Episode 734:  Experts of Dentistry  

 Who are the faces behind the Dental A-Team coaches/consultants? In this episode, Kiera, Tiff, Britt, Dana, and Denae all introduce themselves and their dentistry backgrounds, plus give the most key takeaway they’ve gained from all the practices they’ve visited.

Transcript:

[music]

0:00:05.8 Kiera Dent: Hey everyone, welcome to The Dental A-Team podcast. I'm your host, Kiera Dent, and I had this crazy idea that maybe I could combine a doctor and a team member's perspective, because let's face it, dentistry can be a challenging profession with those two perspectives. I've been a dental assistant, treatment coordinator, scheduler, biller, office manager, regional manager, practice owner, and I have a team of traveling consultants where we have traveled over 165 different offices coaching teams. Yep, we don't just understand you, we are you. Our mission is to positively impact the world of dental, and I believe that this podcast is the greatest way I can help elevate teams, grow VIP experiences, reduce stress and create A teams. Welcome to The Dental A-Team podcast.

0:00:50.9 Kiera Dent: Hello, Dental A-Team listeners. This is Kiera, and today is a super special day because I decided I wanted the Dental A-Team consultant team, so all the consultants to get on a podcast today and kind of do like, I don't know, I feel like it's like the Brady Bunch right now, like here's the story of the five consultants. I'm not gonna keep going. That's as far as I got. But also for those of you who are new to The Dental A-Team podcast, I thought it'd be awesome to intro who the consulting team is. We have incredible coaches on our team, and so I thought today would just kind of be fun to do kind of like a roundtable of who are the coaches and who are the consultants, and where have they come from? And what's their background? So I'll kick it off. It's gonna be a ton of fun. I'm Kiera Dent. If you guys don't know me in really is my last name, it took three fiancés to get this last name, and I'm obsessed with dentistry.

0:01:39.7 Kiera Dent: I started out as a dental assistant and then became a treatment coordinator, a scheduler, a biller, office manager, regional manager, I owned dental practices, and then I decided, hey, if I could grow one practice from 500,000 to 2.4 million in nine months, what if I could do that repeatedly for hundreds of practices across the nation and make happy teams. And so that's really become my passion, that's why we're here, and I'm committed to bringing on consultants who have that same passion, who have a similar... We don't all have the same backgrounds, we all have different experiences, but yeah, every single one of us have been dental team members, we've been clinical front office, we've been there, we've done it, and we've done it successfully.

0:02:17.4 Kiera Dent: So on that note, we've got a killer team, and don't worry, I'm having all of them think currently of if you could give one tip to an office after coaching hundreds of practices, what would be a tip that they think you could take home with you. So on that, note, Tiffanie Trader is another one of our consultants, and we're just gonna go in order of once you've been hired, so to be Tiffanie, Britt, Dana and Danae, 'cause there's five of us, it could get really uncomfortable. So Tiff you're up, kinda just tell them who is Tiffanie Trader? How did you get to Dental A-Team and what's kind of your background to be here.

0:02:47.0 Tiffanie: Well, who is Tiffanie Trader? There's so much to unpack there.

0:02:50.2 Brittany: Loaded question.

0:02:51.3 Tiffanie: So many things. That's a loaded question. Yeah. But dentistry... How did I get to Dental A-Team? I started from the ground up, you guys, I started as a dental assistant in practice, I've done all of the things, anything you could label a front office as. I like to tell my practices that I've done everything except for hygiene and legally hold the drill. So I've never been a dentist either. So...

[laughter]

0:03:14.2 Kiera Dent: So have you done it illegally? I'm still gonna MC-host this.

0:03:16.9 Tiffanie: Allegedly. Allegedly.

0:03:18.6 Kiera Dent: Okay. We won't get you into that, next, maybe that will be her tip. Who knows?

0:03:23.0 Tiffanie: You guys, I live in Arizona, and a few of us live in Arizona, born and raised in Arizona. And it is the wild, wild west out here, I say that all the time, so what you want to go freaking goes, so allegedly. Allegedly. But anyway, my dental career has been so fun, and I literally started as a dental assistant, I loved it, that's where my heart and soul and passion is honestly, but ultimately, I was running my practice, and years ago, I met Ms. Kiera Dent and we were connected through a mutual friend, and we honestly just... We just melded and we realized we're really, really similar, and the most important aspect was that we run dentistry very similarly, and then we knew we could grow this company together, and she presented this incredible offer that I could not say, she assumed the yes, you guys if you've been listening the podcast. You know what that means. She assumed the yes. She's like, I got this figured out. This is what your schedule will be, Tiff, and I was like, man, that sounds amazing. Let's do it.

0:04:20.2 Tiffanie: So I have been running around the country with Kiera, well, not with her, but separately, for six years, so that's how The Dental A-Team came upon my life. Honestly, the best decision I've ever made in my life. It is so much fun, you guys, I love telling practices my story when I go in person and I'm doing my meeting and I show up with all of my Kiera Dent energy that I possibly can, and I used to say Kiera... She laughs at this every time. I used to say Kiera and I, it was love at first sight, and then they get really confusing... It was not. It wasn't. It wasn't.

0:04:54.3 Kiera Dent: It was but not... It's been a platonic way, like it was nothing more.

0:05:00.4 Tiffanie: But I realized 16 times into saying that, that it might have sounded a little different than it was. So we just know...

