[00:00:00] So there was two life events around that time that that really hit home to me. There’s a road in Doncaster where all the car garages are on and mum took me up there one day and she said, Look, if you don’t start working, you’ll be driving up and down this road and you will not be able to go into any of these car garages and buy it. The car that you want. Will just go up and down, and you will not be able to go inside and afford something. If you not working, you can go inside any of these car garages and buy what you want.

[00:00:28] That was one life event, and then

[00:00:30] I’m not sure what we’re talking first. But then that also said, Look,

[00:00:34] I’ve got money. You haven’t got a penny.

[00:00:36] If you don’t start working, you will have nothing. So those were the pretty much the two life events that really gave me the kick of the backside that I needed to start to work.

[00:00:51] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders in dentistry. Your hosts Payman Langroudi and Prav Solanki

[00:01:08] Gives me great pleasure to welcome Professor Hussein onto the podcast. Afsar has been dominating in Doncaster with a couple of practises. He’s achieved a very high level of Invisalign Dental implants, facial aesthetics, Doncaster not really the in my experience, the kind of town where you would expect this sort of high end treatment to take off. See as officers worked out a nice way of, you know, capitalising in that market. So we usually start these things by talking about the backstory your Doncaster born and bred, but that’s about your childhood, about, you know, when did dentistry first come onto your radar? What kind of a kid were you? That sort of thing.

[00:01:56] I’d like to think I was a good kid, but by my report to say otherwise, really, I was a pretty average student. You know, CS and DS and BS.

[00:02:06] All my reports said if

[00:02:08] I tried harder, he could be something. Or if I have to try tried harder, you get better grades. Movies come home crying after every single parent evening. So I was always one of those kids where,

[00:02:21] Yeah,

[00:02:21] I was I was quite naughty. Actually, it wasn’t until I got to make, you know, 15, 16 years old where I started to settle down

[00:02:28] And thinking, You know,

[00:02:30] I probably should stop trying to work because I need to, you know, get get somewhere in life. So that’s a dentist. That’s a dentist. Yeah, that’s a dentist. So, yeah, he has a practise in Doncaster after.

[00:02:44] Were you always going to be a dentist? Was that always the plan?

[00:02:47] I think what I was growing up, obviously with the Asian community, we know there’s our doctors and dentists around, and obviously I saw my dad and I saw my other friends, parents who were GP’s and doctors. And it’s probably thinking and I’m like, I kind of like the lifestyle that we have. You know, dad always pick me up from school. He was always at my place and always at my sports events, you know, never was on corny nights. And I think, you know, I kind of like that, you know, children, lifestyle. He was never, you know, it was always home with me. If I need something, he was always there. You know, work never got in the way of, you know, anything like that.

[00:03:26] So I kind of wanted, you know,

[00:03:29] That sort of more chilled out lifestyle I could, you know, I could dictate where I wanted to do really.

[00:03:35] So I’m quite interested in, you know, someone who’s come from that background of dentistry. What was dentistry actually like compared to what you thought it was going to be like, you know, observing your dad?

[00:03:47] I thought it would be easier

[00:03:50] Than it is.

[00:03:52] I thought, you know, you could just do whatever you want to do, whether you want to survive that.

[00:03:56] But that obviously

[00:03:57] Did turn out to be case. But yeah, it does take a lot of hard work

[00:04:00] In that that

[00:04:01] Did work kind because he’s had his own practise for a while. So now I’m kind of experiencing what he actually went through with, you know, dentists, patients, staff running practise management practise. So yeah, the the reality quickly dawned on me that it’s not all, you

[00:04:19] Know, easy,

[00:04:20] Easy life, easy money. It takes, you know, a lot of work, you know, work starts when you wake up and work finishes when you go to sleep.

[00:04:29] Going back to when you were growing up and you say you see your DS bit of a naughty kid or whatever based on your report, did you kind of know you could just pull it out of the bag when you were 15 and 16 and just switch it up a gear? What happened around that time?

[00:04:43] So there was two life events around that time that that really hit home to me. There’s a road in Doncaster where all the car garages are on, and mum took me up there one day and she said, Look, if you don’t start working, you’ll be driving up and down this road and you will not be able to go into any of these car garages and buy the car that you want to just go up and down, and you will not be able to go inside and afford something. If you start working, you can go inside any of these car garages and buy what you want something that was one life event. And then I’m not sure what we’re talking first. But then that also said,

[00:05:16] Look, I’ve got

[00:05:17] Money that

[00:05:18] You haven’t got a penny.

[00:05:19] If you don’t start working, you will have nothing. So those were the pretty much the two life events that really gave me the kick of the backside that I needed to start to work. But life wasn’t easy in the sense that

[00:05:32] I couldn’t just, you know,

[00:05:34] Shape up and turn up because I’ve not I wouldn’t say I’m really Booksmart. So I did just miss out very marginally on my ability to get into Dental for first time, so I did have to do a reset. So I took a gap year, worked hard and then reset and then got into Newcastle University second time round. So then, yes, I had to take a year out to basically work hard and study. I got a job over at Staples, you know, working and then. Wow study and then got in second time around.

[00:06:05] What was the car that inspired you to say, I’m going to drive that car when,

[00:06:12] When I can? So on my wall, I had a picture of

[00:06:16] A Ferrari F430 and that was

[00:06:20] That was that was a car basically that, you know, that was, you know,

[00:06:23] Every every every guy’s everybody’s got a car in his bedroom wall and that was the kind that I had the Ferrari F430. So that’s the kind of that’s what drew me to. Well, what about drive? I’m quite I’m quite blessed. So I’m quite blessed now. I’ve got a few cars. What few track cars, a few supercars, so. So what do

[00:06:47] You drive now? Do you drive a Ferrari?

[00:06:49] Yeah, I do.

[00:06:50] Amazing. So you actually got your girl? Very good. Nice. Well done. So yeah, so we make, you know, we make goals for ourselves. And, you know, I’ve some thought in my life that, you know, if I get such and such, I’ll be happy. And then you never it never actually lives up to that, is it? Especially not with things, sometimes with the experiences. But you know, now that you’ve got that Ferrari that you dream so much about, does that sort of sort of take away from your motivation to keep on doing more things?

[00:07:22] Yeah, I was quite fortunate to a few years ago, be able to buy a Ferrari. And then after

[00:07:26] That, you don’t

[00:07:27] Get bored of it, but you kind of realise that you have achieved that. I’ve done it. And so I needed some sort of new motivation, new motivation. So nowadays it’s just, you know, building my practise and because my practise is my baby. So I’d like to see it develop like to see it, just be able to get better and better off a wider range of treatments and formula.

[00:07:47] That’s, you know, good clinicians, good stuff.

[00:07:50] And that’s that’s what makes me happy.

[00:07:52] Do you see those things as almost like rewards for achieving what you’ve achieved and doing really well? And the reason I’m bringing this up is, is my brother, right? He’s a Colima car guy or whatever a thin guy, right? But you know, without without putting too fine a point on it, right? He sees these as almost like milestones of rewards for the hard work, the effort, the energy, everything that he’s put into it. It’s just like a treat to himself. Yeah. Is that how you see sort of the cars, the truck cars, the sports cars and things like that, almost like a reward to yourself to say, Hey, you know, I was going down that road in Doncaster one day and I’ve proved it to myself now.

