Episode 858: Deciphering Your True Overhead

 Tiff and Dana share the Dental A-Team method to understanding your practice’s true overhead, and how to budget to get that overhead to where you want it to be.

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Transcript:

Tiffanie (00:02.203)

Hey everyone, I have a massive surprise today. Not only am I here with my favorite podcaster, my favorite podcasting buddy, I should say, but today is an incredibly special day. I love Dana with my entire heart. You guys know that. I talk about her every time we get on here. You guys know that. Today is her literal birthday. And this morning I realized I get to podcast.

 

with her on her literal birthday and that is so so special to me like it literally chokes me up and makes me emotional I know I'm a psycho but Dana thank you for spending your birthday with me I feel like I've gotten to see you today more than I have in quite a while since retreat for sure but like quite a while and you decided to jam pack your Friday and you allowed me to be a part of that and it's honestly incredibly special you know how big birthdays are to me

 

Dana (00:45.465)

Yeah.

 

Tiffanie (00:58.043)

So it means a lot to me that you're here podcasting with me and with the rest of our Dental A Team community on your special day. So happy birthday, Dana. How is your birthday so far?

 

Dana (01:08.473)

Aw, thanks Tiff, I really appreciate it. I was excited to be able to squeeze you in on today too, cause you know, I love our time just as much as you do. And my birthday has been amazing. The team has been, just made my morning so special. This is a big birthday, so it just helped kick off this year and make me excited for a birthday that maybe I wouldn't usually be excited for.

 

Tiffanie (01:18.459)

We won't say which birthday it is just know on the day of recording this that it's Dana's special day and Dana I

 

was thinking, well, first off, I'm the should have brought flowers person. So I should have brought a birthday donut or something just to like, I know we're not together, but just have it because we do video now, which is still weird to me. But I thought 20 minutes ago, I'm going to ask her some birthday questions. And the team's just going to love it when they go back through these and edit them and get them prepped. They're going to be like, what the heck did Tiff do? She went totally off the rails. But.

 

I want to know, Dana, this is a big birthday for you. I think every birthday is big, and I think this is a big milestone birthday. This is my milestone next year. And I want to hear from you, what is something within the last 10 years, your last decade, what is something that you can look back on and just say you're truly proud of and something that you can say, that made that decade for me, and I'm so happy that I had those 10 years? Yeah.

 

Dana (02:36.097)

Yeah. man, that's, that's, that's a loaded heavy question too, but thanks for asking. I think, for me on a very personal level, we talk about my leggings and we talk about my fitness tips and all of that, but truly that has been like the biggest joy and accomplishment for me in the last 10 years, because yes, I'm going in to a big birthday, but I'm also feeling the best I have felt in so long.

 

Tiffanie (02:41.499)

That's a loaded heavy car. I know.

 

Tiffanie (02:47.419)

I love that. I love that. That makes me really happy. Okay. Thank you. Well, I was like, I think I could I could pinpoint a few things, but I want to hear.

 

Dana (03:09.305)

Yeah.

 

Tiffanie (03:15.643)

I want to hear what she says. And I think that's big. And I want to remind everyone, not only on birthdays, but constantly be looking at where we've come. Like, what have we been through? What has gotten us to where we are today? What has made us who we are? I think, Dana, you have lived a life. You have lived a few lives, right? I think we've all lived a few lives. And I think we tend to have spots in our lives where we forget to look at what those lives that we've lived have done for us.

 

And it's just fun to look back. I know Kiera does a year in review every year at New Year's, and I think it's so much fun. But I think the middle of June to year in review and decade in review is really cool, too. So I think on birthdays, it's just really special to look back and think, what have I accomplished and why am I excited for this next year? I think that's really cool. And Dana, something that you've accomplished that I know is honestly budgeting and -

 

Dana (04:11.609)

Thank you.

 

Tiffanie (04:13.595)

your family's overhead is what I'm going to call it. And I think it's really cool. It's amazing what you guys have been able to do. You dedicated time to it, you dedicated resources to it, and you pulled it off. You just did it. And I think you having that experience in your personal life transitions into your consulting with your clients. Because budgeting and true overhead within a business can look a little funky. It can look all over the place, and it's a little difficult to decipher. So I think you provide some really valuable

 

Resources to your your clients you work with every day because you've done it you've been there on a different like it looks different Right, but I like relationships our relationships. We just they just look a little bit different sometimes This is kind of the same like money is money. It's just being used in different ways So I think it's really cool. That's something you guys have been able to do and today I really wanted to talk about that budgeting and true overhead So Dana, I think the first thing to do really is to break down

 

what we determine, what Dental A Team determines as true overhead. There's a lot of confusion in there. There's a lot of misconceptions. And I think the best way that we describe it really truly is saying your true overhead when it all breaks down is if someone were to purchase your practice today, what would they be taking on as financial liability and responsibility? Your debts, all of those pieces, Dana, right? Like I'm thinking.

