you. This is like the first place I go in the dashboard when I work with people, Steve. It's funny, after they go on this session, they read the book and they hold it up on the video before we get started, they go, okay, I'm the person who has a funky relationship to money, so thank you for offering me that, because it never occurred to me I thought all these things were symptomatic issues.

Right. Well, I think they also think it's. You know, we've talked about this before. I think they think that if. And I'm watching these questions come in, and they're kind of the same thing, and we'll ask one. I've got one here. In a second. I'll ask you. But I think it's because they think it's mutually exclusive. If I'm taking. If I'm. If money is my reason for being in business, then I'm not taking care of my patients. And it really is two separate things, right? It's your patients or your clinical skills. You learned that in dental school. But you've also decided to be in business. So even if I was a plumber, And I was a really great plumber, but I sucked at the business part of it. I don't get to be a plumber very long because I can't do enough to keep my business open. And dentistry, to some degree, they, I think I hear that over and over and over. I think is what you're saying, that it's, that it's, they're mutually exclusive. If I care about money, then I don't care about my patient.

And then what you're saying, oh, there's no doubt, Steve, sorry for stepping on you. And money and time are commodities. So for those of you that are, you know, you don't have money, time or energy, these are all forms of currency that you're giving to something and not taking the oxygen mask and receiving. And so it's such a powerful distinction once we start unpacking it for docs, because then in the moment, they don't get in the way of it. And it's. So this isn't a difficult thing to do and you're not going to have to unveil your kimono to every emotional scar you might have from your trauma of your childhood. But what I'm saying is, once you become aware of this distinction, oh, that's just, just my low deserve level. Oh, that's just my ants. We call them, we, we take theory and make them things. We make them distinctions. So an example would be hdl, healthy deserve level ants. Oh, you go, an ant is an automatic negative thought that kills off income, Right? So what's happening is you walk in, in your morning huddle in the morning and you go, she's not going to accept treatment because you know her 401k is a 201k. She lost her job and you kill off and then she walks in and then you interface with her that way and then you're manifesting what your automatic negative thoughts are versus blank slating and having a healthy relationship to money to receive it. Not be greedy, not take more than you're worth, but have a fair exchange. And we teach doctors the distinction. Fair exchange. It's not thief. It's not being a thief, like taking too much. Let's not do you. And it's definitely not giving it all away. I always say your God gave you two hands, one to give and one to take. If you're giving with both hands, then you, then you go bankrupt. I went spirit. I went bankrupt. Or if you're taking with two hands, your, your universe will shut you down and not give you more. I've Seen this incredibly over and over, Steve. It's really. I really study money and people's relationship to it because I came from nothing. And then when I had it, you know what I did with it? Got rid of it.

Yeah.

I couldn't keep it. And there's. There's an actual thing, Steve, called Parkinson's Law. Parkinson's law says this. Not the neurological disease a guy named Parkinson S. That says. You ever notice that your. Your. Your expenses rise to meet the new levels of income?

Yeah.

The same is true with time. You fill time to meet the deadline. That's why people end up with not having time and money. But we actually have a system and a structure to separate that so that when you don't know you have it and you're just putting it away, you're creating a wealth account and you'll retire financially free. Here's the thing that I'm. I must stand against the 96 percentile of the dentist that are now extending six years in their retirement, and only 4% can retire financially free. Financially free, to me is defined as your assets. If you don't work, will outrun, will outpay your liabilities. And that's what we want to set up for people. No matter where you're starting from, by the way. No matter where you're starting from. If you're 65. I just had a guy, 73, works five days a week. Amazing. In Georgia.

And that's not a problem if you want to do that.

He chose to.

It's a problem if you have to do that if you've gotten to 73. And that's what, you know, again, we've talked about this before. You and I both see every day is docs who, you know, they always think they can. You know, they've done it. They've saved their practice financially a dozen times over its life. So they're going to always keep doing that. Well, there comes a point, you know, where you just can't do that, where it's not, you know, And I noticed here. So in that sort of category. I got about three categories of questions coming in. This one is, and I'm going to summarize this, it says, the focus on money makes me uncomfortable. Like I'm putting money ahead of my patients. And I think that really is something to reiterate here, that you just have to get over. And, you know, if you and I could figure that out, you know, if we could. If we could come up with a pill for that, Gary, we'd probably be sitting On a beach house somewhere.