0:05:05.0 Kiera Dent: I know, and then you say we run across the country together, and I'm like TT, this could be real weird real quick, but agreed, it was a good time. And it has been amazing, and Tiff just has an incredible background. She definitely left out the fact that she grew... Tiff, how big was your practice when you left it? And you were there for 11 years, you grew it from like baby to exponential, what was kind of your dental history before you joined Dental A-Team?

0:05:28.9 Tiffanie: Yeah, I can take you through that. So when I started with that practice, one, I was 19 years old, I was a baby, and I grew up with that practice, and we had one doctor who worked out of two rooms and we had one hygienist. So we grew that practice quite a bit, but then we took over another practice, a larger practice, we had seven operatories and we had two to three doctors, we had two full-time doctors, my owner doctor and associate, and then we had a floating oral surgeon that would come in and a floating endodontist that would come in and so we had five hygiene running out of seven chairs, so we had four doctor, three hygiene, we would have alternate those ladies, we had extended hours. So we grew our practice, I think when we were super small, I would say off the top of my head, I believe we were just under 500,000 our first couple of years together, and when I left, we were at about 3.8 million. I was with them for almost 13 years, and so I grew from baby, 19-year-old dental assistant all the way up to business administrator, office manager, however you wanna label it, of that practice, and we typically had anywhere between 17 to 23 team members depending on our need and staffing situations.

0:06:42.1 Tiffanie: Basically, what I did for that practice, and I love and hate it 'cause it was a little chaotic but I loved it 'cause I got so much experience is whatever we needed, whatever position we were short in, I would create that position. I'd see the need, I'd be like, gosh, we really need this fixed. So I'd see the need, create the position, create the onboarding for it, train someone to do it, put them in that position and then move on, and so rather than getting stuck in certain places, I kind of created that, trained it, and then I'm got really smart there towards the end, and I had these rockstar team members, they're twins, so it made it even better and I love them, they're still two of my best friends and they're fantastic trainers. I do really well at consulting, you guys, my teams will tell you that. I'm an awesome consultant, but training is not my forte 'cause I don't have a ton of patience when it comes to it, but these girls, patient as ever, so I trained them to be the trainers and so then they took over what I did and went from there. It was freaking awesome.

0:07:38.2 Kiera Dent: That's awesome Tiff. Thank you for sharing that and thanks for being here, 'cause I think you bring such a fun energy and love for it. So No BS Britt. Speechy Tiffy has a nickname No BS Britt. I'm working on Dana and Danae. Dana almost got one today joining the podcast.

0:07:53.2 Dana: So close.

0:07:53.6 Kiera Dent: But it wasn't my best work. I called Denney, so you guys can all be thinking about that, while No BS Britt takes the mic and I need some nicknames for Dana and Danae, they'll come. So Britt.

0:08:02.0 Brittany: They're kind of close together too, so we've got to come up with different ones for both.

0:08:07.2 Kiera Dent: Well, there's no way we're gonna say double D 'cause that gets really awkward for you to two. The ideas are flowing.

0:08:15.0 Brittany: That's where we're starting out guys. So come up with some other as we go away.

[laughter]

0:08:18.6 Dana: It can only go up from here.

[laughter]

0:08:22.4 Kiera Dent: And now you see why I wanted the story of the five consultants. This is behind the scenes Dental A-Team.

0:08:31.1 Brittany: This is the fun of what we get to do all the time, but my background, I say I grew up in dentistry, so my mom's a dental assistant, so a single mom, kids, it's not uncommon that I would end up at the dental practice from time to time, hanging out over there, and she'd sit me there with an impression and some stone and say, here, have fun pouring this up. So that was my start in the dental world of a mom...

0:08:52.8 Kiera Dent: I did not know that.

0:08:52.8 Brittany: Let me place in the lab, so yeah. I grew up around the dental field, decided to go into hygiene. My mom's like, assisting is great, but really go the hygiene route, go do something else. So mom sent me in that direction, and I knew it would be nursing or hygiene, so hygiene it was, better hours, I can handle the mouth, I don't wanna deal with other things.

0:09:15.0 Kiera Dent: Rectal trumpets, for example. Just curious.

0:09:17.4 Brittany: I'll take [0:09:17.8] ____ all day long, every day. So did hygiene for quite a while in Arizona, and then also I moved out to the DC area, Arlington, Virginia. So I spent some time, worked hygiene out there, and then decided, you know what, I don't know that... I love hygiene, I don't know that I will physically do this forever, so let's start exploring some other options, so I ended up going to grad school-wise out there, studied health care administration and wanted to go into more of the management side of things, and so I had the great opportunity in a practice that I was already working and doing hygiene, getting the opportunity to take over as manager and so...

0:09:53.4 Kiera Dent: Britt, tell me how that conversation happened. I need to know this detail. How did that conversation happen?

0:09:58.3 Brittany: Well, you see, my manager had a peg from the beginning of like, "Oh great, you're probably gonna be my predecessor in the future," so I had her support and the whole thing, and she was awesome and was great to me and allowed me the chance to learn, but I for sure was a hygienist. I had an understanding of business, but I had never worked front desk before other than that hygienist. It's like, "Sure, I'll help out, I'll make some calls, why not?" And so taking over as manager, I got to go sit down with my team who've known me as a hygienist and say, "Alright, guys, teach me how to do an insurance breakdown," and so I got to learn all the things when it comes to front desk from that point moving forward, and honestly just loved it. I loved the business side of it, I had an awesome team in that office, we had five associates, so five doctors working in a team of usually about somewhere around 25 people that we had on our team.