 

X -ray equipment, right? CBCT scans, the software, anything that you owe a debt on will be paid, right? When you sell your practice or you would take those debts with you. So Dana, help me break down like the biggest pieces there for true overhead and the biggest like, gosh, I think we have like six or so categories that are like the biggest pieces, but what does that look like for true overhead if we're not counting anything outside of what we would inherit if we were to sell the practice?

 

Dana (06:06.169)

Yeah, so it is going to include team payroll because if you bought the practice, you'd also have to have a team. It's going to include all your rent, your utilities, all your softwares, all your supplies, your lab fees, computer maintenance, those types of things, anything that has to do with the building.

 

Tiffanie (06:07.803)

Yeah.

 

Dana (06:27.097)

anything that you've been spending on average as far as like equipment and repairs, just like you said. So those are the big heavy hitters. Marketing, right, to keep the same revenue coming in or patient flow coming in. You know, we usually estimate the same amount of marketing expenses.

 

Tiffanie (06:31.043)

Yeah

 

Dana (06:43.161)

And then anything like you're still going to maybe need some legal counsel. You're probably still going to need a CPA. So all of those outside services that you utilize for your practice, whoever purchases your practice, whether they go with the people that you use or not, still have those expenses.

 

Tiffanie (07:02.363)

Totally, totally. So that true overhead encompasses, I love that you said that, all the professional services, right? Your CPAs, your lawyers, your consultants, your team that's behind you and your team that's pushing your business ahead. And whomever it is that purchases your practice, basically what you're trying to do is look at what would that person be purchasing? So what's my collections rate? What are my active patients? What does my practice look like? What am I selling? And then what's my overhead? If you're trying to sell a practice,

 

and you've got a 76 % true overhead, right? And you're barely paying yourself. Somebody's going to come in and be like, this is like, we need to fix this. Something's going on here. It's going to be a little bit more difficult to sell. So I believe, and I think I get this from Kiera herself, I believe you should always be setting your business up to be sold. Whether you're going to sell it one day or not is neither here nor there. But if you're setting your business up to be sold, and that is your mindset,

 

Now, you're doing what's best for your business constantly from a financial aspect. So what Dana is saying here, keeping all of those things in line and making sure that that's your true overhead makes it so that you could sell if you wanted to, and it'd be super clean and easy. It's an easier conversation. You don't have to clean things up before you get ready to sell. You don't have to go a little crazy with it. So it makes it super easy. So the things that are not included in your true overhead, one, the first and foremost is your doctor pay.

 

So whatever it is that you're paying yourself is not going to be included in your true overhead. Secondly is going to be any debt services, like I said earlier. So anything where you owe money that's not, this one gets a little confusing for offices sometimes. I do have practices that pay off, they have like a credit card that is all their supplies are put on that credit card. And so then they pay off that credit card monthly, but they're paying it off so that now is.

 

not necessarily a debt, it's already been accounted for in your overhead. So it doesn't go under debt services thereafter. So typically what Dental A Team does is we look at that true overhead, we'll put it all into our own spreadsheet, we get the percentages, we look at it, and then underneath that, that gives me your true overhead, your baseline. This is what needs to happen for you to have a 50 % or less overhead for your practice. Then we add back in doctor, owner pay, and then we add back in any debt services, and then that tells us what the true profit of your practice is.

 

Tiffanie (09:26.939)

A lot of practices or a lot of practice owners will look at your true overhead and you're like, fantastic, I've got 57 % true overhead. That leaves me with 43 % profit. And then doctors are like, Tiff, why don't I have money at the end of the month? Well, because that 43 % is being allocated other places. You're paying yourself and you're paying off your debts. So making sure that we get that in line. So you want your true overhead there at the top. And then underneath, you're going to see.