Well, go book it because I'm going to give it to you right now. Go get Paula. We'll get Judith. The four of us are going to the beach.

Come up with the money pill. Yeah, I'm okay. Being successful is kind of what you're saying in my business.

Well, let me give you a reframe that'll handle it like that. Like I'm talking like that right there. Money is the scoreboard for how healthy and the impact that you're making on your patients when you have a new relationship and you reframe it. That it's really just a scoreboard for exchange for a job well done and an acknowledgement for the value you created in my life. See, here's where the source of this whole problem exists, Steve. Your professor said, find the chief complaint and fix it. You go down this rabbit hole called looking and searching for symptoms. The patient says, do whatever my insurance covers because you didn't create the value for me. If you don't create the value, they don't give you money. They give you insurance that's no skin off their back. And then you have a drill, fill in PPO mill, and then you're working thousands of hours to get paid low dollars and you feel like you're chained to the chair. You can break free from that right now. Right now when you reframe this to say, this is all about the scoreboard for how healthy I'm getting my patients. One other thing I want to say here, Steve, that I think is really, really important. 75% of dentists are the two personality types that have aversion to money. Humanists and methodicals. So that's the 75 percentile. The Myers Briggs, like, this is science. The people that go into dentistry are methodical humanists. They care deeply about people. And if you're a people lover and a people pleaser and I talk numbers to you, you are gone. A methodical doesn't like numbers because they don't want to make a mistake. And the numbers don't lie. And so this is where we get the doctor who shows up at a CPA and goes, I don't know what I did all year. I don't look at numbers. And then you feel beat up and have to pay this big number for your taxes. And it's like you are in denial and you're avoiding it. So that's what happens, you know? Humanist and methodical, 75 percentile. It's just because that's what it takes to be A dentist, you got to care and you got to know details. And then what happens is once you break free from this, you'll have a brand new relationship to numbers and money. And it's, you'll know that it's just your validation for a job well done.

I have a. So I have a question here that is one of my all time favorites. You and I have done this enough that, and I love my dentist friends, but it seems like I always get this question about. And it really is, you said, like a methodical, like a thinker, like there's a protocol and if I don't know something, I go take a course on it and I solve the problem. And if you're, you know, if the problem you're solving is you know how to place an implant. Yes. Or you know how to do better atraumatic extraction. Yes. That's a technical skill. But a lot of your relationship with money or your business, profitability is what it boils down to, is more attitude and approach. There isn't a formula. What I do to be profitable in my business is a little different than you. And even in dentistry, it's a little different. You know, I know docs who have a $10 million practice and another DOC who has a $850,000 practice. They're both happy. They're both happy with what they're doing, they're both happy financially. And if you switch places with them, they would both struggle. And that's the, I think that really is the relationship with, or the fundamental relationship with money. So here's a question. Every year, every year when I talk to my accountant, he makes me feel, this is why it jumped out at me. He makes me feel stupid and broke. Would it make sense to take a finance course? We always get that. Should I get an MBA question? And I know your answer is always no. You know, let somebody else do that. You're the dentist, for crying out loud. You do the dentistry and be the leader of your business. But so the account every year, that's my other favorite thing is they wait one year to see if they're broke or they did well that year and you just can't do that. Right?