0:10:50.4 Brittany: And I loved focusing on the big picture, and I had awesome leaders there with me in that practice. We got to go through some fun experiences of being bought out by DSO and what that feels like and kind of rallying the team after that experience and coming back together, but truly loved it, and after being bought out by the DSO, they were like, yes, regional, come on, let's go. And I'm like, no, that's not my future. I'm probably going the consulting route, just know it right now, that's probably gonna be my future and where I'm gonna go, and so I eventually did. I decided to come back home to Arizona, found The Dental A-Team, which allowed me the chance to come back being their family and go into consulting, and it's been happy times ever since.

0:11:33.5 Kiera Dent: And just I'll put it out there, Britt technically is on the consultant podcast here. She has shifted her role into more director of operations, which I think hearing your story, Britt, is such a good fit for you. So it's been honestly one of the best things we've done, so those of you who have Britt as your consultant, don't panic, she still loves you, but it's been really fun to actually watch your journey as we've met you, see you as a consultant and then morph into where I really feel you're insanely suited in a lot of areas, but just to watch your mastermind brain thinking operations has been really fun, so. Alright, Danae, Dana.

0:12:08.9 Tiffanie: She's so back.

0:12:09.0 Kiera Dent: D number one. Can we call you thing one, thing two, so it's like D number one.

0:12:14.6 Dana: D one.

0:12:15.8 Danae: D1, D2, oh my.

0:12:17.8 Dana: It's like dental school.

0:12:19.4 Kiera Dent: Alright it might work, D1, D2.

[laughter]

0:12:24.1 Brittany: Sounds better.

0:12:24.0 Dana: I'm working on it.

0:12:24.1 Tiffanie: It sounds like the Star Wars man.

0:12:26.5 Kiera Dent: I know, like R2D2. I see some good Halloween costumes for you and Danae. But Dana. Alright Dana, you're up girl.

0:12:35.0 Dana: Hey. Let's see, I oddly love and hate going after Britt because we are so similar eerily, but yet also very different.

0:12:42.0 Kiera Dent: You are.

0:12:43.0 Dana: So, let's see. I also grew up in a dental family. My uncle was a dentist. My mom was a hygienist and I think probably what has pushed me and molded my dental journey is watching them and watching him. He cared about his team like they were family, he loved his family really hard, and he truly loved dentistry and his patients. And I don't think until I was older did I realize that was somewhat unique, and his approach to everything was a little bit different or/and similar to every dental office out there, and it's just really stuck with me and pushed me to really love dentistry because I see what the potential can be as far as a dentist impact in their community and an impact on their team.

0:13:28.8 Dana: And I remember as early as middle school filing charts in his office and hearing his team members voice their appreciation, and I'll never forget he got a new assistant, and it was maybe her first, second week, and I remember her just saying like, you have no idea how unique you are as a boss, as a dentist, and it's just really stuck with me. And so like Britt, I went to hygiene school. I did public health dental hygiene practitioner, so that I could practice independently in Pennsylvania at the time, and you could do school system, or you could do the prison system, and at the time, school hygienists were kind of phasing out, I remember we had one when I was in elementary school, but they're kind of the thing of the past.

0:14:16.6 Brittany: They are. I didn't even know that was a thing. Is this like like a book club?

0:14:21.9 Dana: Yeah, when you lose a tooth and you go see the hygienist and she like put your tooth in a thing and she'd show everybody how to brush their teeth and yeah, she came monthly to the school. But that was phasing out even when I was in elementary school. So I went the prison system route, so I served in...

0:14:38.4 Kiera Dent: I'm in totally the same pain.

0:14:40.3 Dana: In Pennsylvania...

0:14:41.3 Kiera Dent: Little kids. Little tooth fairy shenanigans to prison. Okay.

0:14:48.1 Dana: So quick turn around. Right? [laughter] So I served independently in the prison system, and then I moved across the country to Arizona, and so I always wanted to keep dentistry in my career, so I landed in a pediatric practice, and so I eventually, a few years in, became regional director and I opened new pediatric practices across the country. So I would kind of scout locations, I'd help open them and I train all of the new team members for every location. And when I started, there were three locations in Tucson and one in Phoenix, then we ended up opening two more in Phoenix, two in Flagstaff, we expanded to Texas, and then into Alabama. And then I switched my focus from dentistry for a little while to motherhood, but I love my children, I have four. I have four children, but dentistry is such a passion that I went back, and so I became an office manager at a single dentist practice, and really went in and grew the team, grew the practice, and then I found the Dental A-Team and it's been so much fun because I feel like I get to take the connection of growing up in dentistry and seeing my uncle and creating those experiences and practices across the country.

0:16:18.0 Kiera Dent: It's pretty awesome, Dana. You have had a wild ride, I didn't know about your mom and your uncle, so that was a fun new fact. I knew about the prison. And I also didn't know you opened that many practices. Sheesh girl, that's a fun. I'm learning things about The Dental A-Team too. Okay, D2.

0:16:37.1 Tiffanie: It's working.

0:16:38.0 Kiera Dent: I'll work on better ones. I'll work on better ones.

0:16:41.6 Danae: I have been called all sorts of things Kiera including Shaniqua.

0:16:44.0 Kiera Dent: Shaniqua. But when Danae...

0:16:46.7 Dana: Oh, it's my favorite.