[00:08:35] Yes, I think I think definitely like, you know, I’ve been qualified 11 years now. So, you know, about eight years ago, I thought, you know, life’s good. I mean, I’ve got a decent cup, but you know, I could definitely never, ever, ever afford a Ferrari or fodder, you know, something like that

[00:08:53] What these other dentists drive

[00:08:54] And then. But no, I kept plugging away, kept working hard and then saving up and developing my business. And then all of a sudden, you know, I found myself in a position where I could do it. So that was, you know, quite a good milestone, really. Where yeah, because right, you know, I’ve achieved what I wanted to achieve all those years ago. But then I didn’t want more, but I wanted to achieve something else. Mm-hmm. So I’ve got to another milestone now where

[00:09:21] I can probably just

[00:09:23] Start relaxing a bit and not working so hard because I’ve got, you know, five or six associates. I kind

[00:09:29] Of do the kind of work

[00:09:30] That I want. So I’ve cut down my NHS work and started to do a lot more Prav work, a lot more implant work. We do a lot of investment. So all this stuff that I enjoy, I really enjoy facial aesthetics. So I’ve got into a phase of life where I’m doing what I want to do with the I’m doing all the dentistry and aesthetic work that I want to do, and I kind of don’t do what I don’t feel comfortable doing, like fillings and things like that. I kind of grown away from that sort of work and go on to the Invisalign and facial prosthetics and implants of work now.

[00:10:06] And it’s there. Is there another milestone that you’re looking at ahead of yourself? You know, sometimes I speak to either a lot of my clients or friends, right? And often we look ahead of ourselves and we think, Crikey, I’m just x amount away from there. Whether it’s a financial target, whether it’s it’s a thing or whether it’s a business milestone. And often we’re looking at that gap that’s in front of us. But sometimes we forget about how what we’ve achieved, which is the gain that’s sat below us. What is that gap for you? You know, the next step, the next milestone, what you want to achieve. Is it more of a work life balance thing? You know, it looks like you’ve achieved the pick your battles in terms of dentistry and pick and choose the type of patient you want to achieve. Is there something else ahead of you now in terms of what you what you’re striving towards?

[00:10:54] Yeah. So my life has kind of been crazy up until last year where I’ve been working long hours, you know, literally 12. Thirteen hours a day for, you know, for six days a week, and currently we’ve got a couple of projects going on, we’re extending the practise to add on a few more surgeries. We’re currently renovating the other practise to become more of a, you know, like a hopeless visual aesthetics

[00:11:16] And more complex

[00:11:18] Work. So that’s

[00:11:20] The milestone for

[00:11:21] Me. Next is to get all those completed and get all the chairs filled. But I think this year I’ve also had a lot more of a I know it’s really January right now, but I’ve never had more of a work life balance, which is what I wanted to achieve because for the last 10 years, it’s literally has been work, work, work, and now I’ve just started to like, calm down a bit and say, you know, my kids are actually grown up and I need to start being

[00:11:46] There for, you

[00:11:47] Know, more for them. So I’m spending a lot more time with the wife. I spend a lot of time more, a lot more time with the children, you know, going to see the place doing the school runs, which I never did before picking them up. So, you know, I’m enjoying

[00:12:00] And really enjoying that aspect

[00:12:02] Of it at the minute. So I’m taking a bit more of a backseat role in my practise. Now I’ve got a good team. I’ve got two really fantastic practise managers who can oversee everything and make sure that the practises don’t be so happy and I can take a bit

[00:12:17] More of a step back. And you know, for

[00:12:19] Me right now, it’s all about Work-Life Balance now.

[00:12:22] That’s lovely. And me and Piers spoke about this even with with guests in the past that, you know, we can look at this work life balance doing those 14 to 16 hour days. I’m putting that grafted and something has to give right, whether it’s that, you know, missing out on part of the kids situation, right? Or those situations where children are two and go, why you never hear daddy or there’ll be little conversations that happen that kind of pull on your heartstrings. But you know what? You just crack on and do what you’ve got to do because you’re a man on a mission, right? And then you get to a point like where you are today, where you can talk back in. Have you ever been any conversations like that that you’ve had with your kids?

[00:13:03] Definitely. Definitely. So. Two months ago,

[00:13:05] I came home and it must have been around 6:30 in the evening, something like that. And one of my kids said to my wife, I was just in the car pulling up. So she told me afterwards. But one of the kids told my wife that, Oh, that’s human. We’ve not even started eating dinner yet. So which basically kind of means that I’m always home after they

[00:13:26] Finish eating dinner,

[00:13:27] Or I’ll get home when they lie in bed trying to go to sleep. So there’s been multiple occasions over the last couple years where the kids have just kind of said that, you know, I’m home early because I’m eating dinner with them or I’m, you know, playing with them just before bedtime. So, you know, work wise. My wife

[00:13:46] Was getting worse

[00:13:47] And worse as the years went by because the practises were getting busier, so work was very good. But then my home life started to suffer like that. So and I kept saying to my wife, You know, I’ll get better or get better or we get better, you know, I’m, you know, I’ll be able to cut down and cut down. But as things got better, the practises, we got busier

[00:14:08] And busier, you know, through

[00:14:09] Word of mouth, and

[00:14:11] There wasn’t

[00:14:11] Just any given in the system for me to slow down.

[00:14:14] Do you think sometimes that perhaps on occasion, that’s a positive example for your children? Because, you know, I look at my dad when I was growing up right, and it was all gruff, gruff graft. He didn’t have time to play with those kids, right? But he taught was the art of graft and the value of hard work. Payman brings this point all the time. It brings us all the time and says, Actually, don’t beat yourself up about it, Prav, because you’re setting an example for your children and they’re learning by what they see and what they witness day to day. Ok, dads occasionally holds the dinner, but is working bloody hard, is not out partying, is he? Or, you know, he’s down at the local boozer or watching football or something like that, right? He’s out working hard and they see that as a big sample. But your thoughts on

[00:15:00] With no matter is never that, that

[00:15:02] Actually that was a

[00:15:05] I’m content with what what he had. So he has a what it was like a one to one to two serve practise, and he’s never had the drive or, you know, the

[00:15:16] He never wanted to make it

[00:15:17] Grow. He was happy to content with his with him and one of the associate, maybe a hygienist one, you know, one day a week. It was always fun for lunch.

[00:15:27] So, you know, he

[00:15:28] Always came home for two miles away from home. So and he was always

[00:15:32] Home,

[00:15:33] You know, 5:30, five, 5:30 at home. So and eventually, you know, we had a comfortable life. We had nice cars. We always went on holiday. You know, he had a great work-life balance. But, you know, I guess you just had no desire to, you know, expand his practise.

[00:15:49] So sometimes we kind of are the same as our parents and then sometimes we’re the exact opposite of our parents. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Did you always have that plan? Did you look at your dad and think, Well, I’m when I become a dentist, I’m going to have multiple practises? Or, you know, was this a planned out thing? Did you know years ago that you were going to do that or not?

[00:16:09] So what I was, you know, growing up when I was 17, 18, when I was in Dental school, I always wanted a big practise,

[00:16:17] You know, five

[00:16:18] Six surgeries. I thought I was advising myself having one practise, five six surgeries

[00:16:22] And you know that be that.

[00:16:24] So as I started a period before this one surgery practise came up after eight as an associate, and that was, I think you should buy it. And I’m like, No, you know, it’s got a very smart contract. It’s wonderful to practise,

[00:16:38] You know, seeing 100

[00:16:39] Percent don’t really work. You know, that’s kind of, you know, the mentality.

[00:16:44] So I can’t

[00:16:45] Do anything with, I can’t expand it. It’s can be too difficult. It’s just a way somebody I’d rather just wait for something bigger to come up that I was like, No, no, no, no, you should definitely have a look into it. So after most discussions, after much deliberation, I ended up buying this practise and it was one of those, you know, rundown onesies practises where, you know, wallpaper on the walls. And it was just very rundown and very, you know, it’s not been touched for 25 years, really. And then a few words then I’m like, What would I have taken like a 50 percent pay cut on what I was, what I was earning? And I need you to live with this practise, realise that it’s just going to, you know, bankrupt me and I’m just not going to enjoy my life. So then I started to think about ways to develop it and you got developed, you know, developed started to increase the turnover.

