by Karah Karah | Mar 14, 2018 | Prescriptions for your Practice
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With April drawing nearer, there’s one thing that’s sure to be on all of our minds: taxes. Understanding financial reports and navigating the tax code can definitely feel daunting, especially with recent changes to consider. But thankfully we have Jonathan VanHorn back on the show to share his insight.
The founder of Dentist Metrics and the man behind the Start Your Dental Practice podcast, Jonathan has helped dental practices all over the country grow their businesses by gaining control of their finances. In this episode, he discusses common financial mistakes he sees dentists making, his advice about what to look for in an accountant, and what dentists should know for the upcoming tax season.
Key Quotes:
- “The biggest mistake I see [among dentists] is people not really understanding what a CPA does.”
- “You need to know what [your CPA is] is going to be doing for you from an accounting perspective, what they’re going to be doing for you from a tax perspective if they offer something like financial planning … et cetera, et cetera.”
- “I’m of the very strict belief that if you had the absolute best dental CPA from a technical perspective, and you had the absolute best general CPA from a technical perspective, you’d have no difference in taxes.”
- “There are general CPAs out there that would do just as well as a dental CPA, and would likely probably cost less, but the problem is, it’s really hard to figure out who those are if you don’t understand the tax code.”
- “I think if you are a single practice owner, and you try and set up a DSO for owning a single practice under the guise of qualifying for Section 199A, you’re moving from aggressive to gambling.”
- “One thing that is completely consistent in the tax courts is that the IRS does not like the reclassification of income. They are not fans of that, and they are well known for trying to cut through that like hot butter.”
- “Everything you do in front of the IRS has to have a valid business reason—it has to be substantiated in some fashion, and ‘I was gonna save more money in taxes’ is not a valid reason.”
- “I think Dental Success Network is going to be something that’s going to be a powerhouse for years to come.”
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by Karah Karah | Mar 7, 2018 | Legendary Leadership
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One of the most important aspects of running a successful practice is putting in the time and effort to be a good leader. Dr. Tim McNamara is a shining example of this, and his success in dentistry is a testament to the strong focus he puts not only on creating a great customer experience, but also on leading his team so they know exactly how to deliver that experience.
After more than seven years doing business consulting in the healthcare field, Tim went from helping hospitals mitigate risks to starting his own dental practice. His unique path into dentistry—along with his ability to see obstacles and turn them into opportunities—has given him a fresh perspective on the industry that we can all learn from. In this episode, he shares what it takes to be a great leader, the lessons he learned from his consulting career that still help him today, and his tips on how to shorten the learning curve on your own path to building your dream practice.
Key Quotes:
- “What you have in a business is risk, and how you control that risk is everything. And then how you lead your people to implement those controls will dictate what your revenue is.”
- “It’s funny to me because everyone talks about secrets in dentistry. … The secret is you. If you just spend some time on leadership and understanding your business, that’s the secret.”
- “When I opened, I did so kind of with this wild idea that demographics matter, but that the dentist and the systems probably matter a little bit more.”
- “The best way to grow is, yes, boost marketing, but turn the customer service experience on.”
- “What I’ve noticed in most dental clinics is lack of leadership.”
- “We need a place where people can ask real questions without getting beat up for it. And so what do we do? We create a community.”
- “I judge a lot of my practice and how it’s operating by how well I sleep at night and how little stress I have at home.”
- “All of my breakthroughs have come when I stopped being so frickin’ independent and realized that there is help out there.”
- “Your advice should be coming from people who are in your exact same situation, that actually stay awake late at night in the fetal position, and that have figured out how to get out of the fetal position.”
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by Karah Karah | Feb 28, 2018 | Bold Biographies
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There are many roadblocks presented when developing a dental career. From financial struggles to battling introversion and depression, Dr. Russell Kirk shares his journey through all of it. He talks about his valuable experience in the military, how he learned humility, anger management, leadership, and how to prioritize the important things in life.
In this episode, Russell speaks in-depth about his military career and how valuable it was to his dentistry career and education. He also shares some struggles and issues along the way and how he overcame them and learned valuable lessons from each. Russell emphasizes the importance of a strong work ethic, self-responsibility, being open to criticism, and accepting help. Through developing these traits and practices he has become happier and more successful in his life and career.
Key Quotes:
- “There’s a lot of, a lot of learning to do as soon as you get into practice.”
- “The older I get, the smarter my parents and grandparents were.”
- “Anything worth doing isn’t going to be easy. If you can outwork the other person, you can sometimes outwork talent.”
- “The educational opportunities in the military are really robust.”
- “Early in the game I liked to blame everyone else that things weren’t going right, and it was pretty frustrating, and now I realize that at the end of the day it’s all on your shoulders.”
- “A lot of us have similar stories and there’s variations but the underlying theme is, it’s a tough profession and life is tough but there are other people out there and we’re trudging along and doing okay.”