0:16:48.1 Kiera Dent: When Britt was interviewing Danae, I looked at Dana and I'm like, so Dana, you know that this is gonna get real wild, you two have one letter apart, like phew, alright, here we go. It's almost like we have little twins here. Alright, Danae. Tell us your story. Who is Danae?

0:17:05.2 Danae: So my story... So I started, I was a baby, like Tiff, I started out in dentistry, I was 18. Random fact, I actually got a call from my sister who was working in a dental practice, and she said, "Danae we've got an office that's looking for someone to help answer phones, you should give them a call." And I said, "I am not going to work at a dental office, that sounds so boring. I'm not gonna answer phones, I don't know anything about teeth," but I'll never forget, she said "Danae, they pay $10 an hour."

0:17:39.8 Kiera Dent: You were like, sign me up.

0:17:41.7 Danae: Sign me up. 18-year-old me, right out of high school. So that was my introduction to dental. I started out answering phones, started checking patients in, checking patients out for a local group practice out in Arizona. And I did that for several years, but over the course of the several years I was there, I eventually took on a lot of different roles. So I was a treatment coordinator, I did all the things that the front office would normally do, and then I was given the opportunity to be an office manager, so I jumped at it, so I became an office manager for one of our locations, actually out of Tucson, and I did that for a few years, but we built the practice up to the point where we really needed to expand and open up a whole separate specialty office. So that's what we did. We went from a general practice that had specialists that were moonlighting in and out to being able to open up an entire specialty location while running a full-time general practice. I absolutely, I'll cherish my time with that organization forever. It really, truly is what opened up the doors for me in the dental industry. But I had met my husband, who was at the time was in the Air Force, so naturally, being a military spouse, he got orders to relocate. So we moved.

0:19:03.4 Danae: So from Arizona, I moved to North Carolina, that was where I took on a Director of Operations position for another small group practice, I did that for a few years, and then we got orders to move again, so then I moved again. We lived in Ohio for a little bit, and I stepped into a regional manager for a DSO, but I realized my heart, my soul, my passion, really what drives me every day to do what I do is working one-on-one with private practices, working one-on-one with the business owners and with the teams so that I can help them get the lives that they want, help them live the life they want, get what they want out of the business, and so I transitioned into consulting. So from there, and that's where I've been, I've been doing consulting for about five years now, so that's kind of my history as far as dental goes and how I got started in dental, and I can tell you there's nothing else I'll do. This is what I'll do for the rest of my life. I really, truly do enjoy watching the difference that... Just being intentional about the things that you're doing, the difference that it can make, not just on your business, but on your life, so yeah.

0:20:19.8 Kiera Dent: I love it. I just wanted everyone who's listening to meet the team, and as you can see, I've got really awesome people in my life, and it's fun to have all of us be here. So consultants I have a funny thing, and then you guys can tell your tips. If we were Kiera, Tiffany, Brittany, Dana and Danae, all five of us were to go to a practice, don't worry, all you listening, we're not coming, what role would each of us be? I wanna know, put us all into a practice, who's which role in a practice, and all of you listening, you can hit pause right now before we answer. Send it in, [email protected]. Who do you think we'd all be? Let's put us all into a practice, what roles, and I'm curious, would we actually get along, is my next follow-up to it, 'cause type A consultants like, hey, Brittany Stone, I'm defaulting to you, where are you putting all of us?

0:21:11.0 Brittany: Okay. Tiff and Kiera are your assistant brains at heart, I joke about it all the time that I'm like, can you imagine them as assistants in your office? Yes, I can. And it'd be a great time, and they would like make magic happen, right?

0:21:28.7 Kiera Dent: We would slay it all day. You could fill a schedule so full, we could crush it.

0:21:34.6 Brittany: Absolutely. Absolutely.

0:21:37.8 Kiera Dent: Okay.

0:21:38.6 Kiera Dent: So I think that's where you guys would be assistants for sure. I feel like Danae would be your front desk master, the lead of the front desk team. That girl knows how to close treatment, she knows how to run a team, she would be running everything up there. It's hard because Dana and I, I'm like, we're such hygiene brains. Like hygiene or manager. I don't know. Dana, I think is an awesome hygienist and loves her patients and like cares for them. Then I'm like, of course, Dana, that's where I would want you to be, is be my rock star hygienist who' also the best team player ever and make sure things get taken care of. Does that leave me in the manager role? A hundred percent.

0:22:13.5 Kiera Dent: A hundred percent. I'm like, let's just see where Britt places herself in this little scenario.

0:22:18.2 Tiffanie: I love that she is like scared to say where she thinks she should be. 'Cause she hates doing that. I'm like a hundred percent, you should be the manager.

0:22:26.9 Kiera Dent: Well, that's why I called on her first, but then I'm like, okay, Danae, where are you placing all of us? 'Cause I'm curious. Danae is a very different brain than Britt. Danae, where's everyone going to be? Where are you placing all of us?

0:22:37.5 Danae: Oh gosh. Okay, so I would say Kiera, hands down would be the treatment coordinator. Fun fact, like Tiff had said that Kiera assumed the yes with Tiff. Kiera assumed the yes with every single one of us. As soon as she met us, she's like, yep, this is going to happen and we're going to make it work.

0:22:57.1 Kiera Dent: I did. I'm like, let me schmooze a few of you. Come along. You haven't seen where your life is supposed to be. I'll show you. I'll show you the path, Danae. I called Danae a couple of times and I'm like, let's have some conversations. You don't know this yet, but you're Dental A-Team. So get ready.