Yeah. Well, that's why in the next month we're launching you'll never read a P and L ever again. Our software called Abundance, you plug it in and it's on your phone. It shows you your, your everything you need to have in a dashboard. It's incredible. But if you don't have that, let me just give you what there is to do here. Just identify your relationship to numbers. I'm going to give you the scale, right? So you can apply this to if you want to lose weight, if you want to make more money, just identify where you're starting from. It's actually, you know, you know, looking at it, and once you identify it, then you can elevate it. Here are the four levels. First of all, you're a denial guy or gal. That means that, you know, you need money, you're scared about it, but you have no clue how much you have and how much is going in and how much is going out. And like, I had one of our docs that came in from our last call. She was one of the 10 that registered right away, she's working a second job. Meanwhile, all I did was, Steve, this is serious. She was so in denial about looking at her numbers. She had more than enough to live her life and not be that associate anymore. But because she didn't look, she didn't know. And all I did on that call was bring it close to her. I put her dashboard up. I showed her her numbers. I figured out how much it costs her to run her life and her business. She's there, and meanwhile, it's costing her her. This really, you know, touched me. It's like it cost her her time with her daughter. Now her daughter got her mom back. Steve, to me, that's the real product here. And I get it. Dennis, you, you know, practice owners, you know, being in denial about your numbers is very natural because we don't want to look at something we don't know a lot about. You don't need to know a lot about this. It's very simple. It's money in, money out, money left over. That's it. And I know that, you know, that might be hard to do, but step number one is getting out of denial. Just look at it. Just all there is to do is practice being with it, look at it, bring it close to you, and then ask for help. You know, raising your hand post pandemic is a great thing. Whether it's me, whether it's Steve, whether it's your cpa. Ask for help. We like automated things that come to you and say, look, you're spending too much money in this area, this area, this area. And really, you know what most practice owners are missing? Their top line is half of what it could be if they just focused in internally on their. Their patient retention and case acceptance, literally 50%, 30%. So when you raise your top line, Steve, your Bottom line, percentages go down. And here's the other good news. If you add maybe 20,000, 70% of that is profit, you're not, you're not continuing with that 30% or 70% overhead, 30% profit, that next rung after your fixed costs are done. When I showed this to her, she was, she's smart. Nobody ever just explained it to her. And now she changed her life, right? So denial committee. Here's my other favorite one. We talk about not making money. We're talking about it. And we have team meetings and the same agenda items, Steve. New, we need new patients, we need to collect, we need to show up on time. All the same BS on the, on the, on the team meeting notes from 10 years ago. They're the same ones because you're talking about it. Number three level is knowing your numbers. When you know your numbers, like, I know I'm 207. I'm seven pounds overweight. So it's like, all right, I could be seven pounds of my weight. I want to be 200, right? That's my, that's my fighting weight. When we go to Turks and Cakes, you know, I got to, I got to get down to my 200 weight, Steve. And here's the deal. I need to move from knowing to owning. Owning is I, I went keto March Madness. I am all keto, no sugar, pulled sugar out. I'm exercising every day. I mean, my wife is on board supporting me. I'm going to get there. So owning is like knowing the number and then having a plan and a structure and an accountability to do something about it.

Well, so in reading the chapter, and again, you can see where I've dog eared and I keep my notes, you said something, I think that's very profound. And I'm going to go back to this question. Every year when I talk to my accountant, you know, as a business school graduate, here's what you learn about accountants. I love my accountants. Accountants look backwards. Accountants tell you what you did, they tell you what happened. So at the end of the year, they tally it all up and they say, hey, this is what happened. And not only that, but if you had a great year, you get to pay Uncle Sam a big fat chunk of that. And, you know, April 15th is an ugly day. And you thought you were doing well then if you spent that money on a boat, you know, now you got to sell the boat to get the money to pay the taxes. If you didn't do so well, now you're going into the year saying, holy Cow, you know, I'm losing money. No wonder I can't, you know, no wonder payroll's tight. No wonder I can't pay off those credit cards. But that's all in the rearview mirror. So it's like you saying, hey, I want to be seven pounds lighter. I'm going to do some stuff and just see what happens. You know, a couple months from now, I'm going to weigh myself and see how I did. You can't do that. You have to take control of it. And there were a couple things in this chapter that jumped out at me, that again, as a person who looks at the dental practice as the business, not the clinician, one of them. You've got quite a few in here. There's a list, and I think there are 18 if I'm not mistaken.

18? Yep.

You go into very specific detail. One of them is getting paid for the work you do.

Yes.

And how many docs do you know that feel that? You know, even as a practice owner, I would say, listen, you know, we all love Mrs. Jones and she needs work and she's going to be our pro bono case for this quarter. We'll do four year one. Each quarter the team can take a vote, but we pick her and you do it and everybody feels good. But then you go into the practice where They've got a Mrs. Jones like every week day, and you know, you're tying up a lot of time and not that you're not caring and you don't love your patients, you're not there to do the dentistry, but if you don't get that relationship with money, get paid for the work you do, you know, you're not going to get to be a dentist for much longer.