 

half out of that quote unquote profit, right? What's left over after your true overhead? How much of that is your pay? And then how much of that is debt services? Now, the best way to do it, and I know this gets sketchy, so just putting that caveat out there. Docs, I know that there are a lot of spaces where, where,

 

your pay is allocated or what it's called on a P &L or within your bank account. So just know that. Know what your bookkeeper and your CPA is tagging those as so that you can pull those out and put it into your actual pay. So that's, again, that profit is actually true profit. And we can see what the company is actually making. So that's a fantastic, quick breakdown and overhead. If you need help with it, honestly, you guys, we work with almost

 

every single client of ours on their overhead. We get their P &Ls every month. They send us the information. We review them with our clients. So we do know how to do this. We do know how to look through them and help you allocate things. So if you guys have questions, clients, current clients, future clients, never a client, I don't care, reach out. We tell you that all the time. Hello @ The DentalATeam .com. If you need a spreadsheet, if you need a little bit more clarification on it, please reach out. We will be there to help you. So Dana, with that, I know that this is something that you've implemented strong.

 

strong this year with a lot of your clients because times are changing and finances are changing and the political world is a little bit different today even than it was a year ago. So I know that we've been focusing in and re -engaging a ton when it comes to financial health. So tell me, once you've got this overhead done and with your clients you've got.

 

Tiffanie (11:38.203)

Okay, this is where our true overhead is. This is where we're at. This is our profitability. Now, what are some key points that you're working with your clients on when it comes to budgeting to get that true overhead where you want it to be or to keep it where it is? What are some tips that you've given some of your clients right now? Yeah. The first thing that I do really is look at, okay, well, there's controllable expenses and then there's expenses we don't really have any control over that are set, right? So, those are your rent, your utilities, your, yeah, maybe we can get a different home system.

 

Dana (11:52.697)

Yeah, the first thing that I do really is look at, okay, well, there's controllable expenses and then there's expenses. We don't really have any control over that are set, right? So those are your, you know, your rent, your utilities, your, yeah, maybe we can get a different phone system, but that's, we've got limited control as far as those expenses. So really what I look at.

 

Tiffanie (12:07.163)

So that we've got limited control as far as those expenses. So really what I look at are the things that we do have control over, and making sure that we have budgets set for all of those pieces. And some things, yes, I think we talked about supplies, and I know there's been podcasts on supplies, tracking those things, and looking at lab fees, right, because those are easy ones. But I feel like if you've got those things in line, and oftentimes clients do, because that is a more...

 

Dana (12:11.289)

the things that we do have control over and making sure that we have budgets set for all of those pieces, right? And some things, yes, I think we talked about supplies and I know there's been podcasts on budgeting supplies, tracking those things and looking at lab fees, right? Because those are easy ones. But I feel like if you've got those things in line and oftentimes clients do because that is a more common place to set budgets for.

 

So it is looking at all of those categories we have control over and setting budgets for those or setting, tracking things and measures for like.

 

overtime for employees or making sure that we're tracking PTO and making sure that like they're utilizing PTO appropriately. So that is an area when it comes to payroll, I'm never going to advocate cutting team members if I don't have to, right? For sure. So let's just make sure that within our team who are doing a fantastic job, we are just controlling and having them understand that every minute that they're on the clock needs to be maximized and needs to be on the clock for a reason. So just putting controllable measures in for PTO.

 

Tiffanie (13:05.671)

Yeah, I love that.

 

Dana (13:13.739)

payroll. Also then looking at beyond supplies and lab fees, which just when we see lab fees, really negotiation there is our tool for lab fees or even changing labs if it's something that you feel like your lab fees are drastically over where they should be. But it really is knowing looking at where should they be as far as industry standard. And if we are over them, then let's set a budget and slowly cut it down. So yes, supplies and tracking, but CEO or CE courses.

 

Tiffanie (13:19.483)

which just when we see lab fees, really negotiation is our tool for lab fees. We're even changing labs if it's something that you feel like your lab fees are drastically over where they should be. But it really is knowing, looking at where should they be as far as industry standard? And if we are over them, then let's set a budget and slowly cut it down. So yes, supplies and tracking, but CEO, right, or CE courses. Lots of doctors, you know, want to advance their skills, and that's fantastic.

 

Dana (13:43.595)

Lots of doctors want to advance their skills and that's fantastic, but let's budget it so that it's manageable and you can make good decisions about which ones. Meal expenditures, travel expenses, things that we do for our team and I want you to celebrate your team and treat them to lunch when it is needed, but setting a budget for those really helps you know when you can do extra and when you can do what you can do.

 

Tiffanie (13:49.389)

Let's budget it so that it's manageable and you can make good decisions about which ones. And meal expenditures, travel expenses, things that we do for our team. And I want you to celebrate your team and treat them to lunch when it is needed. Setting a budget for those really helps you know when you can do extra and when you can do what you can do. Yeah.