0:23:15.7 Danae: So I would say Kiera's treatment coordinator. You're an interesting one, Tiff, because I feel like I would put you as a lead dental assistant or maybe just like assistant manager who also was the dental assistant because you're absolutely amazing with people and I wouldn't want to lose that part of it, your ability to just speak to teams and to inspire people to see why, is huge. So I would say probably assistant manager or some sort of dental assistant. I would definitely agree with Britt as far as the office manager goes, she's just got operations nailed down. I would say Dana, a hygienist, for sure. You're so good, like talking about peril protocols, really working on systems. And then for me, I could own a solid front office position. I could rock the operations at the front office.

0:24:11.1 Kiera Dent: Yeah.

0:24:14.0 Danae: With goals of eventually taking on Britt's role.

0:24:17.7 Kiera Dent: She's like, Britt, get out, I need your spot. Britt's like, sure, I'll train you, it's fine. I got some hospitals, some whatever. I don't know, Britt, I don't even know what your five-year plan is. Okay, Tiff and Dana, any... Do you think people should go in different spots or do you think like, no, they kind of nailed it?

0:24:31.6 Dana: The only thing I would say is with Tiff, I think assistant because of her efficienciness and her love of an unwasted time, but I also think that if she worked in my practice, I would carve out some sort of community liaison position just for her to connect with other offices, referring offices, the community, I'd carve that out just for her.

0:24:56.7 Kiera Dent: For sure.

0:24:57.7 Tiffanie: Aw, you guys filled my bucket. Thank you. I think I'd combo me and Britt, or Britt and Danae, sorry. I think I'd put you at TC. That's the only change I'd make to Britt's.

0:25:08.3 Kiera Dent: Yeah, I might put Britt as like, depending on how big my practice is, I might put Britt as like operations and Danae as manager. I think I could see that flow working. If I had a small practice, Danae would surely be, I don't know, probably Danae at TC. Tiff, I think you'd be bored, but you'd make such an incredible scheduler, and greeter. I think you'd be bored at that job, so, but...

0:25:29.4 Tiffanie: I had a manager put me in that position. She was like, take me from assisting.

0:25:32.0 Kiera Dent: How long did you last?

0:25:34.5 Tiffanie: I lasted a little while, but I was up assisting all the time because I'd be like, "Oh, we can do that. We could totally do that." And I'd squeeze something in and then I'd feel them behind me. And I'm like, "I will go assist. I'll do it. It's fine." So I think I cheated the system. So I kind of got everything I wanted.

0:25:50.3 Dana: That's why I would want Tiff clinical, because I'd be like, "Tiff, let's make this happen." And Tiff will be like, "Oh yeah, we can make that happen."

0:25:55.9 Kiera Dent: Oh yeah.

0:25:57.0 Tiffanie: And yes, I'd be all day. I'd be all treatment all day in the back office. I'd be like...

0:26:02.8 Kiera Dent: So now my next question is, Tiff, perfect position. Where would you be if you were back in a dental office? What would you choose? You get to choose any of them. Where would you place yourself?

0:26:11.2 Tiffanie: Dental assistant.

0:26:12.4 Kiera Dent: Dental assistant. Brittany, where would you go?

0:26:14.6 Brittany: Operations for sure, all day, every day.

0:26:18.1 Kiera Dent: Not a hygienist? Dana.

0:26:20.3 Brittany: No. I can do that, but...

0:26:22.8 Kiera Dent: Dana, where would you put yourself?

0:26:24.5 Dana: Oh man, this is hard. Probably a hygienist. The other option would be treatment coordinator, but I feel like I get to do that as a hygienist too. So yeah, probably hygiene.

0:26:34.2 Kiera Dent: Okay, hygiene. Danae, where would you put yourself?

0:26:37.7 Danae: I would probably say operations as well. Maybe if, can I be an integrator, like a visionary integrator?

0:26:42.5 Kiera Dent: Yeah, you could. You totally could.

0:26:44.6 Tiffanie: You can be whatever you want. She said that it's our own vision.

0:26:48.5 Kiera Dent: She's like, "Let's say."

[overlapping conversation]

0:26:50.3 Kiera Dent: There we go. So the reason I brought this up is kind of fun because I think in offices, like you hear a strong consulting team and how often do we not put right people at right seats? And having people kind of see where should we fit and where should we shake? Because oftentimes, I think if people saw Tiffany, they'd be like, "Let's put Tiff in an office manager role." Can Tiff manage and is she good at it? Yes. But what's her heart and soul? She loves assisting. And so there might be some other tangibles to it of she might want to do this or she might want to do that. But really it's, make sure your team is where people want to be and where they love to be is I think my tip that I would give of really truly, I think when people are in right seats, right spots and you have open conversations like this, find a way.

0:27:28.2 Kiera Dent: If Tiff wants to make X amount of money but loves being an assistant, find a way. It might not be possible, but find a way, 'cause honestly, if Tiff can be a duo assistant and TC in the back, that's freaking power and she can rock and roll. And so just sometimes we put people in wrong positions thinking that's where they want to go. And also team members, you could not pay me enough. I had someone offer me 350,000 to work two days a week in their office. And I said, heck no, I am not being your ding-dang office manager ever again. Ask Britt how much I hate doing, I'm like, "Britt, you can have that combo." I don't want to do that.

0:28:03.7 Dana: I was like, Kiera never told us her ideal position in an office, Kiera, what's your position?