- “You get out here on an island by yourself and it’s easy to get discouraged and it’s easy to get frustrated then you go to a meeting or have a conversation like this and you come away with a little bit quicker step.”
- “You have to stop being the victim and start being accountable for everything in your life.”
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by Karah Karah | Feb 23, 2018 | Prescriptions for your Practice
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This is a very special episode with an exciting announcement that has been hard to keep quiet until now! You’ll hear some familiar voices in today’s discussion, as we have The Dentalpreneur, Mark Costes, and The Dental Hacks, Jason Lipscomb and Alan Mead, joining me to share the big news.
We’ve teamed up with some of the most well-respected names in dentistry to create something that will help dentists take their practices to the next level. Listen in to learn all about it now!
Key Quotes:
- “That’s what makes dentistry exciting for me, is just watching people innovate and then taking that information back and putting it into my practice.”
- “The people that you want to learn from are the people who are literally in their offices learning.”
- “When I start self-leadership, the team is easier to lead, and when the team is easier to lead, the practice reaches new levels.”
- “Sometimes in your practice, you’re the smartest guy in the room, and to perpetually not be the smartest guy in the room is a really good way to level up your life, your practice, and all those sorts of things.”
- “Once you see someone else reach new heights, it’s almost simple for you to do the same.”
- “A big part of our quest is to create an empowering and safe place.”
- “We’ve really gone through meticulously and thought about all the pain points in our own private practice journey and created a support system so that you can be in the number one position once and for all.”
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by Karah Karah | Feb 21, 2018 | Bold Biographies
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As academics, it can be easy and even quite enjoyable to continually be feeding ourselves new knowledge but if we never put that knowledge into practice, it means nothing. Dr. Justin Bhullar joins us on the show to share his journey of pushing through some tough obstacles to arrive where he is today. His optimism and work ethic are inspiring and he has lots of great insight on learning, improving and leading that you can learn from and implement into your own practice.
Justin explains how he turned his pain points and weaknesses into strengths and motivators. He also emphasizes the importance of the people you work with and how to take your leadership to the next level. Justin leaves us with the powerful idea that we should plan to fail and explains how that mindset will lead to resilience and strongly affect our ability to learn and grow.
Key Quotes:
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by Karah Karah | Feb 14, 2018 | Maverick Mind Shifts
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On this episode you will get to sit in on Dr. Dave Maloley’s presentation from the recent Voices of Dentistry Conference. His powerful message is all about what it means to have a relentless mind that pushes past crippling challenges and allows you to live your best life. Dr. Dave shares some valuable insight on how to ask the right questions, how to set goals that mean something and how to take control of your life and your practice.
He shares his story and how his success, and more-so his huge failures, led him to where he is today. The idea that you can live your best year ever and continue to recreate that is a central theme to his encouraging and inspiring message. He emphasizes the importance of good leadership and relentlessness as you take specific actionable steps to make the necessary mind shifts and changes in your life.
Key Quotes:
- It was at that moment that I realized that the epic life I’m always talking about on the podcast, I was living that epic life.
- I sat down, I broke my life into 16 different categories and I wrote down exactly what I want.
- I really believe that we can engineer, after I executed that, we can engineer our best year over and over and over again.
- This is about accountability and accountability taken to the extreme is intensely powerful.
- I thought about all the time I spent complaining about my team and it was always just a reflection on me.
- My practice is not limited by its opportunity, my practice is limited by its leader.
- If you talk to people at the end of their days, they’ll tell you that life is all about relationships.
- It’s okay to be selfish so that you can give more.
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by Karah Karah | Feb 7, 2018 | Prescriptions for your Practice
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Getting a dental practice up and running is one matter, finding the right staff and systems is a whole different matter. When faced with various issues concerning billing, insurance and staffing, Dr. James Anderson found effective solutions that not only worked for his business but for many other dental practices around the country. Today his company, eAssist Dental Solutions, is providing truly helpful solutions to dentist offices and he is here to share his journey and top tips to running an effective and stress-free practice.
James talks about how he got started in dentistry and discovered (the hard way) some key problems that bog down dental offices everywhere. He shares the most basic and important ways that an office should be handling insurance, billing, customer service and more. He also gives some helpful tips and tricks for getting the most out of insurance and serving your clients and practice to your best ability. James talks about eAssist’s core values and really casts an inspiring vision for how office management and accountability should work.
Key Quotes:
- “I wanted to be a physician because I wanted to serve mankind.”
- “I just set a goal every year to build a new practice.”
- “I really didn’t want to build a big DSO at all. I wanted to give people like me, who wanted their own dental practice, a turn-key practice.”
- “In the end the hardest thing was always finding someone in the front to manage the practice.”
- “They hope that they don’t have people that are following up properly because after 12 months or 18 months, depending on the insurance plan, they don’t have to pay you legally. It’s called a timely filing issue.”