 

I love that. I love that. I love that you said CE. You mentioned that earlier when we were prepping for today's call. And I thought that was brilliant because so many doctors are just like, my god, that sounds amazing, bye. Or, my gosh, that sounds amazing, but I don't know if I can. And that, I think, relates back to the beginning of our conversation today, me saying that you've gotten this for your personal finances. It's very similar, right? You bought a new vehicle recently, and you probably didn't buy it on a whim, right? You probably pre -

 

planned for that and you're like okay this is what it's gonna look like if I do this and when I do this so this is how much I have to have in order to get this vehicle and I feel like it's the same for for CE and for my gosh if I get asked by one more doctor can I buy a mill like I don't know can you buy a mill can we buy a CBCT scan can we do this like let's look at these situations and prep and plan for them so I know for one of my doctors we we've spent

 

amount of time, the last 18 months if I'm honest, really trying to figure out where the heck his money was going because he had no money all the time and I'm like you're doing massive cases, you're producing like crazy, your collections are in line, they're pre -collecting, like it took a lot to figure it out and they are now for the last about eight months of that they've been they've been profitable.

 

We were able to figure it out. We were able to get everything in line. We were able to fix enough systems in their practice within that to change it. But what we realized this year, his precious wife, I love her to death. She's so sweet. And she and I realized, my gosh, this is on a whim, that he wants to do CE. And that's fantastic. So I said, OK, guys, I want you to look back at the last two years. And I want you to look at the CE that you took.

 

Tiffanie (16:02.139)

and what the cost was, including, like Dana said, airfare, flights, meals. What was the true cost of that CE? So you had to get there. You had to stay there. You had to eat. You had to pay for the course. What was the true cost? And then what I had them do was I had them figure out the average. What was the average per year that you spent on CE? If we ramp that up by a couple thousand just to be safe and to account for inflation, what would that look like?

 

if we were to put a budget in place. So what we started doing, I kind of have them on, honestly, some really random things. But I kind of have them on a profit first model as well. So we have a lot of buckets going on over there. So I had him start a CE bucket. And every month on his spreadsheet, I have an overhead spreadsheet for him. Every month we put his P &L into the spreadsheet. But pre -allocated on every spreadsheet is $3 ,000 for CE.

 

Because we did the math, we figured out by the end of the year, this is about what we can anticipate we would have spent on CE. So we allocate that, and every month they move that $3 ,000 into his CE bucket. So when he wants to register for CE, if the money is there and there's not something future that it's already allocated to or that he wants it to be for, he knows, do the CE, it's already there. So now we're not incurring new debt for education. The education is being paid for.

 

And then he's able to add the procedures into the practice that just double pays for it. So that's been something that's worked really well. And I think it just falls in line with the budgeting. I have a lot of practices do the same thing for potential equipment. I think of it as like your emergency savings. They have their emergency. They have their savings in line. They've got enough over there. They've paid down their LOE loans and all the things, all the money's there. So we've gotten them to where they need to be. But again, yesterday on our call,

 

always like, do I need a second meal? I'm like, I don't know. Can we have a second meal? Do we have the cash for a second meal? So I have a lot of practices doing the same thing of having an equipment bucket. In the future, if my hygiene team says, hey, all of my cavatron tips are broken, or my cavatron died, it's 15 years old, and it's dead, it's not doing what it's supposed to do.

 

Dana (18:02.201)

Yeah.

 

Dana (18:19.353)

Yeah.

 

Tiffanie (18:24.251)

an expense that's incurred. That's $3 ,500 right there, not including any of the tips. So what does that come out of? It comes out of your overhead. It goes into your supplies. But if we're prepped and planned for it, we've budgeted some money on the side for if a compressor goes down, if a cabotron dies, if we need new tips, if we need new instruments, it's not such a hardship on the practice when it comes up. Dana, I think it's funny because.

 

Dana (18:47.385)

Yeah. Yeah, I...

 

Tiffanie (18:52.827)

You're my local hygienist, right? You're my hygienist. Can I tell you the number one thing that I get back on surveys when I go into practices in person? You may get this on your surveys too. I'm not sure. Number one thing that I get from hygienists, there's a question on there. It says, if I could do one thing for you during my visit, what would it be? Cavitron tips. Either cavitron tips or more scalars. Yes.

 

Dana (19:10.329)

that I can guess. It was either cavatron chips or more scalars.