Well, it's not only the cost of not getting paid what you did. So think about what happens. All the expenses, the wages, the fixed overhead, the time that was taken up, the opportunity cost of not putting another patient in there, the cost of tracking the money down and paying a third party source to get it in. Here's the biggest cost. People don't come back in your hygiene department because people don't want to confront you and say, I owe you money, so I don't want to go there. And then your retention goes out of existence. So the cost of doing this is exponential, Steve. It's not just one dimensional. So getting paid for what you do is actually a privilege and an honor and it brings integrity to your work. You don't go to a supermarket and say, pay me later, see ya. You know, no, no, people respect that. They know they gotta pay, but just know. And what we talked about. Reframe your relationship to money. That's how you approach that. You know, I really want to talk about another couple things in this chapter. This is the game changer. And this is like 9 out of 10 docs that I bump into have this. So I want to give it. I think it's a universal truth. Okay, Bringing accountability to the front desk, Steve. So, you know, the smaller practices, they have usually one person at the front desk. And when I say you really need to bring accountability. And every practice, I don't care how small you are. And this is very scary for dentists. You don't want to do it on your own. You should have two people. Here's why you can't get past where you are. If you have a person answering the phones, checking a person in and out, and then you're going to sit down with them and go over a $5,000 case and. And remove the barriers and do it properly. Because most doctors don't know what they don't know about making this decision. And I help them make an easy financial decision. They always say, I can't afford another person. Well, you can't afford not to. And here's how. Two profis, Two bitewings. No, two profies. Set of bitewings, two exams, a crown and a buildup. Let's just say the annual value of a patient is on PPO fees. Let's call it $1200. Every hour that goes by cost you $600. Now, if that person costs you $100 and they just recovered, the appointment coordinator just covered one appointment that's going to go through your hygiene department. Because it's not just the hygiene revenue, it's the restorative care that comes out of that hygiene revenue. So the cost of that is so big when you, when you miss that appointment. And a person who is doing a treatment plan can't fail the schedule. They're just too busy and they're just in survival. So when you have two people, a treatment coordinator handle handles all the finances. An appointment coordinator handles time, money and time, the two commodities that cost you the most. In a dental practice, if you have 600 to 700 patients, you can afford to have to pay two team members at the front desk.

So you have that something. And I'm looking here, somebody. I've got several questions coming in. And again, if you got questions, put them in. They will all either get answered here or afterwards. The, you know, I've always sort of used a rule of thumb and I want to get your thought on this. For every dollar of hygiene you do, you should see at least $3 or 4 or 5 in restorative or additional treatment off of that. So hygiene really drives that treatment. And one of the chapters in the books here, I wrote it down, it's how you can use existing tools to generate more treatment. Yeah, sort of what you're talking about. There's a patient in the chair, you're doing hygiene you can do. You know, you got two choices. You can either do the hygiene they came in for, build their insurance and say, see in six months, give them a little bit of a treatment plan, they're going to think about it and they go. Or you can use tools you already have to help in again, schedule treatment they need. Not. We're not talking about treatment they don't need so we can make more money and buy a new boat. You're talking about treatment they do need that you, you propose. So what are the tools that are already there that you. That they can use?

Yeah, I mean, Steve, 28% of the treatment that's presented is accepted. That's not a good conversion rate in my book. It just doesn't work. And so, you know, there's a five step process that doctors can have right away. The first is you have to know people buy on why, so you need to find out why. They're there for their reason, not yours. So I always say you need to connect to the patient on what they're connected to. So you want to get in their world health, function, esthetics, you know, finding out what they need and want and tying the dentistry to it. The next is very simple and you can download from my site. This is called the healthy mouth baseline. And this is what's healthy in our practice. And then here's how it's connected to the body and its impact on the body. Value Creator removes the asymptomatic care issue that people think that there has to be symptoms and pain present. This highlights that, especially if you want to do airway or larger cases, if the patient doesn't see something third party, they rely only on your words. And by the way, if you don't have a system, most people aren't talking about what's healthy or what's not. They get them in, they clean their teeth and send them on their way. You don't want to be doing that. And then the third thing is, is what we call the problem consequence, Shush. This is how you don't never have to sell dentistry again where you move the patient to buy because they understand that they have a problem. Intraoral cameras do not have. You know, don't have your hygienist run for them. They should be an arm's length away. You should have a 60. This, this TV behind me, 65 inches. You should have that thing, the big picture. I. I would do pre cleaning lower interiors. It shows the patient all the stuff. I would show them bleeding. I would show them holes in their teeth, crack teeth visually. People respond visually, and they already have it there. See, most people are telling them what they need. No symptoms present. Don't believe you think you're trying to buy your next targa and they're in their mouth. It doesn't work, Steve. And then they get mad and leave. And so. And then the last one is you got to have a system that moves it from the back to the front. We call it a trust transfer. And then you have to have a sit down with the treatment coordinator and really go through and present a very simple approach that you can get from CareCredit. I mean, we use their system, which is how to present a case using paid in full monthly payment or two payments. Really simple. All. All right. At your fingertips. Have most of this already.