- “You know you have a problem when someone says, “We love your office doc but, no offense, your billing is all messed up.” “
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by Karah Karah | Jan 24, 2018 | Hints for Happiness
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When it comes to pursuing your goals and your overall quality of life, few things have as significant an impact as your mindset and your work ethic. With their strong involvement in the dental community—and their shared history of growing up on farms—Cole Hackett, Luis Mariusso, and John Wesley Halliburton know this all too well.
Three of the seven guys behind the Life and Dentistry Podcast, Cole, Luis, and John strive to help uplift and inspire others in the field. In this episode, they discuss how their upbringings taught them the importance of working hard, as well as how their can-do attitudes got them through dental school and continue to serve them as they navigate their careers.
Listen in to hear how they maintain their optimistic outlooks, why it’s sometimes best to take the leap even if you don’t feel ready, and so much more.
Key Quotes:
- “Anybody who’s determined is going to be able to achieve the goals that they set out for themselves. If you don’t give up, you’ll be able to achieve whatever you want.”
- “I think the farm background definitely helped prepare for the hard work and responsibility it takes to not only be successful enough to get accepted into a dental school, but to become successful as a dentist, too.”
- “I hear more and more from the victims, and less and less from the victors. You can talk to one guy and he’ll say ‘dentistry is the ticket to the unlimited, you choose your own path,’ and the next guy will speak doom and gloom. And they both live in the same world, but they’ve each chosen different paths.”
- “I’m a huge proponent of practice ownership. I think we think of it from the tax advantages, the upside and paycheck, and being able to achieve profits, but as you guys really get into it, I think you’ll realize that it brings out the best in you.”
- “You can pull up different podcasts and search any subject that you want to, and somebody’s talking about it in the world of dentistry. Whether it be financial advising, whether it be consulting for your practice, how to become a better dentist, technical advice … if you listen to it, it gets you excited about dentistry.”
- “This is why the people we’re around are so successful and big into dentistry—because they keep lighting each other’s fires and encouraging each other.”
- “Another big thing that’s important to us is not only being great clinicians and great dentists, but also being great at life, and having that good balance between your work, your friends, your family, and your faith.”
- “There’s nothing but opportunity, but it’s the viewpoint that you approach it at that’s powerful or damaging, depending on where you’re standing.”
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by Karah Karah | Jan 17, 2018 | Maverick Mind Shifts
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There are so many road blocks that get in the way of a strong performing team and effective practice but almost all of them can be overcome through strong leadership and integrity. Paul Etchison has some great insight into this and shares some valuable advice on how to become a great leader and use integrity to make your practice better and life easier. He emphasizes the fact that seemingly small details, such as touch-points, are more important and impactful than people think.
Paul discusses the importance of doing everything with integrity and how you can use humility and honesty to become a better leader and improve your practice. He also talks about the importance of intentionality through setting goals, refining systems and always improving your leadership skills. He also talks about the unexpected complications of going from 4-3 work days and how he has navigated that experience in a positive way.
Key Quotes:
- “I think people aren’t setting goals. Once you get out and figure out what you want to do and be intentional about it, then you can reverse engineer all the steps that you need to get there. I think a lot of people never put that pen to paper.”
- “He who walks with integrity, walks securely. And he who takes crooked paths will be found out.” – Proverbs 10:8
- “If you do everything for the right reasons and you do the right thing all the time, you have nothing to worry about.”
- “Your word should be golden. Everybody should know that when you say something, you’re going to do it.”
- “The leadership information is out there and I think people don’t really seek it out because it’s not sexy.”
- “It all starts with leadership so that’s gotta be the foundation. That’s number one. If you can’t lead, nothings gonna happen – you’re not getting anything done.”
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by Karah Karah | Jan 10, 2018 | Maverick Mind Shifts
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Trying new things always has some risk involved but today’s guest, Dr. Baron Grutter, has pushed the limits and found that taking chances pays off more often than not. Listen in to get some great information and motivation from Baron as he explains how he got to where he is and discusses how he navigated his dentistry career and came out as a leader, teacher, and innovator in the field.
Baron talks in detail about the effect digital dentistry has had on his practice and how he has integrated cutting edge technology into his business. He also talks about mindset and the importance of delegating tasks and keeping a great team around you. The effect on clients and the money saved by his innovative practice is also discussed and analyzed. Baron elaborates on some incredible orthodontic software that could quite possibly be a game-changer in many practices.
Key Quotes:
- “Don’t be afraid to try something because worse thing that’d happen – you’d go back to what you were doing.”
- “Maybe I’m digitally claustrophobic or whatever- I want to be able to interact with other people.”
- “If I know an answer I’d love to share it.”
- “I want things to not look so complicated- because it is so intimidating for most people.”
- “All you do is bring in the model, move the teeth where you want to, press go, and it sets all the movements for you.”
- “I can do a 10 aligner case (10 upper and 10 lower) and it’s under $100 for me.”
- “If you can save $1500 on your lab bill, you could literally hire a whole assistant, do two cases a month, and she/he would have 4 hours of work that entire month and the salary would be completely covered.”
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