0:28:08.0 Kiera Dent: If you put me back in an office, well, number one, I don't think I'm a good team member. That's number one. I think I learned that a long time ago when I chew out the front desk of how they schedule, I always thought I could tell people how to run their business better. So that did not make me many friends but if I had to be in an office all day long, I would do TC. I can sell teeth and it's so freaking fun. I'm like, "Oh yeah, you want to hit that goal? Watch me blow that out of the water and have 10 X what you thought you could produce, and you're going to go home on time." it's fun to do that for me. So that's probably where I'd put myself. Managing, heck no, heck no. But I'd only be a TC for like one or two days a week. Come in, do my thing and off I go break.

0:28:49.9 Brittany: One to two days a week, max, that's it.

0:28:52.8 Kiera Dent: That's all you get from me. But okay, whoa, so with that, I just love this team. And it was really fun. And I was just curious of where we'd put each other. 'Cause sometimes again, you get all these team members in your practice and you don't know where to put them. So on that round table, I'm not putting you guys in order, just say a tip. If you could, or do you want me to put you in order? I feel like I should have order. We're going backwards, whatever. Okay, they all just gave me a head shake now. Okay, fine. Danae, you're up. You got to practice. You go back in time to either yourself or you're consulting a practice. What would be one tip? And it's not like your top tip. It's just a tip. What do you think all practices could really benefit from your perspective?

0:29:31.1 Danae: I would definitely say know where you're going. Know where you're going. Yeah, you can get caught up in the day-to-day, the operations, the fires, putting all the things out. But if there's anything that I would recommend is know where you're going. Know your vision, know your path, know what you're working towards.

0:29:47.2 Kiera Dent: I love it. I agree a hundred percent. Okay, Tiffany, you're up.

0:29:53.3 Tiffanie: My tip would be to track your metrics. I don't think that I knew how to track my metrics when we were a small business. And as we grew, we had to try to figure it out as we went. And working with my clients on the day-to-day, that's something that I have all of my offices doing. All of my office managers have KPIs that they report to me and I teach them how to see the trends. So that would be my tip. Track all of the metrics that you possibly can and then look for the trends there within. And if you don't know how to do that, write in and ask.

0:30:21.1 Kiera Dent: Yeah, [email protected] will help you. You'll become a wizard at it. Tiffany even taught me how to track metrics at the beginning. Fun fact, no one really knows. All right, Dana, what's your tip?

0:30:31.0 Dana: Protect your culture. I really feel like culture is something that offices work really hard for and I think protect it at all costs, whether that's team members, whether that's anything, just always protect it.

0:30:42.8 Kiera Dent: Cool, that's cut throat and so brilliant. The times that I've had to make decisions based on culture, Dana, oh man, thank goodness Britt does that now. I'm so happy. Get me out of that. All right, Britt, what's your tip?

0:30:57.4 Brittany: Mine's kind of close to Dana's. I would say just remember that like good breeds good. So like be a good person, be good to your team, be good to your patients and it truly is a key to success. I've loved watching, especially lately, some of my practices that are like, I just have people reaching out to me. I don't even have an ad out and you know in this market how difficult that is. And it's because you're a good human and you're doing good things and that breeds good coming your direction.

0:31:22.0 Kiera Dent: That's really, amen. Brilliant, okay. I feel like I'm a host today. All right, consultants, your next question is, don't worry, I just did Dental A-Team Survivor with you and I feel like I'm back as Jeff Probst. So my next question...

0:31:33.3 Brittany: Jeff Probst is your future dream, isn't it?

0:31:36.9 Kiera Dent: It might be, guys. I could see myself on a TV show, like, and here's the Dental-A Team Consultants coming on up, like runner number one. And then I pair you with a practice and you have to 30 days, you got to flip that practice around. I wouldn't put you in 30 days. That's way too long. You get like three hours to flip the practice around. It'd be like a little mini traction. I think we could do it. So if you guys want to be part of Dental A-Team Survivor, just kidding, Dana. This is how ideas happen. Okay, next question I'm going to round table and then I only have two more questions for the consulting team and then you guys can do whatever you want. But next question, what fills your soul as a consultant? What makes you just lit up, super pumped, like, I love this part of consulting. Tiff, I'm starting with you because I know you always have an answer on this one.

0:32:21.6 Tiffanie: I do. Consulting fills my bucket. But why consulting fills my bucket is because it's people and I get to change lives. And when I can see the change or the positive impact that I've made on an individual's life, even down to my team members, obviously I get to change doctors ' lives all the time. I make it so that your business is working for you, not you working for your business. That's one of my biggest mottos. But all the way down to the team members, when I can say something that inspires them to love what they're doing every day or I can say something and they say, "Oh my gosh, I have to go home and tell my husband this, we've got to communicate better like this, you're going to fix my marriage." Those are the pieces where I'm like, this is so cool because the little bit of knowledge I feel like I have that I can pass on to someone else that can truly change the trajectory of their life, that's an incredible, powerful, powerful bucket filler.

0:33:12.8 Kiera Dent: That's awesome, Tiff, thanks. Thanks for that. And you do a really amazing job at it. I love to listen to your meetings because I take things away from them.

0:33:19.7 Tiffanie: Thank you.

0:33:20.1 Kiera Dent: Britt, what's for you?

0:33:21.9 Brittany: For me, I think it's when clients, teams that we work with, they realize that something's possible that they didn't see beforehand. So it's either like, "Oh, we have grown this big business and we can expand into something else," or like, "Oh my gosh, we're short team members," and they can't see past it and then we get through it and they're like, "Oh my gosh, it's so much better now." that's the thing that I love.