So these are. So what you're talking about is not, you know, it always. I think docs who listen to this, practice owners, they always think, all right, so I need to buy this thing. This isn't a thing you can buy. This is people you already have doing a job, thinking of their job differently. And again, it's not selling treatment they don't need. And by the way, I love the healthy mouth baseline. And we'll. We'll put that link in here because that. Is that cool.

Yeah, it's really cool.

The link below here, and the reason I like that is what it really does is starts a conversation. So I would always say, you know, how many times with airway. How many times does a patient walk in? And you, you know, you check the boxes and you check their health history and you say, all right, has anything changed since your last visit? And they say, you know, not really, but I think I'm having some airway issues. Can you check that out? You know, no patients ever. I'm sure somebody has, but no patient's ever come in and done that. But what you give them is, my gums are bleeding. And that starts a conversation that says, you know, that shouldn't happen.

Or this one. Here's the airway Right here, Steve. Let me see if I can get it right here. See, it has the question. It says right here, are you chronic fatigue? Do you have sleep disorder and snoring? The patient doesn't walk in and go, hey, I can't wait to go to my dentist to get my sleep appliance. They're not right.

I'm having trouble sleeping. I'll catch that on my next hygiene visit. So that's your. That is a conversation, and maybe this is a way to wrap it up. I think of it more as you helping them get the treatment they need and they pay you for it. And so you're not focused on the money, you're focused on the treatment they need. And you know, we talked a little bit ago about the relationship with money and the tools you already have. And I want to, in fact, I want to not forget this. This is one of my all time favorite stories. And I think to your point here, I went into a practice, you know, years ago in the consulting world. This Doc had about $850,000 practice, and he had over $900,000 in accounts receivable. And I know it's jumping around a little bit, but I said, you're a better bank than you are a dentist. And he didn't understand what I was saying. And I said, you've done the work. This isn't money you're asking for. You've done the work and you loaned your patients the money to pay for it in the form of an account receivable. And you're not getting that money back, certainly not getting it with interest. You're technically a $900,000 bank and an $850,000 dental practice. And so once you get those all hitting on the right cylinder, your treatment planning, well, you're collecting it at the front desk or you've got a way to collect it. I'm a big fan of CareCredit, as you know. I don't care what the fee is. I'd rather take whatever they're going to give me today in cash than zero down the road or zero in accounts receivable. But that's kind of what you're talking about with tools they already have. You don't really have to do anything different than what you have now. You just have to focus on it a little bit differently in terms your measure is the money.

Kind of beautifully, beautifully stated, Steve. I mean, that's simple, succinct.

I stole it from a great book, chapter three of Million Dollar Dentistry.

Beautifully stated. Really well done, Steve. Yes, you nailed it. We got more questions.

Yeah, I've got one here that is. I always love the team question. So I'm going to lump this into the. The team bucket over here. And again, we've got a few we're probably not going to get to, but that's okay. You know, keep them coming. Gary will respond. They come in and he can email you back. This says, my team hates when I talk about money. I love the team questions. My team hates when I talk about money or the lack of it. What can I say to get them to understand how important it is to keeping my practice alive and paying them? And them is in quotation marks, by the way. Good question. And as the owner and leader of your practice, I mean, it's kind of. Right. Their paycheck is dependent on the money that the patients who come in the door for hygiene, the expanded treatment that gets done and the money that gets collected. That's what you use to pay everybody with, right?