[00:17:32] So what do you do?

[00:17:34] What? What did I do? So when I bought it, it was a hundred percent NHS, so there was no private work offered you or they’re owed or if you did this, Udas and he just, you know, whatever, basically. So I started offering, you know, whitening crowns, veneers, you know, all the all the little private add ons, composites, et cetera, et cetera. So that’s how it kind of grew.

[00:17:57] And then when you existing patients, yeah, yes.

[00:17:59] I went to the existing patients and then through word of mouth, did did more patients come? And then I started to do facial prosthetics, which obviously added support to that. And then the next practise came up for sale. So I thought, OK, this is a great opportunity. So I bought that or that was not a single surgery practise, no next door. So then I did some better work and enjoyed those two practises together to create a three surgery practise. And then things just got better and better, better. We started to get into Invisalign and composite bonding and, you know, more and more cosmetic work. We’ve got a couple therapists on board as well, and that it just it just grew, grew and grew. You know,

[00:18:39] After you set up your practise pretty soon after VTi, you know, it’s not a joking matter, sort of eight months after vet to start a practise. And you know, it’s obviously gone very well now, but they’ll take us through some of the mistakes that you made along the way, things you would have done differently. So anything you would done differently.

[00:18:58] Mm-hmm. So mistakes that are made or made plenty of mistakes, you know, I’m sure we’ve all been there riveted, you know, to through crowds and we’ve know off some good pat on the back. And then they’ve come back six months later, a year later, with one of them fractured.

[00:19:13] And what about from the business point of view,

[00:19:16] From the business point of view? Mistakes wise, I’ve hired. You know, staff or associates

[00:19:22] Or whoever who haven’t really

[00:19:24] Had the same philosophy as, you know, as I’ve had, so, you know, we’ve not really

[00:19:29] Gone and you know,

[00:19:31] You know, you could see that as a as a bit of a mistake. Mistakes wise, well, sort of.

[00:19:36] I thought you talk about growing the business word of mouth, but you know, what was it about those early patients? What were the early tactics that you used or how did you treat those early patients differently to get the word of mouth because you’ve always done something right to grow practises so quickly?

[00:19:52] So there’s two distinct patients where I can

[00:19:55] Remember doing

[00:19:56] Work and then then personally

[00:19:58] Over Facebook and

[00:20:00] Instagram, and it just going crazy from there. They weren’t influencers. They weren’t, you know, some celebrities, they were literally one person was a semi-permanent makeup artist near me and the other person who was she did nails. So, yeah, I gave one of them some composite bonding. And then the other one had in mind that composite bonding.

[00:20:21] And then literally just from those two, there

[00:20:24] Were probably a few years apart. It just went viral. It just went crazy.

[00:20:28] And so interesting. You know, Prav, you remember we talked to Payman Sobhani and he said his whole business was built on one patient, one Qatari patient. And the difference that that, you know, one or two patients can make, especially in this day and age, it’s really interesting to see that, you know, at the beginning, you need spend time treat people really well. You’ve got the time to treat people well. You never know. One or two patients can make the difference. So interesting.

[00:20:56] Yeah, totally. Ed, I I can think clearly about these two, and I think it’s it’s all hinges on these two patients that we treated.

[00:21:05] And it just went crazy.

[00:21:07] And so and you know, there were there were influences. There weren’t celebrities, there weren’t royalty. There were just, you know. Yes, definitely.

[00:21:16] They yeah. So I’ve got a couple of questions because I often get people booking calls with me 100 percent NHS, right. And the first thing they say is, look, I’m doing 100 percent NHS. I want to start private, OK? So the first thing I advise them to do is they need to cut the cord with the NHS in any way, shape or form, whether that’s wholly an associate to take some of that slack, to make it so it can free them up to do the private right. That bit they really struggle with, right, emotionally, physically, mentally because they feel a degree of loyalty to those patients whose check-ups they’ve been doing. And they and their rebuttal to me, when I say that is this they won’t go to anyone else, right? So I want to learn how you switched pivoted from that. And then the next thing is, you know, pay mentioned, you know, you’ve got apex Invisalign, right? That’s no joke, right? This practise isn’t businesses out there who are saying, Hey, we’ll take you to apex in 12 months or whatever, right? We’ll show you the secret sauce. I want to know what your secret sauce was in getting it going from from, you know, two patients, one of whom you did Invisalign. And now you know, you do it pretty much as much as the biggest players in the

[00:22:29] Apex just means that you in the top one percent of design providers in Europe.

[00:22:35] Just just yeah, yes.

[00:22:38] How many Invisalign cases do you actually do a month?

[00:22:41] We, I think we do about 30 or 40 a month new ones.

[00:22:46] Absolutely. You mentioned you had some practise managers. What’s the relationship with them? What are they responsible for? And you know what you do? Do you have a meeting a week with each of those or how does it work? How do you run it?

[00:22:57] See, this is the thing I I had no idea because, well, let me go back to Prav questions. First of all, so and then we’ll then we’ll come on to that. So I’m literally now going through the phase of,

[00:23:10] You know,

[00:23:11] Let’s say, giving up my own NHS patients, which I’ve treated it for 10 years to other associates and recruiting new associates to do it. And it’s still, you know what I see my patient

[00:23:22] Went through, but to me,

[00:23:24] It just, you know, I get that that feeling said, you know, I want to go say hi to them. I want to say, Hi, how’s life?

[00:23:31] How’s work? Because it’s even

[00:23:33] Now. It’s hard for me to see that patient, which we really are. That patient’s not seeing me, you know, like all my patients, they’re all really nice patients. So it is. I get it. That’s really hard to give up that sort

[00:23:44] Of those

[00:23:45] Patients because, yeah, because you’ve got that good relationship with them. And I’m quite, I mean, quite an affluent area. So it’s not it’s not a high area. So you develop is quite high.

[00:23:55] And so the associates

[00:23:56] Get paid a good, you do it as well. So yeah, so that is how I try

[00:24:00] To put the bit

[00:24:02] Aside and go more towards the private

[00:24:04] So. So the conundrum here is the let’s say you’ve got eight hours in a day and I know you’ve got 16, but let’s say you only had eight, right? Yeah. And in those eight hours, you have literally got your hands in an NHS patients spouse. Yes. Seven. Point, nine hours of that day, but you need to free up four hours of that day to do to start delivering your apex dentistry. Yeah. What do you do with those four hours of patients? What’s your what what’s what’s the communication that has been sent to those patients to say, Afsar can’t see you anymore or is that how you deal with it goes from eight to 16 hours.

[00:24:43] So the way that we’ve dealt with it is that we’ve obviously we’ve had new associates to really tell these patients that, you know, you don’t see after today

[00:24:52] Or really, really going to be,

[00:24:53] See, you know, this is a date. So some of them are OK with it. Some of them are not OK with it. So I have seen a few. I’ve seen a few patients on VHS, but the vast majority, I’ve kind of, you know, passing to two different dentists. But yeah, so that’s how we’ve done it. We’ve just explained to them that, you know, that my eye is a bit

[00:25:17] Focussing

[00:25:18] On this side of the true

[00:25:19] Eye that

[00:25:20] Decided dentistry. So most of the care that person will understand that. But I do go out in the kitchen and say hi to them and you know, so and I think the correct comforted knowing that I’m around still that I’m still in the building. So, you know, if they need me, they know exactly where I am.