0:33:43.8 Kiera Dent: I love it, it's such a rewarding, that's got to be the hygienist in you getting that calculus out, helping them see what's possible. Definitely appreciate that. Dana, what about for you? What do you love the most?

0:33:53.9 Dana: I think for me, it's getting people to love dentistry and business ownership again, because a lot of times our clients come to us and they're not in always the best place. Sometimes they are, and that's great. But I think I love when they're like, "I love coming to work again. I love being with my team again. I am fired up to do dentistry again."

0:34:20.3 Kiera Dent: Oh, reigniting that passion. So many times I want to give it up when it's really not necessary. It's just, we got to change this or that and they'll love it again. It's beautiful. All right, Ms. Danae, wrap us up. What is yours?

0:34:32.5 Danae: So it's no secret, Danae loves results. I love to see progress.

0:34:36.8 Kiera Dent: Me too. I got you girl.

0:34:40.2 Kiera Dent: Ultimately what that is like, yes, I feel super fulfilled. Like that fire is just lit up when I can see the progress that you're reaching towards those goals because I know that that means that you're getting what you want out of your business. That means that you've got the balance that you need to have a really fulfilled life and to really focus and take care of your team. So for me, it's really about changing lives, yes, but what makes me feel that is when together we can see the progress.

0:35:09.6 Kiera Dent: Totally, results all day. Me and Danae, I'm like, it lights my freaking fire when I can come in and be like, okay, you're here and we grew you to this and you have a better life. Boom, let's not drop that mic and have a good time, it's just so fulfilling. That's my hygiene calculus, that's why I was never a hygienist. I'm not gonna sit there and look for the pennies, we're going for the thousands, easy add-ons. It's beautiful. Okay, I love this consulting team so much. So I want them to leave you all with a random fact about themselves of what's something random about you that people don't know. And Britt, I'm coming to you first because you have the most random one.

0:35:46.0 Brittany: Okay, so I can use that one?

0:35:47.4 Kiera Dent: Yeah. Of course, of course. It's not us, it's like to the world. What do people not know about you? Most people don't know about you. I love this fact.

0:35:55.0 Brittany: So my fun fact is I was a synchronized swimmer. I even won a gold medal in the Arizona Grand Canyon State game. So like a significant one, I would say.

0:36:06.0 Kiera Dent: That is so random. I don't know how to expect anyone to follow this up.

0:36:12.0 Danae: Like a legit synchronized swimmer, not just like she likes to water dance.

0:36:18.0 Brittany: Real thing, can I still hold my breath for a long time? Absolutely.

0:36:21.2 Kiera Dent: How long?

0:36:21.7 Brittany: I already tried to see how many times I can swim back and forth underwater without coming up for a breath? 100%.

0:36:28.2 Kiera Dent: How long can you hold your breath?

0:36:29.3 Danae: That's why she wasn't scared when she was going down the rapids like I was.

0:36:34.2 Kiera Dent: Okay, so to Danae, to fill all of you in, we did Dental A-Team Survivor Retreat and I sent the whole team whitewater rafting. I got sick. I think I conveniently got sick. I don't know. But Tiff, Britt, Dana, Danae, the whole team. And Britt is going down the rapids with Danae and if you saw the difference of their faces, Britt's like calm as a cucumber flowing down this terrifying rapid, and Danae looks like she is about to die. Like full blown.

0:37:00.2 Danae: I was dying.

0:37:02.5 Kiera Dent: But I do love that Danae, you just jumped in. You're like, I'm all in for this. And then it was like, shoot, I should have thought about this.

0:37:11.1 Brittany: Yes, yes, that's what it was.

0:37:14.0 Kiera Dent: Okay, so Britt, synchronized swimming, I think it's one of the most random facts I've ever heard of any human. And I love that you got a gold medal for it. That's another fact I didn't know about you. Okay, who's going next? Share your tip, share your random.

0:37:26.6 Tiffanie: Share your random, awesome random. I feel like I don't have, maybe I do have a lot of randoms that you could pull out for me. It's always hard when it's your own if you're not a synchronized swimmer. But I think one of the most random things about me is my whole adult life has been spent, it feels like in dental. But my first actual job, I worked for an insurance company as a data entry person is what I think I was supposed to be doing, but I honestly was there for like a year and I have no idea to this day what I was supposed to be doing.

0:38:00.6 Kiera Dent: That is a random one, Tiff, I like it.

0:38:01.9 Tiffanie: Yeah. And I don't know what my job was.

0:38:05.0 Kiera Dent: I love it. Okay, who's next? Who's in their next random tip or trade about you? Are you ready?

0:38:11.1 Danae: I can go. So super random. I don't know if you guys know this, but to my family and my friends, me and my husband are known for He Will Karaoke, Ice Ice Baby and I Will Do The Worm. It's known, it happens quite often.

0:38:31.1 Tiffanie: Oh, there's Kiera's next survivor.

0:38:33.9 Kiera Dent: Oh, I can't wait, I wish I would have known.

0:38:37.0 Danae: Yeah, it actually happened at our wedding and I did the worm in my wedding dress, so...

0:38:41.8 Kiera Dent: Oh, my gosh.

0:38:43.0 Danae: Not only that, but I just went to my niece's wedding and apparently it really hit home for her because she did the same thing.

0:38:51.0 Kiera Dent: Aw.