Yeah, it's control freak. I mean, you become a control freak because you're in fear and scarcity and you don't have any systems or processes. And the team doesn't have the same level of urgency. This is what I. In my research, you know, the team doesn't have the same urgency according to most doctors. So that's why they hold on to it. Very simple system for the doc. By the way, team members don't like when doctors talk money in the back. But also, patients don't like it either when you. When you step over that line and you start talking money to them, they have a different relationship to you. You should not have a handpiece in their wallet in the same two, you know, same hands. So here's how you handle that. They'll say, how much is it? Say, look, my job is to let you know what you need and why you need it. We have a great treatment coordinator. Brittany will sit down with you because I also don't know. And if you're taking insurance, I don't know how much your insurance pays. You know what she does? She maximizes your insurance. She is the best in the world at it. It takes a professional to do that, and Brittany is my professional. Do you have any further. And you have to ask this closing questions. Do you have any other medical or dental questions for me before you move forward with your treatment? And I'll have Leslie take you up to Brittany, and Brittany will sit down with you and she will explain everything to fit it into your lifestyle.

That's magic. And that's the doc talking about treatment and keeping the focus on the needed treatment, not on the money. And I always say, if you do your job well, the money will follow. It just will. And.

If you have a money system, because if you don't have your attention on the money like we've been talking about and have a new relationship to it and have a structure with two people at the front desk so you can collect it, present it, schedule it, because that's all related to money and time and having two people to do that. And if you have a big practice, you need a multiple of that.

And.

And then, you know, actually have somebody who, by the way, we have treatment coordinators. You know what the question is? When do your palms sweat? And they go, what do you mean, when do my palms sweat? I go, how much money? Like, do you have to ask, when you ask for money, what is the number that you start getting a little nervous that you're asking for? Whatever. And if they say 50 bucks or 100 bucks, they're not going to be able to receive money. So we have to teach them about empathy and sympathy. Sympathy is going in the hole with the person with. When they say they don't have money, empathy is, I'm sorry, you're in that hole. Do you want to get out of that hole? I help you get your treatment, and we'll fit it into your lifestyle. And once they distinguish empathy from sympathy, they. They're able to get past it and not map their money money issues. If you're a team leader and you are a treatment coordinator, not mapping your money issues on top of the patient and not judging them, we call it no filtering, no judging of the patient. It's a very powerful distinction.

So it really is the same first step is you get your head in the right place with money. Again, we joke about the money, but as a successful business person, I always say there's this point at which we're bumping along the Runway and we're fighting it, and we get up a little bit in March, and then we're back on the Runway in April, and we sort of bounce along. But if you do it with intention, if you don't just say, all right, we're running out of Runway, I hope we take off. But if you do it and say, all right, I know that by the time we get to the end of the Runway, we'll be ready to take off. And you do it right. There's just every business I've owned and run and done, there's this point at which it just starts to take off. And now I don't have to worry about, you know, I'm running out of money. I don't have to worry about payrolls, I don't have to worry about bills. I just don't have to worry because my machine runs in a way that provides enough and.

Yeah, and it reports to you on your phone. Yes, yeah, but not your bank account. And production collections. Seven months prior is the sales cycle for a dental practice. Because you have to pre appoint the patient, they have to show up, you diagnose them, you treat them, you then collect, and then it goes into your bank. That's seven months. So you move out of reactivity and putting out fires, and you move to leading indicators instead of lagging indicators. And it's all done to your smartphone so you can just rest. And like you using the plane analogy, once you take off, it's easier to bump the rudder just to just to course correct rather than, you know, fuel up the engine and get it lift once it's lifted, literally, it is like much more on autopilot when it's systematized and has its measures associated to it. And it all goes back to Steve, your relationship to money. And if you can expand that, then we could just go to work and fix the systems. And that's like boom, boom, boom. And then if you want to retire, if you want to take more time off or you want to be, leave that associate job, you know, invest in the asset that you invested in and spend more time with your daughter like that doctor, you'll do that. You know, we have doctors that want to move. They're ready to move. They don't know how to do it. You got it. You got to plan your money and you want to look if it's not your CPA and he's like, he or she is just like a bean counter. Don't work with them. It's fine. If they do your taxes and you trust them, find somebody that you like to work with, somebody that makes sense, raise their hand, and they'll hand hold you through the whole thing. And it's like, you know, amazing.