[00:25:37] So what did you find these practise managers? Were they people who, you know, work for you and you sort of elevated them up into that role? Or did you advertise for them and ask around, how did you find them?

[00:25:47] Yeah. So I’ve got to execute practise matches.

[00:25:51] So is there an element of performance related compensation and you know, bonuses are the managers particularly are they are they the ones who get bonuses or does everyone?

[00:26:01] So yeah, so. So we do have we do give bonuses. We do give. I got to give generous bonuses because my staff all work hard. You know, we are very busy. They all work hard. And, you know, they’re great, I think, and they do get bonuses and they do get incentives if we do hit certain targets. So, yeah, I’m very big on, you know, rewarding staff. Just, you know, for me to give your example,

[00:26:27] Must

[00:26:29] Not last year, the year before for Christmas. I want more, more and more big handbags for, you know, for the bonuses. So, you know, it’s just nice to look after them. And because, you know, they really do have to be,

[00:26:40] You know, they, you

[00:26:41] Know, they buy me lunch, they make sure that I’ve got, you know, coffee and, you know, I’m well looked after.

[00:26:47] So, so other managers also responsible for the, you know, the hiring and firing on the non-clinical team.

[00:26:55] If we need extra members of staff, the practise managers will come to me and say, you know, I think we need to take on an actual member of staff, whether it be a nurse receptionist or we, you know, we to a place where someone is leaving.

[00:27:06] So they kind of put the

[00:27:08] Ad out and then we interview them together. But ultimately, I’d like to give them control. You know, the decision? The decision is yours. Who do you want to take on and for what reasons? And then we can have some sort of agreement. So yeah, they so they kind of do the hiring and the firing, let’s say,

[00:27:25] What are you looking for in associates?

[00:27:28] So an associate, I’m looking for someone with great work ethic. I think having a portfolio is, you

[00:27:34] Know, a very good thing to have.

[00:27:36] And that’s pretty much where I look for in this area because obviously in an interview, you can’t really get to grips with

[00:27:43] How they

[00:27:44] Are with patients and how they are with, you know, others because there’s very little you can ascertain

[00:27:49] From a 10 or 15

[00:27:50] Minute interview because these warheads are desolate. So we have tragedies in the past with them. So, you know, after, you know, a day or two of doing a trial date, you kind of

[00:28:00] Know how they’re going to be.

[00:28:02] So that

[00:28:03] Gives we we we

[00:28:05] Do that as well.

[00:28:06] Sometimes look, when we look for associates, you know, there’s it’s a multifaceted job, you know, there’s obviously, you know, it’s got to work for the business. They’ve got to be clinically good. There’s the sort of the chair side manner, part of it. Obviously, in private these days, I find the chair side manner. But even the most important thing, what do you think?

[00:28:27] Yeah. So obviously there’s a whole bunch of tickets, so there’s a money making side of it. But I like associates who were, you know, on time the punch punctual or associates were on. We had a really nice level. We can just talk to each other like Fred said. We can look at cases and we can, you know, call each other out on things which aren’t quite, you know, road stuff. So that’s that’s really good. Yeah, there’s you know, there’s bedside manner there’s but they’ve got to be clinically good as well. And they’ve been, you know, continuing on courses and, you know, just try to keep up to date. So that’s kind about what I look for.

[00:29:03] How do you triage the word when it comes through? So, you know, I’m assuming you’ve got you’ve got a certain amount of NHS dentistry coming through the door and then a certain amount of private dentistry going through the coming through the door and then your various associates. Is there any kind of triage process in terms of will this? Typekit patient with this clinical need goes to me, this patient with certain clinical needle go to associate one to three and how will the team informed about that whole programme?

[00:29:32] So we’ve got quite we’ve got quite a nice setup now after obviously much deliberation and Typekit. So yeah, we’ve got A. Payman before we got to therapists who do all our composite bonding. So all the money goes to that. So they’ll do the consultation

[00:29:49] Because

[00:29:50] We’ve looked at the therapy. So it’s good practise. They can do x rays, they can true partner, they can do, you know, bits and bobs. And then if they want to check that with it, I can

[00:29:59] Also check

[00:30:00] The pan over so it copies. A bundle goes to the therapists.

[00:30:03] So how do you find therapists who are up to doing composite bonding? And how do you know patients take the fact that the therapist is going to do the composite bonding?

[00:30:15] And I don’t think coverage of bottom is quite an art, actually. So, you know, we’ve had therapists who were self-taught and they are literally self-taught, but they are so, so good at it. And we had some therapists on training courses and, you know, it’s also good. So yeah, it’s all about finding the right therapist, which can be very difficult.

[00:30:36] So if you’ve treated a patient, let’s say you’ve prescribed AB for a patient, would you do the alignment alignment and then the rest of the case moves over to the therapy? Yeah.

[00:30:47] So I do the hybrid that obviously which is an herb and then the the bonding part goes to the therapist. Yeah, my therapies are on a percentage just like my associates

[00:30:58] Are your therapist on a percentage or do you pay them on an hourly rate?

[00:31:02] Yeah, I find that that’s the best way.

[00:31:04] So how do the patients take the fact that it’s a therapist and not a dentist? I mean, do you do you explain to them the difference before they go ahead?

[00:31:12] Yeah. So, yeah, good question. So what? I first started out, you know, the dentist did everything, and then when we started to move to a therapist model, patients used to ask me, Well, why aren’t you doing it? You know, what’s the therapist? And I told patients, the therapist is as good as me, if not better, better than me. If I was to give my if I wanted my mom to have treatment, I’d send my mom to this therapist and not be because they’re better at it than me. So, you know, 10, 10, find that works. And you know, a moment like this. The therapist is so much better off than I am

[00:31:43] That, you know, you get far less

[00:31:45] Complications, far less fractures, forest issues with it. So I think what we need to tell patients that they’re more happy with it because they do trust me. So it’s kind of it works.

[00:31:57] Just some of your associates do AB.

[00:32:00] Yes, so my associate also does. And so we got kind of like a set up where, you know, we’re trying to split up the clients half and half. So one could still do one that I’ll do one procrastination and then we’ll look at the numbers because it’s all about. And then if I’m doing more, then we’ll try to push more of it to him or his mother, and we’ll try and push forward, be to try to equalise it. He’s done some bonding, but

[00:32:24] Again he he has sent

[00:32:26] His to the therapist as well because he’s got a few and he likes it. But then I don’t think he’s that keen on it, which is which is fair enough. So we’ve got therapists who can do it.

[00:32:35] It’s an interesting dynamic because, you know, I’ve spoken out and works with a lot of associates and, you know, they come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, right? So I can I can very much imagine having a conversation with an associate who’d say, Actually, do you know what? I’m keeping that bonding for myself. You understand where I’m coming from because they think, Well, I’ve solved the case, won the case, blah blah blah, so on and so forth. I’m not letting this go to a therapist. Yeah, but I guess, you know, you know, from my perspective, I look at it and think, Well, you know what? They’re going to be busy doing more Invisalign or doing more, whatever. It’s not going to be sat there twiddling their thumbs. But sometimes you know, you do get some associates who feel they’ve got a sense of ownership over this patient and want to do that. Have you ever come across that?

[00:33:20] So, yeah. Oh, definitely. I’ve had one of my associates I’ve had I’ve had since he left FD, so we’ve kind of grown up together and we’ve kind of moulded each other. So back in the day, he was like, You know, we’ve had our fights say, you know, all you do more than me and stuff like this and you know, and all that kind of stuff. So we’ve had our issues, but we’ve kind of as time has gone by, we’ve kind of iron those out and we’ve got some sort of structure and some sort of system in place now where it’s more equalised.

[00:33:48] And you know, he has full freedom.