 

Tiffanie (19:18.331)

Every time I'm like, I just need a pocketful of Cavatron tips. And I think every hygienist that I meet, that I see would be like, fantastic, you brought me Cavatrons. I'll do anything you say. I laugh so hard every time, but it's a real thing. And that tells me that they're getting told no when they ask for Cavatron tips. OK, so and I get it. And I used to keep, I don't.

 

Dana (19:27.961)

do anything you want. Yep.

 

Dana (19:38.713)

Yep. Yep.

 

Tiffanie (19:44.475)

I mean, my hygienists probably listen at some point, but I used to keep a stash drawer they didn't know about of Cavachon tips. I would buy them when they were on sale, so I'd have back stock so that when they asked for them, I'd be like, I'm not sure, but I'll see what I can do. And then I just slide one out every now and again. Because I didn't want them to know that they were there, and then they just take advantage of that. But every now and again, I'd be like, I got you one. I got you one. I'm not going to tell you about the other four in the drawer, because anyways.

 

Dana (19:51.961)

See ya.

 

Dana (20:01.881)

There you go, I knew you'd say that. Yep. Yeah.

 

Dana (20:10.649)

Yeah, it's funny you mentioned cavitron tips. I just had an office that I got an email from the hygienist basically saying, hey, I want a new cavitron tips. It looks like it's not in the budget right now, which it's not in the budget. Okay. So we work together to say to get it in the budget, this is what hygiene needs to produce over the next three months to be able to get their cavitron tips. So you can use it in every area.

 

Tiffanie (20:13.819)

Anyways, budgets.

 

Dana (20:33.849)

When it comes to looking at expenses, looking at collections and truly like why walk through an office, we did this where she was wanting to like upgrade. She had old chairs, she needed new flooring, she wanted to upgrade some shelving and great. And honestly, when we looked at it, it wasn't in the budget to start setting aside. So then the flip side of what you said is yes, you can pull it and budget for it. But if you don't have it in the budget, it also tells you what you need to produce or collect to get the things that you want or need.

 

Tiffanie (20:41.615)

Yeah, I love that.

 

Tiffanie (21:03.515)

Brilliant. And I love that that hygienist was so aware of the budget and what needed to happen. And she was proactive enough to say, it's not in the budget. How do I make the money to get this, knowing and understanding why we have a budget? So that's impressive. I love that. That reminds me, like, people knowing. I want you guys to reach out so that you can get all this information, too, because there's so much overhead information that just won't fit into one single podcast.

 

But I want you guys to know, too, we typically will allocate for back office supplies anywhere between 5 % to 7%, sometimes 8%, depending on the practice. 5 % is a really healthy lean practice. It just means that you're really truly ordering what you need and not overloading. I know a lot of my assistants liked to order the composite capsules when they were buy one, get two free, or buy two, get four free, or something.

 

and whatever the deal was. And it's like, it makes sense, except that it's going to go bad. So we're ordering for what we need, not just for whatever the sale is, right? It's kind of like when you go to the grocery store and the fruit's on sale, but does it make sense to buy the fruit just because it's on sale? Are you actually going to eat it, right? My son's dad used to tell me I'd come home with stuff. And I'm like, it was on sale. And he's like, well, you got to spend money to save money. I'm like, OK, yeah, that makes sense. So that's what it makes me think of. But.

 

Budgeting for your back office supplies, you really want it to be that five to seven percent of eight at the tops. And I only, only stretch to eight just because PPE is still, I know, a little pricier than we want to see. And during a...

 

Dana (22:28.697)

No.

 

Tiffanie (22:41.723)

during a reopen after shutdown, it got really pricey. So I know it's come down some, but not as much as we want it to be. So those back office supplies should be there. Your front office supplies should be less than 1%. Those are super easy, especially now everything's automated. So if you're buying like 60 reams of paper a month, you got to talk to your front office. So we've got to scale back and save some trees. And that's going to include too, like any printer services. I know we had a.