And again, your accountant is looking at. Your accountant tallies up everything that happened and tells you what happened. And you know, I like what you just said there. It's seven months. So if I can't, if I'm struggling to pay payroll today, that problem didn't start today, it started seven months ago. And I just let it happen to where the end result is today. And if the answer is you know, here's the cool thing. If the answer is what we always hear, how many times a day do you hear it? I just need more patience, more new patients. That's the answer. I think one of the things that you do in the book that you outline very well is you may not need more patients. You may have all you need right now. You're just not treatment planning as efficiently as you need. You're not, certainly not collecting. You're not billing and collecting it in a way that you need. And there's a lot of treatment that's coming through your practice right now. You're just missing. And so this many patients might be just fine. And I think after. How many practices have you worked with?

A couple dozen, maybe 6,000 over my career. 6,000.

You know, you see the same things, which is really cool. You see the same things over and over. And anybody who's listening or watching, you know, I've got a lot of questions here that it looks like we'll get to in an email. So just keep them in. But coming in. But I think in our first episode, that's what we really heard is a lot of docs think they're unique. Everybody else is doing great, and I'm a sucky loser over here because, you know, I'm having trouble paying my bills. No. So many docs come out of dental school and are in exactly the same boat. So get over that and then develop and understand your business runs on money. Your patients run on how the care you give them, on how well you do. They're happy, but you still have to pay the bills to be able to see those patients. So it all kind of dovetails together. And I'm keeping a good an eye on time. I know we could do this forever and ever and ever. That's why we broke it down into chapters. So I wanted to ask you my last important question. So anybody who's watching, we're going to tell you here in a second how to get your free book. When you do, you're going to learn that the next episode, chapter four, number four, is what you really should be doing with your dental hygienist. Now, I'm pretty eager to hear this one. We've both been in the business long enough that can't wait to hear what the answer to that is.

Oh, my God, Steve. There was no me too. In 2006, my wife told me I should. In addition, eight, I should rename that chapter. But I get such a chuckle out of it. I just need to keep it In Steve, I just got to.

Well, and I think everybody knows, you know, what it's not about, but it is. And you know the cool thing as we sort of wrap up here, running a dental practice can beat you just bloody your whole career, but it doesn't have to. And you were talking a while ago about the docs that you've worked with. One of my all time favorites is Donna Williams. You know, she literally decided to take, is it two months every year. She just said, I want to take two months off, go to Africa, do some work there. That, that, that fulfills her. And not just once, not, not just one year. But she does it every single year, right?

Yes sir.

And you know, and you've engineered into her being able to do that. She's gotten her money, right?

Well, and here's the thing, Steve. Most doctors think that they, they live in a defaulted world, like this is just how life has to be. And we interrupt that and we create a designed world. I say, what are your dreams? What are your passions? What are your goals? Oh, if I could ever do that, that would be amazing. Let's just do it. And they're like dumbfounded. One of the things that if people are going to connect with me here, one of the first things I do is I say, what are your dreams and aspirations? It really saddens me sometimes, Steve, that people can't answer that question that adults stop. Especially after the, this interruption that we had with the pandemic. People stop dreaming, they stopped creating and their heads down in survival. And what this is about, Steve, pick your head up, start generating your dreams and excitements of travel to Europe or setting up, you know, by charity. We're doing, you know, we just, we're setting up on suicide prevention charity. Just today we started like, like that's one of my dreams because, you know, my life was saved so I want to save other people. Right. It's like, you know, these are the types of things that like once you start dreaming, you're like, hey, I can have that, I can have that. The distinction have is what we talked about today, the ability to receive, you know, and here I'm going to leave leave you with this. If you can't receive an acknowledgment like, Steve, you are so smart and so kind and I appreciate you as a partner. Like, like literally like you are such a good man and I love your wife Paula and I love your team. They treat me with honor. And like if you go Gary, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah. But if you go Gary, thank you. Received. That's money. All money is, is a form of acknowledgment with a plastic card, pixels on a screen or dead guys on green pieces of paper, which we don't use that much anymore. But it's. That's all it is.

Yeah.

And once you get and stay out of the way of receiving the fruits of that tree that you nurtured, you will take this. This. This is what you'll be left with. Pain is necessary. Suffering is optional. See, pain is necessary because it tells you I need to make a change against my integrity. My integrity is at. Is being compromised. My personal integrity is being compromised, and I need to make a change. That is pain. Suffering is shoving it down, not looking at it, not dealing with it, and not living a full, blessed, fulfilled, happy, joyous life. And that is what I am committed to with our practice owner listeners and their teams and their spouses and their families. That is what happens when people work with us. It is a light, a beacon of light turns on and, and then they start giving that light away to other people and then all of a sudden their whole community is transformed. That's what happens when people work and do this work well.