0:38:51.1 Brittany: Awesome.

0:38:52.0 Kiera Dent: That's amazing. All right, Danae, we're gonna need to have follow up podcast with you doing the worm on the podcast. I think it's gonna be excellent. You can surely.

0:39:01.1 Danae: I'm good with that.

0:39:02.5 Kiera Dent: Okay. All right, Dana, what's your random?

0:39:06.0 Dana: Y'all, I have lived a random life.

0:39:08.2 Kiera Dent: Y'all.

0:39:09.0 Dana: You're asking for a random fact.

0:39:11.2 Kiera Dent: Danae, y'all.

0:39:12.3 Kiera Dent: You will never know what you're gonna get. So I don't think any of you know this. So I am probably the only person you'll ever meet who has run into a deer with her bicycle.

[laughter]

0:39:27.9 Danae: Oh my God.

0:39:29.9 Tiffanie: There's so much opportunity.

0:39:30.9 Kiera Dent: Tell me how? I need to know.

0:39:36.7 Dana: I need like a backup story.

0:39:37.4 Kiera Dent: You don't say. I ran into a deer with my... How did you even get that close without them running? Was it alive?

0:39:43.2 Dana: It was a live deer, yeah. So growing up in Pennsylvania, I lived right down the road from a deer farm and one of their fences got cut and their deer got out and my dad had, he owned a construction company at the time. So he had a giant steel building and I'm just like pedaling my bike and I come around the corner of the building and there's a deer and I just plowed right into it. I didn't see it.

[overlapping conversation]

0:40:11.3 Dana: I didn't see it. Yeah.

0:40:13.5 Kiera Dent: So did your bike like make it out? Did you make it out?

0:40:16.0 Dana: I made it out, okay. My bike was mangled and the deer literally just looked at me like, what was that?

[laughter]

0:40:22.9 Tiffanie: It was like, what did you think was gonna happen?

0:40:26.2 Kiera Dent: Oh my gosh, that's hilarious. Oh man. Well, okay, mine's not even half as funny. I don't even wanna wrap. I should have gone first but.

0:40:37.1 Tiffanie: Yeah, you and Britt first.

0:40:38.4 Kiera Dent: No, I should have sandwiched Britt and Dana. My random fact, I don't know. I was trying to think of one that this team wouldn't have heard. So if you do, I'm not gonna think up another one. You'll just tell me you already knew. But there was a point in time, so I got engaged twice, which that's no secret. I technically got engaged three times. But after fiancé number two, I was sitting at home depressed and my brother is a geophysicist and he was like, "Kiera, you need to come and you need to get out of this." And so I went and I actually worked at a geology firm for about like three months and my job, no joke, they had these papers. They didn't wanna pay for what's called a well printer, I think is what it is. So what they did is they print out stacks, like reams of paper.

0:41:21.1 Kiera Dent: And for eight hours a day, I cut paper into the size of the well, 'cause it had like two inches on either side of it. And then I had to tape it together to make these log wells. And then I had to go on some weird database and try and find wells for them to drill in. I have no clue what the heck I'm doing. I just had to click things. And I told my brother, he's like, how's the job going? And I said, Evan, this is what they should give to prisoners. I don't know why I'm cutting paper for eight hours a day. So that was one of my random career paths that I was on for about three months while I was depressed. And then I met Jason and thankfully moved on to dentistry and I'm back into dentistry. That job actually is why I applied for the dental assisting job again, because I got so sick of cutting well logs and that's what got me back into dentistry. So, well...

0:42:08.2 Tiffanie: Well, thank you, Evan.

0:42:09.6 Kiera Dent: Thank you, Evan. I know, right? So on that, I just wanted to thank the consultants and for all of you listening, I just wanted to show you who the consulting team is, who are the coaches that coach your practices and wanted you to see them as humans, like from the random facts. So please, if these are your consultants, ask them. And if you want to request someone, if you want the worm, if you want the non-data entry, if you want the synchronized swimmer, she's really not available, or if you want the deer runner in her bicyclist, that's who I would hire.

0:42:40.1 Tiffanie: Everybody's like, no, it's not her.

0:42:43.2 Brittany: You know she's got more random stories in there. So you want her just so you can hear all the stories.

0:42:48.6 Kiera Dent: I think it's gonna be our holiday party. It's just Dana's storytelling. So, but really I just hope for all of you, like I'm so appreciative of each of you being here, giving your love to the clients. And for all of you listening, I hope that you actually do this with your team. Do you know these random things about your team members? Do you know what lights them up? Are they in the right seat in the company? Do you know where their history is and what's brought them to you today, and are you appreciative of the past? All those past employers, all the people that they've known to bring them to where they are today. So I'm just super appreciative of all of you consultants being here for serving the team. And if any of you are looking for the experience, like as you notice, it's a very diverse group of experience from DSOs to pediatric practices, to opening multiples, to taking it from small practices to larger practices, to growing it exponentially, to giving doctors back their lives and team members empowering you. That's what we're here for.

0:43:38.2 Kiera Dent: So reach out [email protected]. Consultants, that was a wrap. It was fun. Thanks for being the story of the five consultants today on the Brady Bunch. But I just appreciate all of you. And for everyone listening, thanks for listening. And I'll catch you next time on the Dental A-Team Podcast.

0:43:53.0 Kiera Dent: And that wraps it up for another episode of the Dental A-Team Podcast. Thank you so much for listening and we'll talk to you next time.