 

printer service that would come and service the printer and replace the ink and all of that, but it was a monthly expense and shredding expenses, all that's going to go into your front office supplies. It should still be less than 1%. And that's percent of your collections from the previous month. So I have another practice that I've got. And the office manager just texted me yesterday. She's like, will you hop into the budgeting spreadsheet and make sure I did my math right? Because I want to make sure it's adding up. So we've got them. We kind of figured out that they're

 

budgeting for their supplies was difficult because they do so much CEREC. So they do so much in -office accounts that it wasn't being pulled out of the Patterson bills, right? So the Patterson orders were including the CEREC. So their lab bills were nothing. They had no lab bills, but their supplies were like 12 % to 15 % every month. So then we started allocating, OK, well,

 

Let's look at true supplies, what that is, and let's look at true labs. So we started allocating and taking out the seric stuff, taking out the implant stuff, whatever was a lab fee, we separated those and she's got the back office girls who are doing the ordering. Now they have an Excel spreadsheet of back office supplies, true supplies, seric supplies, and then the front office has their 1%. And they can see how much money they have every month to use for their ordering. And if they're going to go over that,

 

amount, they have to get approval from the office manager and the doctor. And if they stay under for a certain amount of months, then they bank some sort of, I don't even remember what we put in place for them, some sort of party or something. They get rewarded for staying under, which isn't something you have to do, but that's something that we did for that practice. So I think those are really great tips on budgeting and really great ways to really keep your true overhead where you need it to be.

 

Tiffanie (24:54.715)

Dana, real quick question. I think we've got some action items in my mind. But number one way that you said your hygienist that had called you, your practices hygienist called you and said, how do we get this into the budget? How do you get teams to understand the budget? How you do really well with teams? I say this constantly. You are my systems gal. You are my teams gal. You kill it with the teams. How do you get them on board with understanding and using a budget?

 

Dana (25:23.769)

Yeah, I think it is, doctors, as much as you are comfortable sharing the flip side numbers, we talk a lot about production and collections, but truly sometimes it is eye opening for team members when we talk about what it costs to.

 

run an office and keep the doors open. So I always challenge my doctors to share, whether it's bulk numbers, whether it's percentages, to share the numbers. And then when we set a budget, be open and honest about what our budget is, what our amount is, why we're doing it, how they can track it.

 

Tiffanie (25:52.923)

is what our amount is, why we're doing it, how they contract it. And if it isn't in the budget, it's okay to explain that to team members knowing that, hey, we're gonna find a way. Whether we do it together, whether we reach out to our consultants, whatever it is, we're gonna find a way to get it in the budget if we truly need it. But the more open and honest we can be about the other side or the overhead side of practice numbers and having team members understand that they truly can impact.

 

Dana (25:56.153)

And if it isn't in the budget, it's okay to explain that to team members, knowing that, hey, we're gonna find a way, right? Whether we do it together, whether you reach out to our consultant, whatever it is, we're gonna find a way to get it in the budget if we truly need it. But the more open and honest you can be about the other side or the overhead side of...

 

practice numbers and having team members understand that they truly can impact those numbers, that the decisions they make when it comes to ordering, that the decisions that they make to work overtime, or the decisions that they make to schedule tighter or schedule, you know, over or double book appropriately, those things like, those decisions make an impact and team members need to know that. And as much as we feel comfortable sharing, you should.

 

Tiffanie (26:22.877)

The decisions they make when it comes to ordering, the decisions that they make to work overtime, or the decisions that they make to schedule tighter or schedule, you know, double book.

 

I love that. I love that. Okay, awesome. All right, so action items Go pull your PNLs. Okay, whatever month we're on I want you to go through a year You can do the first quarter the second quarter whatever month you're on listening to this podcast today I want you to go pull your PNLs and I want you to find your true overhead. Remember that's anything dot. It's anything not

 

not including doctor salary or pay and debt services. So go pull your P &Ls, learn what your true overhead is, and start looking at what you're allocating in those areas that Dana talked about that are manipulatable, things that can be changed. Like your rent, you can't change, right? Your professional services, you can change some of those, probably not really. You need them, right? So what can you change within your supplies, your labs, auxiliary items that you're adding in? What can you do? And then,

 

and find that budget for your supplies and your labs at minimum and see what else you need to start budgeting. Maybe it's a CE, whatever it is. But I want you to go pull your P &Ls, figure out your true overhead, and then figure out what you need to start budgeting. And then consider, how can I get my team on board with this? And is this something that I'm ready to do? If it is something you're ready to do, how are you going to do it? Maybe you're already doing it. You just need to have more conversations.

 

Dana, thank you so much. This was an incredible podcast. We got a lot of great information out there. I really appreciate you. Happy birthday. Thank you for being here with me. You're amazing. So thank you. All right, everyone, go do your action items. Go do the things. If you're driving, you know I always say, go back, re -listen, take some notes. And as always, leave us a five star review below so that we know.

 

Tiffanie (28:27.739)

This was great information for you as well. Remember, I always say people use those reviews for extra information too. So if there's something you can think of that should have been in there, put it in that review. And we'll catch you next time.