[00:33:49] If you want a Bundy case, he’s very he can do it. If he doesn’t want it, he can pass it off. So I don’t force my associates to pass off

[00:33:57] Or the body, you know, is

[00:33:58] Their patient. He can do as he pleases.

[00:34:01] So he’s got

[00:34:03] Full force for freedom.

[00:34:05] It’s actually quite interesting. You know, we’re getting a lot more therapists on many spas, makeover on the composite course and, you know, they often do some of the best, best work as well. And, you know, maybe, maybe it’s self-selecting, right? Maybe someone who’s. Finds the money for a composite cause the therapist provides money for the cognitive course might be really keen one or whatever it is, but I’m quite interested in this question of, you know, as the pendulum has swung

[00:34:31] One way or

[00:34:31] The other, you know, in in in the favour of principles, then in the favour of associates, you know, with lockdown and then with a shortage of associates, is this therapist model going to actually, you know, be something that we’re going to see a lot more

[00:34:45] Of? What do you think, Prav?

[00:34:48] You know, the way I look at it, if we just take it right back to brass tacks, it comes down to the values of your practise, right the way you treat the patients, the way you want to deliver that treatment. And we talk about pendulum swinging associate to to to principle and all the rest of it, right? Ultimately, if you’ve got some values in

[00:35:09] Place are

[00:35:10] There and you understand your associates. So, you know, often I have conversations with our associates and said, What do you want? I think it’s a really important question that principals don’t have with their associates, right? What do you want? Ok? Is it money? Is it work life balance? Is that these high ticket cases? Is it a mixture? And just asking them what they want and get into the bottom of that and delivering what they want? So if they want a flood of Invisalign patients, they want a flood of implant patients or a particular type of patient. If you deliver that, there’ll always be give and take right. This is not a case of without putting too fine a point on it. Screw you, associate. I’m going to replace you with a with a therapist or after.

[00:35:54] What do you think about the therapist model? Do you see that side of your business growing and associates getting

[00:36:00] Less or or what?

[00:36:03] We’ve definitely got a good therapist model going on. And I think my practise is very therapist heavy, let’s say, and then do the practise, which is which was, you know, which is predominately private. That’s very dentists heavy say, you know, the associates don’t want to pass off the work to the therapist, which is which is also, you know, fine. They’ve got freedom. So if the therapist is there, if they don’t want to do it, if they were to pass off, if they do want to do it, then it’s then it’s what are there for them. But I might to

[00:36:33] A whole team.

[00:36:34] So we’ve got because we do something. And for example, we’ve got very cyclic process. So, you know, I don’t do any of the scans. So the patients don’t see me for the scans. They see the nurse with the scans. So the nurses do all the impressions, the nurses do all the oil scans for the patients.

[00:36:51] So do you scan all patients, every single patient?

[00:36:54] So we scanned all the evidence on patients.

[00:36:57] Ok, so not not every single patient.

[00:36:58] No, not all patients.

[00:37:00] So I think the nurse who does it,

[00:37:02] I think she sees about a hundred patients a month, whether that be for the white impressions, whether that be for

[00:37:07] Every 10 compressions, whether that be

[00:37:09] For scan. So, you know, I had to use a whole team because it just creates a better patient journey and everyone gets involved.

[00:37:19] So after what you put it down to, you know, being this apex predator Invisalign guy, it doesn’t happen by mistake. How have you grown it so quickly?

[00:37:28] I’m not actually too sure how we’ve got this big within design. And I could I could answer your question, probably. But it’s just somehow it’s just it just happened. We do. We do. We advertise very

[00:37:41] Minimally.

[00:37:42] But just recently we’ve been advertising using Ignite, where we do get quite a lot of leads. But maybe I think it’s it’s just through word of mouth and Facebook and Instagram. So the patient requires one, whether we give them the price and et cetera, they come in from the consultation.

[00:37:59] And then, you know, so what about follow up? Do you follow up the ones who don’t go ahead?

[00:38:04] So I should say we do, but we don’t

[00:38:07] Because I don’t actually speak without B.S. that we don’t need to follow people up. I think I think we do do a lot wrong. We don’t follow up, you know, we don’t follow leads in this. But I think what?

[00:38:17] But what I’ve

[00:38:18] Always done quite wrongly, O’Reilly is I’ve always kept stuff when I first get into keep stuff cheap. And then as the years go by increasing an increasing increase to what we call an acceptable amount. Just to give you an example, when we did composite bonding, I used to do it for £80 a tooth,

[00:38:36] £80 a tooth. Oh my goodness. No, no. Don’t do that.

[00:38:39] Yeah, yeah. So and now and you know, and now we quote people two or different parties, do they don’t even bat an eyelid because we’ve got the reputation to do it? So I think it was only two years ago where we were doing it for age partners tooth.

[00:38:53] And I thought now that we’ve got the

[00:38:54] Reputation, we increase it. So we’ve been increasing it twice a year. So now we’ve clawed through what we call a normal, acceptable amount.

[00:39:02] What’s your pricing model for Invisalign?

[00:39:05] Yeah. So we used to charge the design research charge two thousand five hundred for pretty much four go, which is not bad. Actually, it’s not cheap, but it’s not expensive and three thousand three hundred four four, which is on the cheaper end of of it.

[00:39:21] But now we’ve, you know,

[00:39:22] Increased to a more normal amount.

[00:39:24] Does that include whitening, including whitening? Do you have that upgrade conversation with a Prav? Prav, an expert at it, will let Prav have to tell us about that

[00:39:35] In my practise. So we looked at the business model of every patient comes through the door, right? And without putting too fine a point on it, how can you increase the amount of money that you take? From every patient period, right? You analyse every treatment, every patient is, how can you maximise the revenue from that patient, right? So let’s say someone comes through the door, keep the numbers simple. You charge someone four grand for Invisalign and you say includes whitening and retainers at that point. If you were to say that conversation, if you were to say to that patient for an extra two hundred and fifty quid, you can get enlightened with it. So it’s now four to 50. Yeah. The level of trust is somewhere on the floor at this point because you’re a salesperson, right? Yeah. That’s not the right time to have that conversation. Yeah, by the time they’ve been through their treatment and they’ve had, I don’t know, 10, 12, 15 appointments, whatever it is, the level of trust is through the roof. Even when I speak to some practitioners, they say their patients are starting to feel sad about the fact they’re not going to see them again because they’re coming towards the end of the treatment.

[00:40:41] You’ve probably experienced that yourself, right? Yeah, yeah. Ok, now at that point where you’re handed over the whitening or you’re having that conversation, say, look, you get in this free whitening with the treatment and b that, you know, boutique Phillips or whatever that that lower rate whitening is. Yeah. And then at that point after that, we have the OK great conversation say. But if that’s worth three hundred and fifty quid for an extra two hundred and fifty quid, we can upgrade you to enlighten. We find that ninety five percent of our patients go for that. But you can go for this. It’s still a high quality premium whitening. Now what usually happens in that conversation? You think about the psychology. Do you want to be in the five percent or the ninety five percent? Yeah, OK. So that’s that’s one point. Yeah. The second point is that the level of trust is so high at that point.

[00:41:35] The patient doesn’t forget this, not just about the trust. It’s also that the hassle, you know, you’ve just been through the hassle of Invisalign, if there’s a real commitment. Yeah. Of course. Of course, my wife had it done. It’s a difficult treatment.

[00:41:48] Yeah, yeah. And so what we found is we increased the value that we were getting or the revenue we were generating out of the patient. By having what’s called that whitening or great conversation, you can have the same retainer or great conversation. And naturally, if they haven’t even considered bonding at this point, they’re definitely going to get a conversation about that. And the majority of them look great. So we end up in a situation where the, you know, the value or the revenue per patient goes up just because you make a conscious effort to have a business discussion around it and then put the process in place.