And I think the, again, the cool part is you've got a. You wrote it down 14, 15 years ago. Hasn't changed. You know, business hasn't changed. And it's really, it's not a step. One is go tell your front office person to do this. It's not like dentistry. There's not a protocol. It's more of a mindset and getting yourself right. And that's what we're kind of covering here. So as we promised, you can get your own copy of Gary's book. I'm going to put a link here down below. And if you want to get it early and find out what you really should be doing with your dental hygienist, get it early. I haven't read. I don't read ahead, so I'm not sure what that is. But we'll put the link down below, get the book. And you've also agreed, as we did with each of these, and I know your time is really tight and you're, you know, getting any kind of time with you is a, is, is a gift. The first 10 people who schedule a discovery call actually will get you right. So you have time for 10 and they click the link below. They're going to get the book anyway, free. And then they'll get an option at the end is to just say, thanks for the Free book. Thanks for listening, and I'm moving on. Or they can click and say, hey, I'd like to schedule just a chat with Gary. No obligation. They're not paying anything. They're not signing up for anything. No. You know, nobody's gonna put them on a spam list and, you know, come after their kids or anything. It's just a chat. Although, you know, I have five kids, and if it cost me, like, maybe my firstborn or second, I'd probably sign up for that. But it gives them. It gives them the ability to just say, gary, I do this. And we have a lot of questions down here that are. That are, I think, a little more specific. So. So the first 10 get time with you, right?

You bet. You bet. It's a privilege, and it's really fun. It's really safe, and it really opens your eyes, takes your shoulders, and brings them down. And what everybody said they left with, like, nine out of ten. They leave with hope for a better future. I said, what are you leaving today's session with? They go, hope. I didn't know I could have all this. I'm like, yes, you can hope. And then I show them how they can do it, and then it just rests their mind, and then they just go, go. Start doing it. You know, it's really great.

Well, the work is hard, but if you're not. I always say, you know, we're not. I'm not saying it's easy, but I'm saying if you don't enjoy doing it, you're doing it wrong. You should be doing something else. And, you know. So any parting words, Any wise. Gary always has the wise words at the end. One of the things I appreciate about you. What are your wise words to leave people with today?

Oh, man, I got a good one for you. This one. You ready? The secret to success is no secret at all.

There you go. And, you know, the other thing is, Gary, like, I would have all those written down in a wall here. Like, you keep them up here. So that's what. That's what inspires me. Well, this has been a great episode. Chapter three again. Watch for the next one. If you haven't seen the first two, you know, they. They really sort of lead one to the other, to the other chapter or the first one about Larry DDS is just, you know, we're all. It's kind of the same experience. Two is learning how your understanding of accepting success, and three is money.

And.

And Gary's a sports guy.

So number one, that's called the Yankees, baby. It's baseball season, Steve. Number one, Yankees. Rogers.

So by the time we record the next one, you'll know they already had played the first game, right?

Oh, yeah, they're playing spring training, so. Yeah, it's great. Yeah.

Well, that's so. And obviously, you know, you enjoy what you're doing. You work with 6,000 practices. There are days, I know through the pandemic, you were just worn out. And most of it, I think, was keeping people's head in the right place, right?

Every Tuesday, Steve. Every Tuesday. 2,000 people on every Tuesday for 12 weeks. It was amazing. We still get thank you notes and thank you, Steve, for your wisdom that you brought. I mean, was amazing. People love the fact that you had this ability to give the landscape about what was happening, you know, it was incredible. It was what a great partnership of eight people every Tuesday. I'll never forget it. It was so moving.

Well, it's a lot of fun and, you know, we have the same mindset if, you know, we can back and offer a little something that, that takes a practice owner who really wants to be a dentist, but suddenly is the owner. And now, you know, they found that out the hard way and get them through the next week and the next week and the next week and give them that vision to just keep doing it and look forward. I mean, that's, that's what we're here to do. That's, you know, so.

Amen. Well, Gary, thanks for a great one.

That was Practice Owners. Keep your. Put your questions in, click the link, get your free book and spend a little time with Gary.

Thanks, Steve. Thanks, practice owners.

Bye, guys.

Great one. Bye now.