[00:42:24] Yeah. So we definitely have spoken about O’Grady whitening, but very few talk about Great Rivera’s, which, you know, processes that we should be having with these patients. So again, we’re not we don’t do things right sometimes. And, you know, we should be something that will we could be looking at the future to try to get increased revenue from each patient.

[00:42:46] You know, you talk about mistakes, but you know, you’ve definitely done some things right. You know, you don’t you don’t go from one surgery to Ferrari, but without doing something right? Yeah, you’re obviously very good with patients. And you know, the kind with patients or something you’re bedside manner must be good. Your patients have built up trust in you.

[00:43:07] Yeah, it’s been. It’s been a very surreal journey. But you know, I’ve had I’ve had one thing I would say I’ve had good people, you know, beside beside me, whether it be product to love a good people, mentor me, that you know, yes, he’s got one to celebrate, but he’s got, you know, the ins and outs of business. He’s made the mistakes, you know, even now he’ll say, What are you doing? You know, this is what you’re doing is not right. You just change this. I’ve had good mentors throughout my career. You know, when I was in FDA, my trainer was, you know, a good guy. That’s no was he was from salary Dental care. So and then and then my other two jobs, my service jobs, you know where sedation in for them undivided from death. So these guys taught me, you know, very skills, which obviously it’s all part of the journey, isn’t it? Really? And then then you might know Sheriff Card from Rockingham House.

[00:44:02] Oh, great guy. Sheriff Kern, one of my favourite people. Really, really

[00:44:05] Visionary. Great guy. So yeah, I’ve he’s known me since I was maybe one years old and he did work experience for my dad. So, you know, we’ve. So yeah, we’re grateful. We’re friends. So he’s, you know, he’s been a good mentor as well.

[00:44:17] So he’s a he’s a top

[00:44:19] Guy as well. So I’ve I’ve had really good backing.

[00:44:22] Let’s get on to darker days. What’s been your darkest day from a business perspective?

[00:44:29] Parker said, business wise. So. It was obviously the big, mysterious financial.

[00:44:37] I literally had maybe

[00:44:39] A few thousand in my business account because a big Payman went

[00:44:43] Out and I,

[00:44:44] You know, I just got my my numbers wrong and I think, you know, crap, I need to run a business on

[00:44:50] This. And it’s not, you

[00:44:51] Know, it’s not sufficient. So it’s at a good few sleepless nights thinking, how can I rectify this? How I need, you know, I need some buffer in my account. So, yeah, so that was quite quite a dark day. And so Agnihotri had just had to put some more hours in at work and tried to work the weekend just to just to earn some just to get that money back in.

[00:45:13] Was there ever a moment where you thought to yourself, shit has seriously hit the fan? Now, what have I done or something imploded? Maybe it was the work life balance situation and you just felt, Oh my god. Yeah. Has there ever been those ever been those moments where you’re so down in the dumps where you think, How the hell am I going to dig myself out of this? Not just like, I’ll just put a few more hours in and I’ll lock it from 16 to 18 or whatever, right? Well, real dark hole where you think, actually, you know what? I don’t know how I’m looking up out of this hole, and I don’t even know what the way out is, whether it’s, you know, work life balance, patient can play everything, all sort of coming in at once. Have you ever had that sort of moment in business where you thought, this is it so?

[00:46:04] Oh yeah, definitely. I’ve never had had one of those. It was a couple of years back, actually, where

[00:46:10] I started on my implant journey

[00:46:12] After graduating from Sheffield doing the one to one course, and I started to place implants and then I felt, you know, actually this patient, everything looked OK. And then when it came out, she’d done four surgery breast implant. And I think something’s not right here, but I breast implant, you know, just took a leap of faith and close it back up and then a couple of days later, severe pain. And I’m thinking I shouldn’t have done that. It’s just I should have

[00:46:44] Took a step back,

[00:46:46] You know, no breast implant

[00:46:47] Cause I

[00:46:49] Just thought about it. And yeah, so that patient went went on

[00:46:53] For a bit, but we kind of got

[00:46:55] It resolved. But yeah, that was a I had a good few sleepless nights a weeks about that.

[00:47:01] Just a painful implant. That’s such a difficult thing as such a difficult problem to solve.

[00:47:07] No, no. And I’m the Typekit guy where I just jump in and I’ll just do something, you know, because as I say, you know, new shit is fun. So just jump in and, you know, go ahead at eight

[00:47:19] And just do it.

[00:47:19] As example is, is beside, you know, after the trade cos people either jump in and they do it or they get scared of it and they kind of, you

[00:47:28] Know, don’t do that.

[00:47:29] Many cases where I just kind of jumped in, I just went for it. And, you know, I probably shouldn’t have, you know, doing this on people that I should have thought about it but

[00:47:39] Know I miss that type of

[00:47:40] Guy. Just sometimes I just go for it. Yeah. So most times it works out fine, but you know it can go wrong.

[00:47:50] So, so what did you do about it? What did you do with that patient?

[00:47:53] What I do. So it’s all about obviously patient correspondence and just talking the patient around and in the end, I taking out, but just just leaving it and just refer to the patient. And I just, you know, it just kind of resolve that way, really. But yeah, I should have. It’s one of those where there was there was all sorts of red flags and I didn’t listen to it and I just I just did it. So, yeah, the resolution was actually quite simple, but it took a bit of time to get data together.

[00:48:23] What about what staff have you had any terrible things that have happened with staff over the last 11 years? Must have been some stories over staff.

[00:48:31] So I think the documentary staff was when I first bought my first practise. You know, it was very, you know, they’ve been there for 30 years. You know, they were the type where the waste, where those, you know, those white dresses. So they’re very old school, you know, they weren’t really in tune with the modern way of thinking, you know, you know, cosmetic work and private work. So I think and then a couple of them were our long term sick with stress, and then I had to go through all the hate child complications. And that was very, very stressful because that was, you know, I’d only been there for probably four or five months or six months. So I was in a new practise, very young and having, you know, all these staff issues and, you know, had the thing of, you know, are they going to contribute or are they not going to a tribunal?

[00:49:17] So that was,

[00:49:19] You know, that was not not good stuff wise, but at the end, it took months for that kind of like, write this off. But that was not a fun at all.

[00:49:28] After now, in retrospect, when you look back on your career, yeah. Do you think you jumped into early to practise ownership? And you know, is that some advice that you would give to a young dentist now to, you know, start as quick as possible, make mistakes as quickly as possible? Or would you wait?

[00:49:46] I think I think I did it because I knew that I had good backing. You know, my dad has a dentist and, you know, he’s only a few hours on the road. So it kind of was that. But yeah, I mean, you know,

[00:49:58] My income dropped and

[00:50:00] I was like, You know what, I’m going to do? But no, I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t

[00:50:03] Do anything anything differently

[00:50:05] Now if I had to again. But now I would say to anyone, you know, take it, just take a leap of faith that you’ve got to you’ve got to. It’s all about comfort zone. A lot of people had to stay within their comfort zone. If you take that faith outside your comfort zone, it’s just, you know, walk away is something good. It’s all about leaving your comfort zone.

[00:50:24] So, you know, the plans to make more of these and keep on dominating South Yorkshire. Or have you had enough and you know, you’re now going to focus on the work life balance?

[00:50:35] So currently, I’m trying to extend my foster through practise into a service as you practise. And then and then and then renovating my dad’s practise to have five surgery this far with beauty. But after that, I think I’m done.

[00:50:51] Have you thought about an exit plan? I mean, I know, you know, you’re quite young. How old are you?

[00:50:56] Thirty five.

[00:50:57] Yeah. So it’s a bit strange to talk about an exit plan at that age, but you know, the valuations are high right now. So, you know. Has anyone offered you an exit? And you know, what are your thoughts around exit? Are you planning that?

[00:51:11] So actually, in August last year, I was actually thinking about retiring. I was thinking about this,

[00:51:18] You know, selling up,

[00:51:19] You know, I got offered, you know, I got offered good money by a couple of corporates and I thought, You know what, if I do this, I can just do it and work one or two days

[00:51:29] A week and just have a

[00:51:31] Have a chat. But then the more and more I think I thought about it like, you know what my brain is, were that way. I’m not going to. I’m not going to do that. I’m going to end up doing that for six months.

[00:51:40] And I just, you know,

[00:51:42] Go buy cigarettes and build them up and drive my wife crazy once again by working dots and trying to, you know, build that up. So I decided not to do that. I just kind of steadied myself where I am. I mean, you know,

[00:51:57] Obviously when you exit at the end of the day, you’re working for someone else and you have to do what they say in the end. So, you know, maybe you’re at this point of contentment where you’ve got complete control over your practise. So, you know, keep going. Keep going. Why not?

[00:52:12] Yes. Yeah, I mean, I thought about this and I thought, you know, it’s it’s it’s the fact that where we do now, I’m really comfortable with because what I’m doing now, I could not do it if I was an associate or if I was working for one or two days a week because

[00:52:26] I have literally, you know, I’m

[00:52:28] At the place where I can kind of do what I can see, the patients I want to see. And if I don’t want to, if I don’t, yeah, if I don’t want to

[00:52:33] Do so, I just pass it off to a

[00:52:35] Therapist or pass off to associate who does want to do it and where. If I work for someone else, I just cannot do that. So.

[00:52:42] So I’m sorry. You know, Guy, like you must have been, you know, you must think that you’ve got a number, a number that you would exit for the number in your head that you would exit for. Do you think of it that way?

[00:52:53] No, we don’t need to know what that number is unless you’re comfortable show.

[00:52:58] I do have a number and you know, I do have it and I got offered it last year, but I just think I’m just too young. I just don’t, you know, I’m just I’m just too young. Yeah. And that’s the thing. I think I think my age is, you know, get to be. I think I’m just too young to be doing that.

[00:53:17] So I’d rather just own this for a bit longer.

[00:53:20] You know, raise car a couple of days a

[00:53:21] Week and work, you know, two

[00:53:23] Or three days a week. And you know, I’m

[00:53:26] Good for now. So there’s that. What’s your magic number? You know what your magic number is. You’ve been offered it and you’ve walked away from it. Right? And the narrative may have been that flippant. If I want to shoot this off to a therapist now, it’s not going to happen under new ownership.

[00:53:38] Yeah, yeah. That’s the thing I’ll do to yeah,

[00:53:41] That’s there is a strong case that there are people out there that would buy. It would let you carry on running and operate in exactly the way you are today. The reason I know that is I’ve just exited in December and nothing, absolutely nothing has changed. Right? And that was one of our concerns. That’s not to sort of say, look, change your goal or whatever your mindset. Just be aware there are options out there that enable you to carry on and get your magic number and have a whole stack of every single colour of those Ferraris that you you right? But but that’s being put to one side. You know, my dad would always say to me when we were younger, everything is for sale. Son just depends on the price. Yeah, it depends on the price. So, OK, so what’s the plan? What’s that? You’re thirty five now, OK? You’ve obviously thought long and hard about this because you came across that crossroads, you know, however long ago it was and hit that thing. So where we go in next and what is your exit strategy if there is one?

[00:54:46] So right now, my main

[00:54:48] Thing is to, you know, I’ve

[00:54:50] Got a nice

[00:54:50] Practise, I’ve got I’ve bought

[00:54:52] His baby. You know, he’s had it for 30, 40 years, so I’ve now got his baby. So my main concern is to make him proud and see, you know, let’s see, see what I could do with his business and how I could make his business grow to the next level. And, you know, even even, he said, you know, once you’ve grown it, I don’t mind if you sell it.

[00:55:12] I just, you know,

[00:55:12] Just just do good with it. And, you know, put your spin on things and, you know,

[00:55:17] Do what you’ve done to your

[00:55:19] Your business. You know, my first, you know, my first practise and then, yeah, so that’s my big thing. So over next, probably two or three years,

[00:55:28] We’re going to

[00:55:28] Develop that. But, you know, it’s probably three or four years. I’ll be looking to take it, you know, a bit more of a backseat. I think that’s that’s that’s where I’m heading at the minute.

[00:55:39] Really, really.

[00:55:40] Continue.

[00:55:41] Continue what I’m doing. But you know, you know, basically my parents proud of, you know, of just cherish their baby.

[00:55:50] Yeah, they they say behind every successful man is either even more successful or crazy woman, right? And if so, tell me a little bit about your family.

[00:56:02] Yeah. So yeah, we’ve not we’ve not talked about family yet. So yeah, I’ve got, you know, an amazing family and amazing wife.

[00:56:09] So I actually

[00:56:10] Qualified the week later got married.

[00:56:12] So she’s been with me, you know, every step of the way.

[00:56:16] She’s seen the darkest day. She’s seen the good days. You know, when we were younger, I was working four days a week as an associate for eight months. So, you know, we were just loving it. And then we kind of obviously what the practise together. She was a practise manager, so we helped develop the business short term and then she got pregnant so that she stopped being at work actually for the past eight to nine years of that. So but you know, she’s she’s taken care of because I’ve been working crazy hours and it’s been getting worse and worse. My work, my work life balance was getting worse. So she’s taking care of all the home life and, you know, making sure that it’s done. And so, yeah,

[00:56:55] And actually on the weekends,

[00:56:56] You spend a lot of good quality time. But yeah, she’s she’s put with, you know, me not being at home, basically. So she’s an amazing woman. But now I think it’s time I said I give take a bit tired out and just spend some time with him and the family say, I said, I’ve got a daughter who is eight years old, their son, who’s six, and a daughter who’s three.

[00:57:17] So, you know, it’s time I just spend some time

[00:57:20] With them helping with the homework, tried to get home before they start eating dinner. You know, all these all these things notice small things where the kids notice.

[00:57:29] And, you know, because

[00:57:31] This is where, you know, I don’t need no need to don’t need money. You know, we’ve got,

[00:57:35] You know, I think, quite blessed.

[00:57:37] So now it’s just a case of showing the kids that, you know, you can have a good work balance. You can spend time with kids and you can have a nice house, some nice cars. But you know, you can have both

[00:57:49] What you like in terms of switching off when you get home. So I used to struggle with it and still do actually is that you get home and it’s, you know, the ideal scenario is that work just flies out of the window when you pick it up the next day. What’s what are you like with that?

[00:58:06] So, yeah, so no, I’m really bad at actually. So in the sense that, you know, I’m always taking work with me, work or whatever will be. So I’m always, you know, even though, for example, I pay one of my staff to do the social media hours so they get paid, you know, between two and semesters. So I’m always checking and making sure they’re getting done. And so I’m quite controlled in that sense, which is obviously not good because when I’m at home, I’m always checking things and making things again done and the way I like it.

[00:58:37] But I guess, you know, one or two months

[00:58:39] Are, you know, two wait trade to have started to just come out, you know, things are fine. They, you know, I is taking care of, you know, they can do it, they can do it to a good standard. Just let them do it. So. So now you know

[00:58:54] What kind of a boss are you?

[00:58:57] I’d say that I’m quite demanding, but my staff will probably tell you that I’m quite laid back

[00:59:02] Because I’m kind of,

[00:59:03] You know, it’s all stuff gets done as long as we’re busy and stuff gets done always well. And it’s when stuff doesn’t get done, you know? You know, if a patient complains, and that’s when I start to take, you know, get a bit angry, decide, say, right, why this happened, how can we fix it? So I’m quite laid back, actually. So I’ve heard, but I can be demanding if if stuff does get done.

[00:59:25] How have you developed as a leader? I mean, obviously, it takes different skills to to be the

[00:59:31] Leader, you know, to be the sole

[00:59:32] Practitioner in a single chair practise compared to, you know, the number of people that you’re having to lead now. How have you changed going in these 11 years

[00:59:42] As I kind of think I’ve done the same thing always.

[00:59:45] And it’s just it’s just

[00:59:46] All everything’s just falling into place. I wouldn’t say that I’m any different that, you know, to always tell you to to our now, I think it’s just to say I’m laid back in. It’s all about I think it’s all about hire the right people just getting along with everybody, making sure everyone knows what they’re doing. And you know, everyone has a certain skill set just utilising that skill set.

[01:00:07] What’s your favourite clinical treatment? Do you have one that you know you like the most?

[01:00:11] What do I both?

[01:00:13] I would say

[01:00:14] In this world and in parts that’s my, you know, interest at the moment. I really, really like, enjoy this ride because it’s, you know,

[01:00:22] I really reside and

[01:00:24] I presume practising talking to patients through the whole journey. And because it’s that that’s kind of, you know, those two things are quite life changing.

[01:00:32] So with with implants, though, it’s one of those things that you have to sort of super focus on, you know, and do that and not do anything else. And that’s what I understand anyway. We’re talking to lots of implant soldiers on this, this this show, you know, how have you gone into that, you know, by dabbling a little bit and how far in it are you?

[01:00:54] Oh, definitely.

[01:00:54] Literally. Just last week, I showed it to my practise man and say, You know, I need it or my my came because, you know, I think I’m still quite basically, I need to be ready to start doing more courses that get you bought into that. So literally last week, I was told my practise manager about it. So yeah,

[01:01:10] It’s a very the switch. You can work,

[01:01:13] You know, in practise soft tissue surgery and,

[01:01:16] You know, grafting

[01:01:17] Inside have said on for this. You know, it’s it’s endless, isn’t it?

[01:01:22] Isn’t it is an interesting question. So someone in your position who has got a certain level of implant experience, but you know that there’s a lot more to learn. How on earth do you go about finding the right course, the right person to train you? What do you look for? You know, I have this conversation with what? Well, several clients that I work with who do this right, you’ve got Hassan, we’ve got Alfonzo. We’ve had first hand on year loan to different people out there. My brother. Yeah, loads of different people who teach implants. What is someone like you look for?

[01:02:00] So I went of the Sheffield. What one course and there. And then from there I met, met a few people and then, you know, they’ve been helping me and mentor me from there. So and then I’ve also asked, you know, some good advice from it, from Sheriff Carter, who

[01:02:15] Is obviously very good at it.

[01:02:17] So I’ve had I’ve had kind of good mentorship from a few directions, you know, whether it be restorative or implants. My my dad’s always had, you know that he’s always had some good contacts. So I’ve always gone to them and they’ve always helped me out. So I’ve had good backing right from the start. So, you know, it’s all about contacts, really, you

[01:02:39] Know, word of

[01:02:40] Mouth. What about

[01:02:42] Them? It’s like that thing you say Prav about the the who, not the what,

[01:02:46] The who, not the how they the who, not the

[01:02:48] Have the who, not the how. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We’re coming to the end of our time now. So I don’t know if you’ve heard this podcast before, but we always end with the same questions or the same two questions now. Mm hmm. I’ll let Prav kick off with his.

[01:03:03] So after, you know, imagine it was your last day on the planet and you’ve done you’ve done all your graphs and you’ve made your dad really proud and you’ve grown his practise into into something similar to yours, if not better. And everything is great. You’ve you’ve sold them and achieved everything you wanted to in life, but it’s your final day on the planet and you’ve got your three children around you, your wife, and you need to leave them with three pieces of parting advice. What would those be?

[01:03:38] So it would be do what you enjoy.

[01:03:44] Don’t don’t get

[01:03:44] Forced into doing something that you

[01:03:46] Don’t want to do,

[01:03:48] Do what you want to do in life and enjoy

[01:03:50] It and, you know, just be happy in

[01:03:52] That sense.

[01:03:54] Second, what

[01:03:54] Would probably be have a good work-life balance because I’ve never been there,

[01:03:59] So have a good

[01:04:01] Week apart.

[01:04:02] Will you just be happy?

[01:04:04] Your family will be happy, your wife will be happy?

[01:04:06] And then I’d say, just

[01:04:08] Just look after your family. Just be there for one another. Help help each other out because family is family at the end of the day, so that those would be my advice.

[01:04:18] That’s a bit of a cheat. The second or the third one with a saying, we, you have to do one more.

[01:04:24] This is keep one more, make one more.

[01:04:26] Well, I have to think about that. I’d always have enough, always have enough money for a rainy day because I’ve been there. I’ve I’ve run out of money. I’ve had to go to a bank of mum and dad and ask for a loan for a new surgery.

[01:04:41] Okay. And how would you like to be remembered after there was? And then just finish that sentence?

[01:04:51] I’ve had to think Elizabeth herself is a kind, caring,

[01:04:56] But also hardworking

[01:04:59] After and now pays. Final question! Fancy dinner party? Three guests. Dead or alive? Who would you pick?

[01:05:09] So would they be the power of a cabinet by childhood hero back with you, back

[01:05:16] At the centre

[01:05:17] Because he’s just a legend and the old Doncaster guard Jeremy Clarkson is

[01:05:22] Here. Don’t call us the guy, Jeremy Clarkson. He is, yeah. I never knew

[01:05:25] That he went to the same school as me. Yeah. Jim Clarkson before he got expelled.

[01:05:30] Jason Smith is a Doncaster guy who is he is. He is a three car guy. You love your cars, man.

[01:05:37] I like that very much. I do. I do other cars. I do have a cars.

[01:05:41] Well, Gandhi is not getting much of a look in these days, though, with the car.

[01:05:44] No, no, no. He’s not. And actually one one one final question, which is, let’s say you have 30 days left and you could do anything you want. You had all your health and wealth intact. What would you do, mate?

[01:05:58] No, I definitely I’d actually travel the world. My aim, my aim is, you know what? I want to, you know, I get my time with the kids, get older because hopefully my my kids will be older and I’ll be still relatively young to, you know, take the wife and travel the world because we’re actually we’re not forwarded enough.

[01:06:16] And yeah, don’t go

[01:06:18] Places closest from Los Alamos, you know, safaris, et cetera. So that is that is

[01:06:24] If people want to connect with you, what’s the best way for them to connect with you?

[01:06:28] They want to. They can always email me

[01:06:30] Or Facebook me,

[01:06:32] You know? Yeah, I’m always open to a chat. So, you know, I’ve get people come up to me and say, You know, how to do this? Or What have you done to do this? And I’m happy to chat with anyone about anything, really.

[01:06:42] Well, I want to thank you both. It’s been a lovely conversation. Thank you so much for doing this. Thank you.

[01:06:47] It’s been great. Nice to see you both. Really, really good.

[01:06:51] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders in dentistry. Your hosts Payman Langroudi and Prav Solanki.

[01:07:07] Thanks for listening, guys. If you got this far, you must have listened to the whole thing and just a huge thank you both from me and pay for actually sticking through and listening to what we had to say and what our guest has had to say, because I’m assuming you’ve got some value out of it.

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